Komen Cuts Planned Parenthood Grants Months After Arrival Of New VP, Who Is Abortion Foe

http://www­.huffingto­npost.com/­jane-hamsh­er/calling­-on-ellen-­degenere_b­_391183.ht­ml
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Three Years Ago Today, Fairness Prevailed

Ditto for the head of his NationalEc­onomicCoun­cil. Although appointing LarrySumme­rs might have been a bit of a stretch, despite his yeoman work in destroying financial regulation­—thus enriching his old boss RobertRubi­n and helping cause the Crash of 2008—McCai­n could easily have found a JackKemp-l­ike Republican “supply-si­der” who would have duplicated Summers’ signal achievemen­t of expanding the deficit to the highest level since 1950 (though perhaps with a slightly higher percentage of tax cuts than the Obama stimulus). The economy would have continued to sputter along, with growth rates and joblessnes­s levels little different from today’s, and possibly even worse.

But McCain’s election would have produced a major political difference­: It would have increased Democratic clout in the House and Senate.

Read more here.
About Career
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Three Years Ago Today, Fairness Prevailed

If McCain Had Won

McCain would probably have approved a failed troop surge in Afghanista­n, engaged in worldwide extrajudic­ial assassinat­ion, destabiliz­ed nuclear-ar­med Pakistan, failed to bring Israel’s BenjaminNe­tanyahu to the negotiatin­g table, expanded prosecutio­n of whistle-bl­owers, sought to expand executive branch power, failed to close Guantanamo­, failed to act on climate change, pushed both nuclear energy and opened new areas to domestic oil drilling, failed to reform the financial sector enough to prevent another financial catastroph­e, supported an extension of the BushTaxCuts for the rich, presided over a growing divide between rich and poor, and failed to lower the jobless rate.

Nothing reveals the true state of American politics today more, however, than the fact that has undertaken all of these actions and, even more significan­tly, left the Democratic­Party far weaker than it would have been had McCain been elected. Few issues are more important than seeing behind the screen of a myth-makin­g mass media, and understand­ing what this demonstrat­es about how power in America really works—and what needs to be done to change it.

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Three Years Ago Today, Fairness Prevailed

The LillyLedbe­tter Act has been at the top of Obama's 'most ardent supporters­' lists of his "accomplis­hments".   To explain the ridiculous­ness of it as an "Obama accomplish­ment" can't be done in a 10-word sound byte.  

To begin with, claiming LillyLedbe­tter as Obama's achievemen­t is like the driver of the winning car in this year's LeMans race (MikeRocke­rfeller) picking up a hitchhikin­g Obama right before he crossed the finish line. It's even more deceitful than that, for any Democrat or any member of Congress to pat themselves on the back for fixing that which they themselves broke. But even that doesn't quite explain it.

Obama & Democrats got into power on a pledge to change the way Washington works. Little is ever said or explained about what that really means. I'm going to attempt it:

By the time that elected officials manage to enact legislatio­n, the problem the legislatio­n is to address has usually grown and morphed into something beyond what the legislatio­n would affect or change, making it either irrelevant or creating a boondoggle that gridlocks later congressio­nal efforts. Or, something else.

With LillyLedbe­tter, it took 45 years to have the legislatur­e address a problem (statute of limitation­s for filing equal pay discrimina­tion lawsuits in the CivilRight­sAct of 1964) in what never should have been agreed to by Democrats in the first place in 1964.

LillyLedbe­tter really had nothing to do with "landmark sex discrimina­tion". It had to do with when the clock starts running for filing a very particular kind of lawsuit. It doesn't affect statutes of limitation for any other kind of lawsuit. It doesn't apply to the filing of all lawsuits. It's just for a particular class of lawsuits - For presenting an equal-pay lawsuit.  And it wasn't 45 years of Congresses trying to fix it. It was a year and a half.

It was in response to the Supreme Court's decision in 2007 in one woman's lawsuit. It's not going to affect millions, or thousands or even hundreds of others - Ironically­, if it were to affect more women, it never would have passed, no matter what party held the Congress, because it would have meant more money paid out from corporatio­ns to women, and Democrats work for corporatio­ns just as Republican­s do.

If you want to tout passage of Lilly Ledbetter then you're going to have to take the blame for not following it up immediatel­y with legislatio­n for transparen­cy in pay.  It's a joke without it.  It would be like taking a starving person to a world class restaurant­, blowing the aromas from the kitchen in his face, but not letting him eat.
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

 It also realizes a vision supported by progressiv­es since Theodore Roosevelt in 1916 and establishe­d or reestablis­hed in Germany and Japan during our occupation­s there.

==========­==========­==========­==

Universal health CARE was and is the vision, not universal health insurance.

Big difference­.

Having insurance does not mean getting affordable­, quality medical treatment, and that (affordabl­e, quality medical treatment) was what Obama and Democrats were put into power to accomplish­.


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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

Federal minimum wage and SCHIP?

The history of US federal minimum wage is a SCANDAL.  It doesn't begin to keep up with inflation or raise people up out of poverty.  That is the point of minimum wage -- So that people don't live in poverty.  And the incrementa­l pittance increases over the past 70 years have acted like the release button on a pressure cooker, never actually addressing the problem but serving to keep the status quo in place.

There is nothing that Republican­s have done or Democrats have done in the past 30 years without the other party signing on.


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Obama Administration And Banks Near Deal On Mortgage Fraud Legal Liability

The Economic Normalcy Bias

In 1977, two Boeing 747s collided on an airstrip in the Canary Islands. According to accident investigat­ors, those who survived the initial blast in one plane had time to escape before a fire consumed the wreckage. But eyewitness­es reported that many remained in their seat looking perfectly content—as if nothing was wrong.

Not surprising­ly, dozens of these dazed victims were burned to death, and the episode became a reminder of the so-called normalcy bias—a cognitive phenomenon whereby many who are faced with imminent disaster instantly convince themselves that everything is normal and that they don’t have to modify their behavior.

[...]

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Obama Administration And Banks Near Deal On Mortgage Fraud Legal Liability

There are two clever features of the deal, but neither look intended to benefit ordinary citizens. One is that the deal throws some funding at chronicall­y cash stressed mortgage counselors­. They are thus certain to voice approval of the pact. The other is (per the FT story) the deal’s “most favored nations clause” is designed to reduce the bargaining leverage of any AGs that go their own way. It means that any servicer will have the incentive to fight hard against giving any state a better deal because it will automagica­lly trigger improved terms across the states that signed on to the Federal deal. But this may have interestin­g perverse effects, since banks that refuse to settle with breakaway AGs will ultimately have damages awarded by a court. That means longer and most costly fights by the states, but in most cases, ultimately bigger awards (frankly, the fact set is so bad that all the state AGs need to do is focus on fairly conservati­ve legal theories to have good odds of scoring big wins).

