It isn't about being "conservative" enough. It isn't about being "considered too liberal." Our two-party system doesn't work because they aren't American enough and following the guideposts our founding fathers wanted us to follow.  Ron Paul has the right message, I feel he was just the wrong one to deliver it because the media perceived him as a nut-job, and that is sad, because it wasn't true.  I can't believe we are facing the possible of the Bush-Clinton reign continuing for another eight years?

How can this happen?

by Debra Craig (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 8 comments) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 9:20:28 AM

  (0+)

Because mid-westerners were so busy thumping their Bibles and listening to anti-gay and anti-abortion crap that has no effect on them whatsoever, they voted against their own best interests and voted for Bush not once, but twice.

Because voting machines were rigged by Diebold, an unashamed maker of voting machines and Bush supporter who said he'd do anything to make sure Bush became president and remained in office a second time.

Because right wing radio brain washed the masses by repeating the 900 or so Bush lies until they became the preceived truth that those of us with brains and reasoning power knew were lies.  Now the leaders of the lemmings are screwed, because the other lemmings don't see through McCain and are supporting him.

Because the Republicans have no one to offer up as an alternative to McCain.  They're all hiding in a closet, under indictment, in jail or fleeing Congress to take lucrative jobs as lobbyists, therefore cheating on the rules they set for themselves by mandating a two-year wait between the end of a Congressional term and a lobbying job.

Because Gore went about the Florida recount in the wrong way by not demanding the entire state be counted, and the Supremes stepped in where they should have feared to tread.

Because chicken, weak sister John Kerry didn't demand a recount in Ohio.

Because Bill Clinton didn't marry a plastic, insipid, smile-pasted-on-face woman of no substance who raised two vapid, self-centered, wild, untrollable daughters, and couldn't teach her husband how to pronounce words let alone speak English correctly, but a woman of strength and opinion, right or wrong, who has always had political ambitions of her own.

Because the Clinton's have name recognition and a powerful political machine.

Those reasons are just for starters.

Now that it looks like the Republicans have committed political suicide, they have no one to blame but themselves.

For the record, I am not a Hillary supporter, nor am I a fan of Bill's any longer.

He's the schmuck who brought us NAFTA, CAFTA, GAT and all the rest of "F"*&%ingTAs.  But if she's the ultimate choice, I will vote for her with free hand strongly gripping my nose.

It's still better than wasting my vote on a third party candidate who has no chance of winning, or a Republican who will bring us more of the same.

by Sandy Sand (198 articles, 0 quicklinks, 227 diaries, 1548 comments [2 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 10:25:00 AM

  (0+)

You know the game is rigged; you know that the Clintons are as neoliberal as the Bushies.... so why bother voting at all?

Voting in a rigged system is voting for it. 

There are other, more proactive, ways of pursuing democracy.  My first suggestion is for citizens to run parallel elections (also now known as citizen run exit polls) outside polling sites and determine for yourself how your neighbors voted.

Another suggestion is to work toward building a political party that isn't beholden to (e.g. sponsored by) corporations.

We don't score points in heaven for voting - U.S. elections have become meaningless because of the total lack of basis for confidence in reported results.

Like they say in Alcoholics Anonymous - the definition of insanity is to keep doing the same actions while expecting different results.   

Withdraw your vote, your consent, and your participation in a system that has no intention but to continue pursuing profits to the exclusion of all other considerations.

Try something different, and maybe we'll get different results.

by Rady Ananda (182 articles, 374 quicklinks, 49 diaries, 1718 comments [201 recommended, 2 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 11:33:04 AM

  (0+)

What "different" thing would you recommend?  Not voting at all?

All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men [and women] to do nothing.

Voting for the lessor of two evils might still be voting for evil, however, it is hard to imagine that had Al Gore or John Kerry been elected that as much destruction to our country, the constitution our economy and our international reputation would have transpired. 

by August Adams (11 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 585 comments [11 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 1:18:33 PM

  (0+)

It does not even always mean that either of the 2 is actually evil, just that neither is your first choice.

In the 2000 election, I voted for the lesser of 2 evils.  I liked Kucinich best, and by the time the debates were over I didn't really care for either Gore or Bush, but there was no doubt anywhere in my mind that Gore was the lesser of the 2 evils.

Did that make Gore evil?  Not by any stretch of the imagination.   In retrospect I have little doubt that Gore would have been a great President.   It's just an expression - don't take it too literally.  

by PrMaine (13 articles, 13 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 510 comments [22 recommended, 1 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 2:31:26 PM

  (0+)

I agree that the republican party allowed itself to get hijacked by those who fixated on a few single issues, but I have to say, the democratic party, of which I was a member, allowed itself to get hijacked by those same few single issues. I support gay rights, I am pro-choice, but those two issues do not deserve prominence above all else. I spoke with someone from NOW last year, and she just couldn't grasp the fact that large numbers of American women who were democrats were not willing to abandon the wider issues and cast their votes and support solely on choice or gender. I've watched the gay rights movement infer that gay marriage was more impportant than millions of working poor and struggling middle class American citzens ability to work, support their  families, than homelessness, hunger and privation.

