Dazed and confused

I wake up in the mornings in a state of shock. After all the grim news, all the finagling, the shenanegans, the vitriol and hysteria, the good guy won. I was braced for the worst and it didn't happen. So I allow myself a smile, a sigh of relief, and a ray of hope. There's no guarantee of course. The same dangers that beset us last month still threaten us today along with new dangers lining up to take their place. But the man in charge of dealing with them is the best of two choices. He still could screw up but at least his vision is clear and the America that Barack Obama describes is the America that I want to know.

Deja Vu all over again

I remember feeling like this in 2000. The tension and stress of the whole horrible experience when Bush's brother was stopping the vote counts in Florida. It seemed to last for ever. When President Bush was placed in office by the Supreme Court, I was devastated but believed in my naive way that somehow everything would turn out OK anyway. I actually believed that Dick Cheney would act to guide and moderate George's natural stupidity and bluster. Boy was that wrong. In 2004 I heard the news that Bush  was in position to continue screwing everything up.With the two wars well underway, what else could he do but trash the economy. Which he did. Now President Obama is on the way to cleaning up the disaster left behind by the last ideological Republican. Will he be able to continue or will everything go down the tubes AGAIN?

Well, DUH!!

One of those common sense ideas that are now backed up by the data. This study confirms what every human with a halfway functioning brain might have guessed, that when young fertile women have full access to birth control, abortion rates will drop. Those House Republican mouth-breathers Akin, and Broun might have a hard time understanding this however. After all, Obama supports free birth control, so it must be BAD!

The pornographers of hate

Rush Limbaugh gets to say anything he wants as an "entertainer". He spews the most vitriolic vile garbage and brings home buckets of money, millions and millions every year. How can he get so rich when he produces nothing of value? Just like any pornographer he stimulates and strokes the base instincts that lie beneath the civilized brain. Hate, like lust, is a powerful driving force. He and the other right-wing "entertainers" are no better than pornographers, and worse than most.

The other 1%

From Time magazine, November 21, 2011
Some 2.4 million men and women have fought in Iraq and/or Afghanistan since the wars began. This is almost exactly 1% of the population of the US  who areover 18 years old. Never before have we average Americans been so distanced from the reality of the wars. Not long ago, I was sitting in a meeting when a colleague said that the wars were over. He had no idea that our 1% are still killing and dying in a country  on the other side of the planet.
We need to bring back the draft. We should NOT maintain a standing army and expect to fight any wars with volunteers. The founding fathers were adamantly opposed to maintaining standing armies. It is too easy to go along with the war mongers when the only Americans who pay the price are our Pat Tillmans, or those impelled by poverty to fight. There is great incentive to create poverty, and great incentive to start wars of choice. We need to make sure everyone pays the cost of war, that blood shed on foreign soil comes from the children of politicians and billionaires, as well as children of roofers and housemaids.

Religious freedom means never having to say you're sorry

Hey folks, religious freedom doesn't mean you get to write your own rules. For centuries, the Catholic church has been a powerful political entity, shaping governments (or trying to - see Thomas Becket) and using all manner of force and violence  to force conformity to their doctrine.Even in the past decade they continued to write their own rules regarding what happens to priests who abuse children. Now they claim the right to  deny access to essential health care to women. Here's a reality check. This isn't about conscience. It's about undermining President Obama, and distracting us from all the issues that make Republicans look bad. It's a cynical ploy, a disgusting manipulation and they will burn in hell for it, if there were a hell.

What's next, Sharia law?

Why are a bunch of pedophile protecting perverts in funny hats and gaudy skirts setting public policy these days? While there are many fine people who call themselves Catholic, the church itself has a long history of atrocities, including  the crusades, the inquisition, witch burnings, suppressing science (Gallileo),  complicity with the Holocaust ( Hitler was a Catholic you know), and  and vicious misogyny. While I am OK with Bishops getting pregnant or AIDs if they choose that for themselves (yes, it's irony), they have NO DAMN business trying to control anyone else's lives.

Why Romney is really scary, even though he seems like the sane one.

Mormons make good neighbors, I hear. They have wonderful family values. But they are completely divorced from any kind of reality. This is a good explanation of how Mormons are brainwashed and why we don't want them in charge of the country.

Why are we listening to these clowns?

Republicans caucus tonight in Iowa. They're all clowns and it would be incredibly amusing to watch them, if there didn't exist the possibility that one of them may be our next President. There are plenty of examples in history where the crazy one, or stupid one (GWB) got in power. The results are never felicitous.

Republicans make your brain happy.... and stupid

What makes your brain happy and why you should do the opposite.
It's a really interesting book by David DiSalvo. One of the most interesting tidbits deals with studies showing how we are unconsciously influenced by  short messages that are  repeated often. But the interesting thing is that these messages must not be  placed before us in a way that encourages close examination. These messages become part of the ambience so to speak. Fox "News" is the perfect example of how this propaganda technique is applied. The messages are crafted to be simple, short, and repeated in many different ways on each of their shows. It's the opposite of journalism, but disguised as serious media. How many times does Fox mistake Republican miscreants for Democrat? How many right-wing slurs and innuendos are spread by those plastic - groomed talking heads? It's exactly the same a massively funded advertising campaign. And it works, too.