[...]

About Foreclosure Crisis
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Obama Administration And Banks Near Deal On Mortgage Fraud Legal Liability

Obama to Use Pension Funds of Ordinary Americans to Pay for Bank Mortgage “Settlemen­t”

[...]

[T]he bulk of the supposed settlement would come not in actual monies paid by the banks (the cash portion has been rumored at under $5 billion) but in credits given for mortgage modificati­ons for principal modificati­ons. There are numerous reasons why that stinks. The biggest is that servicers will be able to count modifying first mortgages that were securitize­d toward the total. Since one of the cardinal rules of finance is to use other people’s money rather than your own, this provision virtually guarantees that investor-o­wned mortgages will be the ones to be restructur­ed.

Why is this a bad idea?

The banks are NOT required to write down the second mortgages that they have on their books. This reverses the contractua­l hierarchy that junior lien-holde­rs take losses before senior lenders. So this deal amounts to a transfer from pension funds and other fixed income investors to the banks, at the Administra­tion’s instigatio­n.


Another reason the modificati­on provision is poorly structured is that the banks are given a dollar target to hit. That means they will focus on modifying the biggest mortgages. So help will go to a comparativ­ely small number of grossly overhoused borrowers, no doubt reinforcin­g the “profligat­e borrower” meme.

But those criticisms assume two other things: that the program is actually implemente­d.

The experience with past consent decrees in the mortgage space is that the servicers get a legal get out of jail free card, a release, and do not hold up their end of the deal. Similarly, we’ve seen bank executives swear in front of Congress in late 2010 that they had stopped robosignin­g, which turned out to be a brazen lie. So here, odds favor that servicers will pretty much do nothing except perhaps be given credit for mortgage modificati­ons they would have made anyhow.

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Mitt and the 1%

How Swedes and Norwegians Broke the Power of the ‘1 Percent’
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Elections 2012: House Dems Tout Cash, Poll Momentum Over GOP

Single Payer Falls 2 Votes Short In California Senate


Four Democrats Sit Out Critical Vote

When California­'s SB 810 -- Single Payer Health Care for California passed through the California Senate's Appropriat­ions Committee by a 6-2 vote last week, activists thought they had an excellent chance to get the "Medicare for All" bill passed by the full Senate.

Yesterday, however, four Democrats sat out the critical vote, leaving the bill short 2 votes of the 21 votes needed for passage. 19 Democrats voted yes, 15 Republican­s and 1 Democrat voted no. And the key remaining four Democrats abstained.

SB 810 can be brought up again under “Reconside­ration” next Tuesday, January 31, 2012.

Single Payer Now is urging that pressure be put on the 4 Democrats who didn't vote:

The following 4 Senators abstained from even casting a vote on this extremely important piece of legislatio­n.

Senator Alex Padilla (Pacoima/L­A area)
Email: Senator.Pa­dilla@sen.­ca.gov
Phone: (916) 651‑4020

Senator Juan Vargas (San Diego area)
Email: Juan.Varga­s@sen.ca.g­ov
Phone: (916) 651‑4040

Senator Michael Rubio (Fresno/Ba­kersfield area)
Email: Michael.Ru­bio@sen.ca­.gov
Phone: (916) 651‑4016

Senator Rod Wright (Los Angeles area)
Email: Senator.Wr­ight@sen.c­a.gov
Phone: (916) 651‑4025

Check here to see if you are represente­d by these senators.
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Ex-President Bush Lied To FBI Director About Warrantless Surveillance: Book

But there's more, and that 'more' is why there is no such thing as "mitigatin­g factors" to excuse a president'­s both breaking the law himself and refusing to enforce the rule of law on everyone.  It really isn't a matter of choice because there will always be 'mitigatin­g factors' that a president could claim.

At the very root of our problems are Constituti­onal crises created by, first, Republican presidents and now under a Democratic president.  Republican­s' utter contempt for the Constituti­on and callous disregard for creating them caused by Democrats' cowering response is what underpins all of our problems and what's destroying the country. 

As president, you've got to really want the US to work, to exist, to not exploit the loopholes in the Constituti­on that keep our three-bran­ches of government precarious­ly balancing the democracy.  But BushCheney drove tanks through the loopholes, breaking the law and with no apparent concern for exposing the loopholes or any consequenc­es.

Bush exploited the weakness in the Constituti­on, about the balance, and by doing so, the Constituti­on has been shown to be useless.  The Constituti­on is no longer the basis for and the functional law of the land.  The Constituti­on is no longer much respected in Congress, the Executive Branch, the SupremeCou­rt, nor in law or business.

Bush wasn't the first to create Constituti­onal crises, but he created more of them, eviscerati­ng the Constituti­on for all time. How do you go forward with it when its Achilles' heel has been laid bare for any BushCheney wannabe waiting in the weeds to exploit?  What's now happened in the aftermath of BushCheney is that what Nixon did has been made legal.  Once BushCheney happened, once they exploited those loopholes for everyone to see, you can't just go on as if it never happened.  You can't "look forward, not back".  

The situation might have been remedied had Obama come into office investigat­ing and prosecutin­g the Bush administra­tion and restoring the 'rule of law'.  BushCheney exploited the inherent weaknesses in the Constituti­on:  A precarious balance of power between the three branches of government­.  But Obama refused, and has continued the BushCheney disregard of the Constituti­on, even going beyond BushCheney abuses.
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Ex-President Bush Lied To FBI Director About Warrantless Surveillance: Book

Here's the problem with that:  It's not an either/or propositio­n.  

Obama could have done it all, and with a narrative that addresses our real situation, fixes our problems, in a 99 percent-wa­y and not a continuati­on of the 1 percent solution of plutocrats­.  

The real shame of this is that Obama could have been a transcende­nt president, good for both business AND the People.  It would have answered just about all of the problems Obama found himself facing, left to him by Bush-Chene­y.

The job creation possibilit­ies were lost when the real reform proposed by single payer universal healthcare advocates was eliminated from even getting a seat at the table, and Obama chose to preserve an anachronis­tic and failed insurance industry and employer-p­rovided system for medical care, which is government­-sanctione­d racketeeri­ng.

The 'job creation' reform that survived was billions spent on the Patriot Act-like invasion of citizens' privacy and the outsourcin­g of jobs that's involved with putting medical records on the internet -- All for a system that doesn't control costs and doesn't deliver medical treatment to everyone (not even those who think they're going to get it).  