Whether we're talking about either extreme, they both have degenerated into selfish, elitist, jaded, Caligulaesque movements, and neither of them serve the citizen's interests.

I refuse to care about abortion or gay rights any longer. I'm a woman, but I'm also a wife, a mother and a worker. I'm a human being first. You want to talk about those single issue rights, then also learn to care about the wider issues facing the American people, because they have civil and human rights considerations as well. I refuse to sacrifice the majority of the people for what are essentially frivolous matters by comparison.

by J Perry (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 1:01:59 PM

  (0+)

Despite the fact that I didn't like Romney as a candidate, he just handed the nomination to McCain--HUGE mistake.  Huckabee is somewhat better, but Ron Paul was really the only viable republican candidate, in that all the others kiss the boots of the establishment--the SOURCE of our perennial problems in America.

Republicans are causing the Republican party to disintegrate.  But that might be good in the long run, because then a real Republican party can rise from its ashes.,

by Frank Staheli (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 37 comments [16 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 11:01:17 AM

  (0+)

I, for one, am sick of the historic revisionism that makes Ronald Reagan a "great president". All of the historic evidence indicates that the good things that happened during his presidency would have happened anyway (the collapse of the Soviet Union, for example) and that the bad things happened because he was just as bad a manager and just as criminal as George W. Bush and his father. Remember Iran-Contra? Remember Bush Sr. pardonning John Negroponte and Poindexter?

I begin to think that many people who are Republicans, ARE Republicans, because their short term memory abysmally sucks.

by brantl (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 23 comments) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 11:10:32 AM

  (0+)

After he was shot, something changed in Reagan... He left the day-to-day governance to too many Washington insiders- the nascent Neo-COns of today. Instead of making government smaller and more efficient, it got bigger- MUCH bigger. While taxes were cut for some, the middle class- the driving force behind the economy- saw little or none of that, as those same Washington isiders made sure that any tax cuts were steered toward the well-connected corporations, who also got bloated no-bid government contracts. The Military-Industrial complex got fatter and richer, as the average shmoe got raped, pillaged and sheared like a sheep.

This has continued on through Bush 1, Clinton (don't believe for a second he wasn't OWNED by lobbyists!) and Bush 2. ESPECIALLY Bush 2! Time has come for radical change. People don't revolt with their heads or hearts, they revolt with their stomachs. Now, even the Upper Middle Class, and the 'rich' (whatever that is- we're ALL slaves!) are getting very hungry, as we witness the wealthy take food out of the mouths of our children to feed their insatiable greed and lust for power.

 From Reagan on down, the neo-cons have given conservatism a bad name. They are no more conservative than Mao was a champion of democracy! And the so-called liberals are no better. It's a choice of either National Socialism on the Left, or National Fascism on the right. You say toe-may-toe, and I say Toh-mah-toh- either way, we're all tomatoes being stomped into totalitarian ketchup by our overlords! We now live in a high-tech serfdom, and the world is rapidly reverting to a one-world feudalist government. They tie us to the land and our jobs with taxes and threats of unemployment, and use taxes, health care, the media and pharmaceuticals to control us, beat us down and milk us dry.

 Anyone who stands up to this debased system, like Ron Paul, is portrayed as a 'kook' and a 'fringe character', and is personally attacked, in order for the message to be lost in all the heat and fury that signifies nothing. Too bad people are leaving the party, because the Ron Paul rEVOLution is all about taking back the party. Wait til' 2012, and you won't recognize the Ron Paul-ized Republican party!

xtrabiggg

++++++++++++++++++++

by Thaddeus Kaczor Jr (7 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 46 comments [7 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 5:53:25 PM

  (0+)

I'm not well versed in Libertarian ideology and I don't purport to be.

My understanding is that Libertarians reject the idea of any laws or policies that seek to "level the playing field." My understanding is that we should all be free to "get all we can" and let the chips fall where they may. Is this correct?

If so, Libertarians, like Republicans and Democrats and all other supporters of capitalism, especially "free market" capitalism, fail to acknowledge that highly centralized wealth destroys democracy. As the "winners" in capitalism's predatory struggle gain more and more wealth at the expense of the "losers", they are able to devour more and more resources and they are able to control more and more of the people's government.

Put more succinctly, capitalism and democracy cannot co-exist. If you rejected Republicans because their philosophy strangles democracy, remarrying into Libertarianism will bring you only more of the same. Even the name is absurd. What liberty remains to the common man and woman when corporatists have the power and the freedom to do whatever they choose?