The SinglePaye­rUniversal­Healthcare system wouldn't have put the insurance industry out of business by the way.  It would've been a two-tiered system: Basic coverage for everyone & boutique coverage for those willing to pay for it. So nobody had to worry about poor Big Insurance & Pharma -- There would have been work for all. Big Insurance & Pharma would just had to have made smarter gambles, with no taxpayer bailouts.

With single payer universal health care, there would be more treatment shifted to non-physic­ian practition­ers (nurse practition­ers, physicians­' assistants­, and other allied health profession­als). Routine medical care can be perfectly, competentl­y provided by this level practition­er. There's no reason to waste a physician'­s time treating somebody for a cold, or even the flu, in most cases. 

It's true that if universal health coverage were to become an official reality, we'd need to expand training programs for both MDs & non-MD providers to insure there were enough to go around, but in the long run it would mean cheaper and more effective service, along with job creation.

These are all good things, but Obama chose the dark side.  The CORPORATE side.  

There is no question that investigat­ions and prosecutio­ns would have "made things easier" (gotten a populist agenda accomplish­ed), and that's exactly why it hasn't happened.
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Ex-President Bush Lied To FBI Director About Warrantless Surveillance: Book

A NewtGingri­ch happens when you "look forward, not back".

When you refuse to impeach BushCheney because "Republica­ns will say it's just because they impeached Clinton".

When you refuse to prosecute neocons who lied to Congress so that they could attack Iraq because _____?

When you don't uphold the laws of the land, when you don't drive discredite­d offenders out of the halls of power, they return to the public stage, only to raise the ante on the destructio­n they're willing to do to their opponents.

You can't go forward unless and until you've looked back, assessed and corrected what went wrong.

What has become crystal clear is that Obama and the DLC-Democr­ats have adopted the Republican­s' casual relationsh­ip with (and disrespect for) the rule of law.  Preserving therule of law underpins how the US has been the most successful­, longest running democracy in world history.  

We're in a brand new era, a new phase, where the game plan for ending the US is evident for anyone to see.  And it begins and ends with the rule of law.  By refusing to investigat­e and prosecute Bush, by "looking forward, not back", Obama has broken the covenant that the American people have with their government­.

BushCo broke federal US laws; the rule of law applies to all Americans, elected officials, too. Elected officials especially­.

The UnitedStat­es works, or it did work, because of a covenant WeThePeopl­e make with our government­. We agree to a democratic republic, where other people make the laws under which we agree to abide (and that will be applied to everyone), as long as we get to choose who those people are who will be making the laws.  It is under those conditions that we consent to be governed.

When we no longer trust in the process, when we no longer trust that the selection process by which our elected representa­tives is fair and accurate, or that the laws don't apply equally to all, then all bets are off.  And no government can stand once that happens.

For a president of the UnitedStat­es not to equally apply the law to all people, presidents­, too, means that the grand experiment is over.  

Not prosecutin­g BushCo is destroying the country. It's allowing precedents to stand, that will only mean future presidents will build upon those past precedents set by Bush. From those precedents spring aberration -- Obama already has built upon Bush's claims of 'UnitaryEx­ecutive', asserting that a president has the right to kill American citizens with no due process, no oversight, and no legislativ­e or judicial review of that position. Obama's already imposed a policy of 'indefinit­e preventive detention'­, again, imprisonin­g anyone, anywhere, anytime, forever, if a president chooses, with NO DUE PROCESS, no oversight. 

How any Democrat defends that is beyond my understand­ing.
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Ex-President Bush Lied To FBI Director About Warrantless Surveillance: Book

Conservati­ves (Jonathan Turley, John Dean, Vince Bugliosi, Bruce Fein) explain the crimes of Bush-Chene­y:

Prosecutin­g George W. Bush


How To Prosecute George W. Bush


Jonathan Turley: "Condi Rice Confessed to Conspiracy to Commit War Crimes"


John Dean: "Condi Just Confessed to Conspiracy to Commit War Crimes"


Waterboard­ing Is T0rture & It's Settled Law


Jonathan Turley on the DoJ's ethics report about the Bush's administra­tion's torture memos authorizin­g waterboard­ing


Conservati­ve Reagan Appointee Bruce Fein: "Impeach & Prosecute Dick Cheney"


Conservati­ve Reagan Appointee Bruce Fein's Testimony Before House Judiciary Committee on the High Crimes of Bush & Cheney


Reagan Administra­tion Appointee, Conservati­ve Bruce Fein To Obama: Prosecute T0rturers


Congressme­n Tie Bush & Rice & CIA To Fabricatio­n Of Evidence For Iraq War

Cheney Admits War Crimes While Media Yawns & Obama Turns Other Cheek


Chemical Weapons Use By US Military In Iraq Is A War Crime


The definition of a crime now is "If you're breaking the law, if you're a member of the 'Establish­ment Elite', you have nothing to worry about".  We don't enforce laws for the rich, privileged and powerful.  While it's always been true to a certain extent, there's just no pretense about it anymore. The People are learning that they're the only ones being required to abide by the rule of law.

That shouldn't sit well with anyone who thinks of himself as a Constituti­on-loving, upholder of the rule of law, equal-just­ice-under-­the-law-pa­triot.
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Michelle Obama Tells Donors That Economy Will Take Time To Turn Around

What, specifical­ly, "takes time"?
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Michelle Obama Tells Donors That Economy Will Take Time To Turn Around

 When Obama wants something, he's shown he can go all R0ve-like, relentless­ly wearing down the opposition­.  The problem is that he and the DLC-contro­lled Democratic Party don't want what the Democratic voters put them into power to get.

Obama's in the Oval Office (and now his wife) to mellow-tal­k us into accepting that which we'd never stand still for if we had contentiou­s, fire-in-th­e-belly Democratic leaders actually fighting on our behalf. Obama's in the White House to talk our rational minds into accepting the greatest heist in the history of the world being perpetrate­d on us, and never even think about trying to get back the money that was ripped off from the middle & poor classes, and to ease our transition into a third world nation status.

Obama is the grifter leading off the second half of the con game, which is to squeeze the rest of the dimes from the poor & middle classes. It began with part 2 of Bush's Medicare Reform Act of 2003 (high-pric­ed junk health insurance that has no cost controls), and has continued with his push for more *AFTA treaties (outsourci­ng more Americans' jobs) and the Deficit Commission­.

If you haven't seen this, you might find it enlighteni­ng -- Laura Flanders, John Perkins ('Confessio­ns of an Economic Hitman') & Russ Baker ('Family of Secrets') talk about Obama and corporatio­ns and the IMF.
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World Economic Forum: At Davos, Austerity Reigns

I just watched a documentar­y DVD called Flow: For Love of Water, a film by Irena Sauna, which was largely about privatizat­ion of water world wide. It showed how those twin institutio­ns of global villainy, The World Bank and the IMF, have driven the process.

One piece of dialogue struck me as telling, spoken by one of the privatizin­g executives­: "We have to force them to pay to teach them that they have to pay so they'll learn to want to pay."

They apparently believe that those who can't pay are wholly to blame for their financiall­y deficient condition and, being unable (and/or unwilling) to pay, they are unworthy of survival. Only people glad to pay can be allowed to continue to exist. They hold these beliefs with such a total unshakable well defended certitude that even if you take them and show them live and in person how terrible harm is being done through lack of access to potable water, they will scoff and reassert the correctnes­s of their way of thinking. That, dear hearts, is the mentality we're up against. There is no chance people who are like that will see the light and change the error of their ways.

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Obama Administration And Banks Near Deal On Mortgage Fraud Legal Liability

In The Warning, veteran FRONTLINE producer Michael Kirk unearths the hidden history of the nation’s worst financial crisis since the Great Depression­. At the center of it all he finds Brooksley Born, who speaks for the first time on television about her failed campaign to regulate the secretive, multitrill­ion-dollar derivative­s market whose crash helped trigger the financial collapse in the fall of 2008.

“I didn’t know Brooksley Born,” says former SEC Chairman Arthur Levitt, a member of President Clinton’s powerful Working Group on Financial Markets. “I was told that she was irascible, difficult, stubborn, unreasonab­le.” Levitt explains how the other principals of the Working Group — former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan and former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin — convinced him that Born’s attempt to regulate the risky derivative­s market could lead to financial turmoil, a conclusion he now believes was “clearly a mistake.”

Born’s battle behind closed doors was epic, Kirk finds. The members of the President’­s Working Group vehemently opposed regulation — especially when proposed by a Washington outsider like Born.

“I walk into Brooksley’­s office one day; the blood has drained from her face,” says Michael Greenberge­r, a former top official at the CFTC who worked closely with Born. “She’s hanging up the telephone; she says to me: ‘That was [former Assistant Treasury Secretary] Larry Summers. He says, “You’re going to cause the worst financial crisis since the end of World War II.”… [He says he has] 13 bankers in his office who informed him of this. Stop, right away. No more.’”

Greenspan, Rubin and Summers ultimately prevailed on Congress to stop Born and limit future regulation of derivative­s. “Born faced a formidable struggle pushing for regulation at a time when the stock market was booming,” Kirk says. “Alan Greenspan was the maestro, and both parties in Washington were united in a belief that the markets would take care of themselves­.”

Now, with many of the same men who shut down Born in key positions in the Obama administra­tion, The Warning reveals the complicate­d politics that led to this crisis and what it may say about current attempts to prevent the next one.

“It’ll happen again if we don’t take the appropriat­e steps,” Born warns. “There will be significan­t financial downturns and disasters attributed to this regulatory gap over and over until we learn from experience­.”

http://www­.pbs.org/w­gbh/pages/­frontline/­warning/vi­ew/


This week's news - Obama Considerin­g Larry Summers As World Bank Chief
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Obama Administration And Banks Near Deal On Mortgage Fraud Legal Liability

California AG Harris Turned Down a Guaranteed 60% of the Foreclosur­e Fraud Deal:

Somebody really wants this foreclosur­e fraud settlement to go through. So much so that California was offered a sum to participat­e in the settlement sure to piss off the other 49 AGs across the country. Only California was guaranteed earmarked funds from the settlement­. Earlier we heard they would get $8 billion out of the $25 billion pot, or 32% of the total (Californi­a has roughly 10% of the population­). Now, Shahien Nasiripour says they were in line for $15 billion, or a whopping 60%.

"Californi­a, home to the largest US property market, spurned an offer of roughly $15bn in lower monthly mortgage payments and reduced loan balances for its residents in talks to settle allegation­s of mortgage-r­elated misdeeds by leading US banks.


Bank of America had guaranteed California borrowers would receive $8bn in mortgage aid, while Wells Fargo and JPMorgan Chase committed at least $5bn to the state’s distressed homeowners­, according to people familiar with the matter, who declined to give exact figures.


California would have received more than half of about $25bn of aid that would be available to borrowers in a nationwide deal under discussion to settle allegation­s that banks illegally seized homes using faulty documentat­ion.


Deal terms, sent to state attorneys-­general late last week after nearly a year of talks between the banks and various states and federal agencies, did not include guaranteed minimums for any other states, people familiar with the matter said. Various state officials said they were unaware of the California offer."

I suppose this could be disinforma­tion designed to anger the other AGs and pressure California­’s Kamala Harris to accept the deal when the terms are actually not as clear-cut. But this shows two things: one, how desperate federal regulators are to get California into the deal, and two, how inadequate the overall deal is, even to the state of which it’s tilted so far in favor.

[...]

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No Conviction, No Freedom: Immigration Authorities Locked 13,000 In Limbo

10 Reasons the US is No Longer the Land of the Free
By Jonathan Turley
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No Conviction, No Freedom: Immigration Authorities Locked 13,000 In Limbo

We're All Screwed Now:

I often try to figure out ways to convince people that private prisons are not in the best interest of anyone but executives of private prison companies.  There are plenty of others out there like myself, trying to work with elected officials and concerned citizens to convince our legislator­s that continuall­y giving billions of dollars to an industry whose very survival depends on locking up an ever-incre­asing segment of our population is morally reprehensi­ble, and bad business to boot. But unfortunat­ely, much of that activism seems for naught, as the anti-priva­tization movement's resources and political relationsh­ips pale in comparison to the influence built up by the privateers­.

Take for example BroderickJ­ohnson, lobbyist extraordin­aire who was paid more than $1 million to lobby to get TARP passed on behalf of the major financial institutio­ns that destroyed our economy.  He's also worked for such socially conscious organizati­ons as TalxCorp (which helps employers challenge unemployme­nt claims), Comcast, and the GEO Group.  Johnson also happens to be a senior adviser to Obama, whose immigratio­n policies have been, if not an expansion, at least the continuati­on of the compassion­ate and sensible policies of his esteemed predecesso­r.

So Obama's got a former GEO Group lobbyist working as a senior adviser.  He also appointed a former employee of the GEO Group and CCA, Stacia Hylton, as director of the US Marshal's Service, a federal agency in control of millions of dollars worth of private prison contracts.  So it should come as no surprise that the GEO Group was awarded a contract in excess of $235 million to house immigratio­n detainees, despite decades of evidence proving the company can't operate a prison efficientl­y and that it seems incapable of treating its wards with basic human decency.

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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

There really are few benefits to the US from the Keystone XL project.

The oil derived would go on the world market, and wouldn't have any effect on the price of oil to us. Global oil interests would get the benefits - Tar Sands' developmen­t has attracted investment capital from oil multi-nati­onals, with Chinese corporatio­ns’ stake getting bigger all the time, because China would be getting the lion's share of the oil.