One of the Green Party's "Ten Values" states:

DECENTRALIZATION
Centralization of wealth and power contributes to social and economic injustice, environmental destruction, and militarization. Therefore, we support a restructuring of social, political and economic institutions away from a system which is controlled by and mostly benefits the powerful few, to a democratic, less bureaucratic system.

Do Libertarians acknowledge the problems caused by the "centralization of wealth and power?" If not, you might just want to get that new marriage annulled. 

by welshTerrier2 (7 articles, 3 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 105 comments) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 12:03:10 PM

  (0+)

How do you decentralize wealth and power - when those that control the wealth and power have centralized it, used it to dominate our political discourse and the messages conveyed through the mass media?

All for decentralizing wealth and power - but how do we get there? 

by August Adams (11 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 585 comments [11 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 1:21:47 PM

  (0+)

The first step in the process has to be to acknowledge that we have a problem with our "democracy." Not all accept this premise. It is incumbent on all who do to convince "the others" of the national condition. I think more and more Americans are starting to see the problem but they still think they can solve it by "giving the other party a chance." The image of a ping-pong ball being smashed back and forth comes to mind.

If we could somehow achieve critical mass, i.e. a state where a strong majority of citizens demanded change, then, at a minimum, the battle would be joined. The outcome, however, would not be at all certain.

Two basic possibilities exist:

1. we would demand that the political parties responded to our majority or we would vote them out of office (presumably either supporting a new third party or seizing control of one of the major parties) or

2. the corporate state would drop the pretense of democracy they currently advertise and we would have explicit repression of the masses. The key to this situation would be how the military, and  certain privatized military groups(e.g. Blackwater), reacted. If they side with the wealthy and powerful, we're toast. At that point, the only path for change would be violent revolution.

One of your posts above gave me the impression you supported the PDA model of "working within the Democratic Party." I'm all for working for change but I see no possibility anytime soon that the Democratic Party will become a party of the people. The alternative I've chosen, which I see as a totally lame alternative, is to vote for a third party candidate. The objective is NOT to win an election but rather to build a political coalition, i.e. a block of votes, to gain greater political clout.

Tucked inside the Democratic Party, progressives have absolutely no voice. Blocking Kucinich from the debates should tell you all you need to know about that. PDA board members have lined up to swear their allegiance to either Hillary or Obama. That's just pathetic. Neither of them will bring the changes we need. They don't even talk about our positions on the issues.

The three most critical issues are global warming, dependence on oil and military spending. The only possible solution to any of these serious problems is to gut the military budget and spend money on alternative energy research. The Democrats have offered little more than tokenism to solve these problems. The corporations funding them have no interest in reducing oil imports or reducing military spending. You think voting for Democrats is better than "doing nothing?" I think voting for Democrats is endorsing the status quo. Why would they change if they know they can win elections?

It's time to tell the Democratic Party that, if they cut progressives out of the process, and they have, they cannot have our votes. When it costs them enough votes, maybe then they'll be room for some honest exchanges. Right now, they don't give a damn about you.

by welshTerrier2 (7 articles, 3 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 105 comments) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 2:30:35 PM

  (0+)

"Do Libertarians acknowledge the problems caused by the "centralization of wealth and power?" If not, you might just want to get that new marriage annulled. "

Of course we do, if you'd read any Austrian economics you'd know that. The centralization is caused by the gov's interventions in the economy, in other words as power grows & centralizes so does wealth. Does this mean all will have equal wealth in a free economy? Definitely not, people have different levels of skill & ambition. The good news is that all will be better off.

The opposite happens when the gov intervenes in the economy. The elites get richer & the economy stagnates, leaving the majority poorer.

Ah, but you say the special interests will control the gov if they're allowed to make unlimited amopunts of money, right? The problem stems from the growth of the gov's power. (In my perfect world there is no coercive gov, society's institutions are voluntary. But this gets in too deep.) That's why the concept of limited government is so important.

A note on corporations, they aren't free market institutions, but a creation & extension of the state. As Mussolini said:

"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power."

Which goes hand in hand with Jefferson's ideas:

"I do verily believe that..a single, consolidated government would
become the most corrupt government on the earth."

--Thomas Jefferson to Gideon Granger, 1800.

A great read that clearly makes the distinction between Capitalism & the mixed economy below:

What is the link between fascism and socialism? They are stages on a continuum of economic control, one that begins in intervention in the free market, moves toward regimentation and greater rigidity, marches toward socialism as failures increase, and ends in dictatorship.