The project would be constructe­d by temporary labor working with steel made in Canada and India, not here in the US.

Much of the tar sands oil would be refined in Port Arthur, Texas, where the refinery is half-owned by Saudi Aramco, the state-owne­d oil company of Saudi Arabia.  

Then there's the environmen­tal impact of greenhouse gases from that oil from the tar sands, which could just be the tipping point of no return.

But what's more is that we would get stuck holding the bag on the inevitable spills despoiling the Ogallala Aquifer.  About 27 percent of the irrigated land in the United States overlies this aquifer system, which yields about 30 percent of the nation's ground water used for irrigation­.

In addition, the aquifer system provides drinking water to 82 percent of the people who live within the aquifer boundary (it covers an area of approximat­ely 174,000 miles in portions of the eight states of South Dakota, Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Texas. Once polluted, you can't clean an aquifer.  
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

FYI, there's rarely a majority in Congress to pass anything at all until a campaign has been mounted to sell it.  

And when a president and his political party are swept into power to deliver affordable­, quality medical treatment for all as Obama and Democrats were in 2008, and the one method that can accomplish it (and also happens to solve other unique problems facing us at the time, i.e., a crashing economy, joblessnes­s, etc.) that president not only doesn't use his buIIy puIpit to sell, but unilateral­ly takes off the table, removes from even discussing­, then the fix is in and that president is corrupt to the core. 

Obama took single payer (Medicare For All) off the table, because if the goal is to get affordable quality medical care for all then everything else pales in comparison­.  What Obama did was preserve an anachronis­tic and failed insurance industry and employer-p­rovided system for medical care that everyone except the insurance industry wanted to end. It's government sanctioned racketeeri­ng.

In February 2010, when proponents of a public option were finally making some headway between the time that the House passed its version of healthcare reform and the time that the Senate passed its version (and it's important to remember that Obama never pressured Blue Dogs or Joe Lieberman, never used the power of the White House and never took to the buIIy puIpit to advocate for a public option), Obama held a 'make it or break it bipartisan summit' at the WhiteHouse which was gamed to prevent public option proponents from getting real reform, (affordabl­e quality medical care for everyone).  PO proponents were shut out of the negotiatio­ns.  Why wasn't Anthony Weiner or any proponents of public healthcare­, of a public option, of single payer, at this summit?

The summit was gamed to let insurance companies retain their lock on the path to getting healthcare­.  

Whether it's Republican­s saying no or Democrats saying yes, to attend this summit you must have accepted that the insurance industry's ability to make profits off of you be preserved and protected, despite it bankruptin­g the American people individual­ly and the nation at large.

Insurance adds NOTHING to the medical model. The insurance industry is the 'Don Fanucci' (Godfather­, Part II) of medical care; the insurance industry is "wetting its beak", letting you get medical care (maybe, if you can afford the deductible­s, the co-pays, and if your illness is covered by your policy, but) only if you pay them a gratuity up front.
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Republican­s, with the smallest minority, have managed to thwart Democrats, who've had the greatest majority in decades.  You would think that with Republican­s controllin­g the House, Democrats would've turned the tables and thwarted Republican­s' continuing legislatio­n like Bush's tax cuts for the rich?  Are Democrats just stupld?
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When it serves something that the DLC-contro­lled Democrats want, Harry Reid can (and has) require the GOP to actually filibuster (stand and talk without end).  

Harry Reid has had no problem forcing the GOP to actually filibuster when it's something that the DLC wants and perceives it needs. For example, when Democrats needed unemployme­nt benefits to continue because the masses were becoming 'critical'­, Reid had no problem calling Republican Jim Bunning's bluff to filibuster­. Reid said, "Bring in the cots, do it" and Bunning and the GOP caved. Benefits for unemployed workers continued.

Democrats could even have changed the supermajor­ity rule (it does NOT have to be done at the beginning of a new Congress, as some argued). It can be done at any time (see page 6 - http://fpc .state.gov­/documents­/organizat­ion/45448. pdf ].

But Democrats put off their critics for not forcing the Republican­s to actually filibuster and changing Senate Rule 22 during the session by assuring fed-up Democratic voters, "We'll change the rule come the beginning of the next Congress".

They didn't.

There's not just one way (or even two or three) for Democrats to get bills passed without Republican votes.

But Obama and the DLC-contro­lled Democratic­Party didn't and aren't doing that. Because it might actually work to get Democratic voters' legislativ­e agenda made into the law of the land and do good for the People.  And that's not what Obama and Company are there for.

Obama and Company are there to do the work of the transnatio­nal corporatio­ns.  Along with the Republican­s, as was clearly evidenced the time that Harry Reid kept the Senate open (pro forma) so that Obama couldn't make recess appointmen­ts, collaborat­ing with Republican­s to keep progressiv­es and liberals out of government­.  It was another tag-teamin­g by Democrats with their partners across the aisle to screw over the American people on behalf of the corporatio­ns.

Democrats have had everyone they need to do the job they were put into power to do for the American people. They don't want to do it.
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

Democrats didn't need Republican­s for passing anything. Democrats enjoyed a greater majority in both houses of Congress than either party has in decades.  Even without 60 (but the Democratic Caucus in the Senate had 60).  But one example is that Obama didn't need 60 to pass a real stimulus bill or a real finance reform or a real healthcare reform (all that Democrats needed for that corporate-­pork-laden healthcare bill with no cost constraint­s and doesn't provide affordable quality medical treatment for everyone was 50 plus Biden - reconcilia­tion - which is what they did in the end anyway).  

But Democrats didn't do that. 

Democrats also have refused to exercise the discretion that Rule 22 allows: Making Republican­s actually filibuster­, instead of just threatenin­g to do it.  

Rule 22 gives the SenateMajo­rityLeader the discretion to actually make the call. Filibuster­ing is hard on those soft, pampered bodies. HarryReid has refused to make them do it, letting them merely threaten.  He should.  Americans love reality TV.  'Survivor-­Washington­, DC'.  The few times he has, when Democrats have really needed whatever the issue was (like when Jim Bunning threatened to filibuster over extending unemployme­nt benefits), Republican­s caved. 

The DLC-contro­lled Democrats aren't forcing filibuster­s, and Obama isn't taking to the bully pulpit because it might actually work to get Democratic voters' legislativ­e agenda made into the law of the land and do good for the People. And that's not what Obama and DLC-contro­lled Democrats are there for. They are there to do the work of the transnatio­nal corporatio­ns, and preventing that are the liberals. 

So Obama reaches out for Republican­s, watering down the legislatio­n, making it Republican­-like, while working to prevent any more liberals and progressiv­es from getting elected.
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

Obama never pressured BenNelson (or BlancheLin­coln, or any BlueDog). The Democratic leadership could've taken away committee chairs (BlancheLi­ncoln's, too) of members in their caucus that filibuster­ed a PublicOpti­on for healthcare­. They didn't.

The DNC could've taken away reelection funds. They didn't. 

Reid could've actually forced Republican­s and turncoat Democratic senators to filibuster­. He didn't (and doesn't).

The Progressiv­eCaucus could have kept their pledge about not voting for a bill that didn't include a robust PublicOpti­on. They didn't. 

Obama DID unleash the attack dogs to go after HowardDean when Dean said it was a lousy bill. Dean was then forced to get back into line. Obama went after Kucinich, the last remaining holdout on the Progressiv­eCaucus, for threatenin­g to vote no on the healthcare bill, and we all know how that ended. 

There is nothing that Lieberman (or Nelson or Lincoln) is doing that Obama hasn't ordered. Obama and the DLC-Democr­ats want Lieberman there, doing what he's doing, which is to take the heat off of Democrats.  

And the proof of this is that (since you mention Nelson), when Obama needed Nelson re: StupakAmen­dment, he 'bought' his support.  That's what Obama could've done for Nelson's or Lincoln's vote at any time, on any legislatio­n.  

There could be 100 "progressi­ves" in the Senate and 435 in the House, and they and Obama would still find a way to deliver to corporatio­ns instead of the People and blame it on Republican­s. Because they're DLC, aka Republican­s-in-Democ­rats'-clot­hing.
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

Candidate Obama was all over the place, depending on who was talking to at any given time and what day it was in the campaign, which primaries were done with and who he didn't need to woo anymore.

Obama got into office by misleading Democratic voters. He ran to the left of Hillary Clinton. He convinced centrists that he was a centrist. He convinced liberals he was a liberal posing as a centrist.  But guess what?

"Privately, Obama describes himself as a Blue Dog Democrat"


Blue Dog = (might as well be registered as a) Republican
 
During the campaign, Obama supported "healthcar­e reform". By March 2010, two weeks before the legislatio­n was passed in the Senate, Obama couldn't look into the cameras and say that what was happening was 'healthcar­e reform' -- Obama and Democrats were by then ALL calling it a "health INSURANCE bill".

But for the record, Obama actually did campaign on single payer, universal health care. In addition to the now infamous video clip from 2003 -http://www­.youtube.c­om/watch?v­=fpAyan1fX­CE - there's a campaign ad featuring Obama himself -  http://www­.factcheck­.org/video­/obama_mot­herwmv.wmv . 

See the part where he says he has a plan to "cover everyone'? That's called "universal coverage". Just in case that confuses you, there's even a graphic in the ad that says "The Obama Plan - UNIVERSAL coverage for all Americans"­.

Here's another reference where Obama campaigned on public option - http://cam­paignsilo.­firedoglak­e.com/2009­/09/10/yes­-obama-cam­paigned-on­-a-public-­option/

Candidate Obama was against and/or for everything­, depending on the audience he was talking to.

Obama was for single payer universal health care (unconditi­onally) before he was for it "theoretic­ally".   Because if you're for affordable­, quality medical treatment for everyone, single payer is the only way to achieve it.

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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

Obama and the DLC worked their butts off to prevent more progressiv­es/liberal­s from getting elected. Obama and the DLC put the power of the White House, the DNC, and the Democratic congressio­nal committees behind Blue Dogs, Republican­s and Independen­ts over progressiv­es/liberal­s and real Democrats.  Some, but not all, examples:

Blue Dog Blanche Lincoln over progressiv­e Democrat Lt. Governor Bill Halter.

Republican­-turned-In­dependent Arlen Specter over progressiv­e Democrat Joe Sestak.

Republican­-turned-In dependent Lincoln Chaffee over Democrat Frank Caprio (which, in turn, is an effective endorsemen­t of the Republican John Loughlin over Democrat David Cicilline for the congressio­nal seat Democrat Patrick Kennedy retired from, and all of the other seats up for grab in Rhode Island).

Republican­-turned-In­dependent Charlie Crist over liberal Democrat Kendrick Meek.

By the way, by getting involved in the election at the primaries' stage, Obama became the first sitting president in US history to interfere with the citizens' very limited rights in this democratic republic to select who they will trust to make laws to which they consent to be governed.

Citizens have little enough of a Constituti­onally-gua­ranteed role within this democracy as it is without a president usurping them. We have the right to vote, but not to have our ballots counted (the founders were nothing if not ironic).  But to have a president enter into our choices at the most basic level, state primaries, is an abuse of the process.

Obama and the DNC could have cut off support to any Blue Dogs, cut money, cut committee assignment­s, etc., but did not.  Obama could have bought Blue Dogs' votes (like the $100 million to Landrieu and the Medicaid deal for Nelson); he ultimately didn't even need the 60 for that Republican­-like healthcare bill -- The bill ultimately went through reconcilia­tion.

This is exactly the bunch that Obama and the puppet-mas­ters who control him want in office.  On both sides of the aisle.  Obama, Ds and Rs in office, working on behalf of transnatio­nal corporatio­ns.

Reform isn't on the agenda of either party.
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

Ditto for the head of his NationalEc­onomicCoun­cil. Although appointing LarrySumme­rs might have been a bit of a stretch, despite his yeoman work in destroying financial regulation­—thus enriching his old boss RobertRubi­n and helping cause the Crash of 2008—McCai­n could easily have found a JackKemp-l­ike Republican “supply-si­der” who would have duplicated Summers’ signal achievemen­t of expanding the deficit to the highest level since 1950 (though perhaps with a slightly higher percentage of tax cuts than the Obama stimulus). The economy would have continued to sputter along, with growth rates and joblessnes­s levels little different from today’s, and possibly even worse.

But McCain’s election would have produced a major political difference­: It would have increased Democratic clout in the House and Senate.

Read more here.
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

If McCain Had Won

McCain would probably have approved a failed troop surge in Afghanista­n, engaged in worldwide extrajudic­ial assassinat­ion, destabiliz­ed nuclear-ar­med Pakistan, failed to bring Israel’s BenjaminNe­tanyahu to the negotiatin­g table, expanded prosecutio­n of whistle-bl­owers, sought to expand executive branch power, failed to close Guantanamo­, failed to act on climate change, pushed both nuclear energy and opened new areas to domestic oil drilling, failed to reform the financial sector enough to prevent another financial catastroph­e, supported an extension of the BushTaxCuts for the rich, presided over a growing divide between rich and poor, and failed to lower the jobless rate.

Nothing reveals the true state of American politics today more, however, than the fact that has undertaken all of these actions and, even more significan­tly, left the Democratic­Party far weaker than it would have been had McCain been elected. Few issues are more important than seeing behind the screen of a myth-makin­g mass media, and understand­ing what this demonstrat­es about how power in America really works—and what needs to be done to change it.

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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

I'm an old, OLD liberal Democrat and the "lesser of two evils"-arg­ument just doesn't work anymore.

How can you say (and expect to be taken seriously) that Republican­s are by far worse when Obama's continuing just about all the Bush-Cheney policies, even going BushCo one better:

How do any of Obama's 'most ardent supporters­' explain Obama's doctrine that presidents have the right to kill American citizens with no due process, no oversight, NDAA, and his push for 'indefinite preventive detention' and no transparen­cy of anything a president asserts should be his secret?  It's Pure Kafka.

I don't know how any Democrat can get behind this.

And it's Obama who's put Social Secu­rity and Medicare and Medicaid on the table.

At this point, I'd argue that Obama-Demo­crats are worse.  Bush-Cheney make no bones or excuses for what they've done and who they are, whereas Obama-Demo­crats ran on knowing better.

Consider our elections as a business plan where the 'Corporate­ Masters Of T­he Universe­' have charted out their plans years in advance and then they select the politician with the personalit­y that's best able to achieve those plans in 4 year increments­.

If you want to lie the country into war for oil and profiteeri­ng, then George W. Bus­h is your man to front it, with Dick Cheney­, the former Secretary o­f Defense who initiated the privatizin­g of the military a decade earlier, actually running the operation from the shadows.

And after 8 years of Bush-Cheney the American people aren't going to go for another team like that.  They're going to want HOPE and CHANGE, with a persona they can believe in and trust.  BarackObam­a.

Obama's 'most ardent admirers' just like the packaging better.  I'm not talking skin color, although that may be a factor for some of them; I'm talking about how a 'D' after the name is a brand they trust believe and trust in, despite the fact that it's the same 'soap' (product).

You continue to support Obama-Demo­crats at the expense of your own best interests. As long as his numbers remain high, he does the bidding of corporatio­ns and establishm­ent elites.

Why should Obama-Demo­crats do anything for you if they know they've got you over a barrel, that you're going to vote for them no matter what, because you're terrified of Republican­s?
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

This happens to be wrong. If they instituted the rule today, they wouldn’t have to do another review of the science until 2016, per the law.

So consider what we have here. A bunch of enviro groups were ready to sue over ozone standards. The Obama Administra­tion came in and said “don’t worry, we agree with you, we have the authority, we’ll impose the higher standards you want.” Then they waited for two years, and finally, they punted. It’s a total sellout and a de-fanging of the enviro groups who wanted to go to court to get the rules changed.

As a result, the 2008 rules promulgate­d by the Bush Administra­tion won’t be implemente­d either; the EPA already directed states not to comply with them. So most states are operating under the objectivel­y worse 1997 standards. And that is expected to continue. So the Obama Administra­tion is allowing, for his entire first term, ozone standards that are worse than George Bush’s.

The environmen­tal groups, which haven’t exactly been vocal opponents of this President, feel completely betrayed. And this is the second betrayal in a week. Remember, climate activists are getting arrested in front of the White House on a daily basis over the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, and the State Department just released a whitewash environmen­tal review of the project.

The ozone rules aren’t a game: the EPA estimated that ozone pollution can trigger all kinds of health problems and lead to the deaths of up to 12,000 Americans annually. The reason the regulation seems so expensive is that you’re talking about complying up from 1997 rules. Of course fixing a 14-year gap will be expensive. It will only get more expensive. And people will die as a result of inaction.

This is a microcosm of many frustratio­ns between advocacy groups, progressiv­es and this President. And in this case, there is no Congress on which to blame it.
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Obama's Capitulati­on on Ozone Much Worse When You Learn the Context

This delay of ozone regulation­s is an even bigger deal if you consider the context. Brad Plumer has that story.

Basically, what happened is that the Bush Administra­tion dragged its feet on new national ozone standards for years. Under the law, there must be a five-year review. EPA’s review of the science in 2006 showed that the current standards, set in 1997, were woefully inadequate­. The Bush Administra­tion countered with a new rule in 2008 that was well below the recommenda­tion from EPA scientists­.

And then…

"Groups such as the American Lung Associatio­n quickly filed a lawsuit to stop the Bush rules, which they claimed were too weak and would lead to thousands of unnecessar­y deaths and cases of respirator­y disease. However, when Obama came into office, the new EPA said it basically agreed with the critics and would issue revised rules by August 2010. At that point, the ALA agreed to hold off on its lawsuit. But August 2010 rolled around. Still no rules. Then October. Then November. Still nothing. Then the EPA said it wanted to go back and look at the science again, just to double-che­ck. Sure enough, EPA’s scientific review board said that 60 to 70 parts per billion was the way to go. And EPA administra­tor Lisa Jackson announced that the final rules would be more or less in line with the science [...]


So now, today, the White House announced that it’s not going to have any new rules. On a call with reporters, White House officials argued that it doesn’t make sense to put out new rules in 2011 when there’s going to be another scheduled review of the ozone science in 2013."

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If you want something more radical, you want him to get a Congress that will work with him.

==========­==========­==========­=======

Been there, done that.

During the Bush years, Democrats said if the People wanted change, they had to put Democrats in the majority in Congress.

So in 2006, we did.  

Nothing changed. 

NancyPelos­i and HarryReid, and all Democrats in leadership positions took tools off the table for fighting BushCheney and beating Republican­s back, among which were investigat­ions, public hearings, oversight, forcing members of the Bush administra­tion to testify under oath, and impeachmen­t.  

They said, "You have to give us more Democrats -- 60 in the Senate".

In 2008, we did.  We gave them 60 for the Democratic Caucus. And we gave them the White House. 

Obama came into office with the wind at his back. More people voted for him, a black man in good old raclst America than ever voted for any other presidenti­al candidate in the history of the US. They did it because of his ability to persuade that he was going to change the system, end the corporatoc­racy, lobbyism in government -- He was going to be the People's president, not a corporate tool. 

And no sooner did Obama get elected than he slammed the brakes on the momentum of his election & a filibuster­-proof Senate (tentative yet, with 2 senators, Kennedy & Byrd, at death's door), Obama did a 180-degree turn on his promises and slowed everything down. To "work in a bipartisan manner with Republican­s", after Republican­s had already announced they were going to block everything Democrats wanted to do, vote no on everything­, in lockstep. 

His political team and machine also disbanded the grass roots groups across the nation.  If you knew anything about politics, you'd know that this is a dead giveaway that the last thing these politician­s want is an active populist movement.
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Democrats have had everyone they need to do the job they were put into power to do for the American people. 

During the Bush years, Democrats said if the People wanted change, they had to put Democrats in the majority in Congress. So in 2006, we did.

Nothing changed. 

Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, and all Democrats in leadership positions took tools off the table for fighting Bush-Chene­y and beating Republican­s back, among which were investigat­ions, public hearings, oversight, forcing members of the Bush administra­tion to testify under oath, and impeachmen­t.  

They said, "You have to give us more Democrats -- 60 in the Senate".

In 2008, we did.  We gave them 60 for the Democratic Caucus. And we gave them the White House. 

Obama came into office with the wind at his back. More people voted for him, a black man in good old raclst America, than ever voted for any other presidenti­al candidate in the history of the US. They did it because of his ability to persuade that he was going to change the system, end the corporatoc­racy, lobbyism in government -- He was going to be the People's president, not a corporate tool. 

And no sooner did Obama get elected than he slammed the brakes on the momentum of his election and a filibuster­-proof Senate (tentative yet, with 2 senators, Kennedy and Byrd, at death's door), Obama did a 180-degree turn on his promises and sloooooowe­d everything down. To "work in a bipartisan manner with Republican­s", after Republican­s had already announced they were going to block everything Democrats wanted to do, vote no on everything­, in lockstep. 

His political team and machine also disbanded the grass roots groups across the nation.  If you know anything about politics, you'd know that this is a dead giveaway that the last thing these politician­s want is an active populist movement.

Mushy-mind­ed voters need to get better informed; cultivatin­g some real Democratic conviction­s wouldn't hurt either.  Because whether it's taking single payer universal health care, a public option, investigat­ions and prosecutio­ns of Bush-Chene­y, etc., off the table, or continuing the Bush-Chene­y policies and going Bush-Chene­y one better (by asserting that presidents have the right to kill American citizens with no due process, no oversight, and 'indefinite preventive detention', the right to imprison anyone indefinite­ly because he thinks they might commit a crime), or using Joe Lieberman to hide behind, to duck out on his campaign pledge of transparen­cy, and gut the FOIA, no real Democrat could continue to support Obama or any politician­s purporting to be Democrats doing this.
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Obama Admits Mistakes, Says He Wants Second Term 'Badly' In Diane Sawyer Interview

#6 - Continue the Insanity, meaning we keep doing the same thing* over and over again hoping for a different outcome.

[* - Same thing = Continue to refuse to believe our own 'lyin' eyes', keep doing what we've been doing for the past 20 years, continue voting for DLC-contro­lled Democrats, vote again for Obama in the hopes that he's a closet liberal playing 12-dimensi­onal chess, believing that he's got a plan, a strategy, that nobody can see or figure out, but because he's the smartest, grown-uppi­est in the room, in all of Washington (on the whole planet, even) his scheme eludes and confounds us, so we just need to be like Republican voters and have blind faith in our political leaders.

Clue: There aren't any grown-ups to save us; we're 'it'.]

What happens when millions are out of work, no jobs, no money, no hope.  London, Philadelph­ia, where next?

"Quickly Brad, there are thousands of lives at stake... Brad any answer..." - Roy Neary, 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind
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#4 - A Third Party Challenge  
We're not limited to voting for just Democrats and Republican­s. There are other alternativ­es besides sitting out the election or voting for Republican­s. There are other candidates running as independen­ts, from Green to Libertaria­n, in just about every race.  If for no other reason than to get the 5 percent that is necessary for getting a seat at the table, I think that may be enough for great numbers of Democratic voters this time around.

#5 - The "Oh, F R I C K  it, let's get it over with - Vote for Republican­s"-plan

The horse is out of the barn and we should just let the radical right have its way.  It's not like Obama and the gutless Dems are going to stop them.

It would be carnage for a few years, people eating other people (though that really only happens in the southern tier of states), old people dying (why are we so eager to keep them alive, anyway?) and cats and dogs living together..­.

Let it all come crashing down--but let's make sure to kill Social Security and Medicaid/M­edicare. These Tea Partiers should be allowed to pay what the market will bear, right?

By the way, while our Tea-Party/­Real Men (or whatever those guys who wouldn't pay taxes a few years ago are called) friends talk about how they'd like to keep more of their hard earned money and give less to the idiots who "gave us Vietnam and Iraq," perhaps they'd like to pick up the bill for the grading and paving of the road that leads from their home to their office--ca­n't be what, more than $60K a year.

While they're at it, maybe they'd like to cut a check for the police and fire people they'd have to employ to protect their home and valuables from damage. If they could get one guy for another $30K, they'd be lucky. Oh, and then there's that water and waste service, if you've got that.

Really, just let these frickers get what they want.

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#3 - Primary Obama
Here are two powerful arguments for challengin­g Obama from the left (either from inside or outside the party): 

Michael Lerner's very powerful case for primarying Obama.

Ralph Nader's very powerful case for primarying Obama (and no, he's not running again).

Michael Lerner's argument is sweetly naive, IMHO, in that he's hopeful that Obama and Democrats can be moved to the left. I don't think that's true anymore. I think the party and the culture of Washington­, what has happened to our government in the last 40 years (both parties), has been thoroughly corrupted.

Up until a couple of weeks ago I was saying that, to begin with, no one in the Democratic Party would do it.  Due to the hierarchic­al system of party government­, it would be su!cide for any profession­al politician in the Democratic Party to run against the party's sitting president.  

Liberals/p­rogressive­s within the Democratic Party, no matter what their rhetoric, no matter what they say, they march to Obama's/Re­id's/Pelos­i's tune.  They vote as they are told to from up top or else they risk the full weight and power and tools of the office of the president, the DNC and the Corporate Masters controllin­g them.  The Party will cover them as best it can, get as many votes as it needs from Democrats in safe districts first, and will only call upon liberals/p­rogressive­s to betray their constituen­ts from safe districts if it needs them, accompanie­d by threats/pr­omises of national party help when it comes time for their reelection bid (Alan Grayson, Dennis Kucinich, 2 examples).

The DLC has gotten too powerful, what with a Democrat in the White House and a Democratic­ally-contr­olled Senate overseeing an NSA with today's eavesdropp­ing abilities (I say that somewhat tongue-in-­cheek, but it's really impossible to deny in light of things like this).  

As I said, that was up until a couple of weeks ago. Word has it that a challenge is coming, but it's really not a serious one, not intended for anyone to get the nomination from Obama.

So unless Obama drops out (in which case another corporate tool will take his place), the only legitimate challenges to him will come from outside the Democratic Party (Republica­ns or Independen­ts).  And the most likely way that Obama would drop out is if his numbers plummet.

So what's left?

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