The fascist system, wrote Mises, "clung first to the same principles of economic policies which all not outright socialist governments have adopted in our day, interventionism. Then later it turned step by step toward the German system of socialism, i.e., all-round state control of economic activities."[1]

What distinguished the fascist variety of interventionism was its reliance on the idea of stability to justify extending state power. Big business and labor eagerly allied with the state to obtain stability against what Murray Rothbard called business fluctuations, the ups and downs of particular markets that result from shifting consumer demands. They naïvely thought that state power could supplant consumer sovereignty with their own producer sovereignty over their industries while maintaining the greater productivity of the division of labor.

At first, the fascists used state spending, mainly for war, to eliminate business fluctuations. Only after they became dependent on the state did the leaders of big business and labor realize that they had merely traded consumer sovereignty for state sovereignty. Soon after they learned which one was the more exacting taskmaster.

To extend their control, the fascists bolstered fiscal expenditures with debt and monetary inflation. Not only did they hope thereby to dominate more and more industries with their expenditures, but also to boost public support for their regimes by generating economic prosperity. Instead, their reckless spending and inflating set in motion the boom-bust cycle. They took the depression as an opportunity to extend their power further by socializing investment with regulations while claiming that such measures would stabilize the business cycle.

The fascists found a readymade theoretical justification for stabilization policies in the work of John Maynard Keynes.[2] Keynes claimed that the instability of capitalism emanated from the free play the system gave to the "animal spirits" of investors. Driven by bouts of over-optimism and over-pessimism, investors alternate between bullish spending and bearish hoarding sending the economy into fits of boom and bust.

Keynes proposed to eliminate this instability with state control over both sides of the capital markets. A central bank with the power to inflate the money supply through credit expansion would determine the supply of capital funding and fiscal and regulatory policy would socialize the investment of capital.

In an open letter to President Roosevelt published in the New York Times on December 31, 1933, Keynes counseled this plan:

In a field of domestic policy, I put in the forefront, a large volume of loan expenditure under government auspices. I put in the second place the maintenance of cheap and abundant credit. . . . With these . . . I should expect a successful outcome with great confidence. How much that would mean, not only to the material prosperity of the United States and the whole world, but in comfort to men's minds through a restoration of their faith in the wisdom and the power of government.[3]

Keynes was even more enthusiastic for the spread of his faith in Germany. In the preface to the German edition of the General Theory, published in 1936, Keynes wrote:

The theory of aggregate production, which is the point of the following book, nevertheless can be much easier adapted to the conditions of a totalitarian state than the theory of production and distribution of a given production put forth under conditions of free competition and a large degree of laissez-faire.[4]

State control of money, credit, banking, and investment became the blueprint for fascist stabilization policy. Thus, the expansion of state control under fascism followed a predictable pattern. Debt and monetary inflation paid for state spending. The resulting expansion of credit led to the boom-bust cycle. The financial collapse of the bust resulted in stricter regulation of banking and socialization of investment, which permitted more monetary inflation, credit expansion, debt and spending. The consequent decline in the purchasing power of money justified price and wage controls, which became the focal point of all-around state control. In some cases more slowly and in other cases more rapidly, fascism followed this path toward central planning.

(snip)

http://www.mises.org/story/1935#

by Darren Wolfe (15 articles, 400 quicklinks, 141 diaries, 1031 comments [84 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 5:16:18 PM

  (0+)

The Libertarian Party is!

If you are interested in restoring our free republic with the Constitution intact, then consider the Libertarian Party! See LP.org.

Ron Paul is the only Republican contender that was ever true to its principles. Now they are on the verge of nominating John Mc Cain who is closer to the Democrats.

We need to continue to support Ron Paul. If the GOP does not nominate him (and right now it looks impossible) then he might decide to accept a third party nomination. I hope that would be the Libertarian Party with an endorsement from the Constitution Party.

by Alice Lillie (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 72 comments [16 recommended, 1 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 2:19:37 PM

  (0+)

Thank you for refreshing my memory about Reagan. I was in denial about many of the things you wrote because let's face it, do I want to really face up to the fact I've been loyal to a party that has actually increased the government so dramatically.  At least Bill Clinton did it while being fiscally responsible.

I did like how Reagan stood up to the air traffic controller's union. You know there is a person alive today who would have had the guts to do that.

by Debra Craig (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 8 comments) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 7:43:40 PM

  (0+)

Ronald Reagan, a great president? You decide where how high that bar is.

Kick-started his 1980 campaign in Nashtoba County, Mississippi with the coded call on behalf of “states rights.” Oh, Nashtoba? That’s the country where Philadelphia, MS is. You do remember Philadelphia, MS don’t you? Try Mississippi Burning, in 1964.

Prior to 1980, RR strongly opposed the Voting Rights and the Equal Rights Acts. What a bonhomie fellow, that Ronnie was, eh?

More members of his administration were investigated, indicted, tried and convicted on felonies than in the administrations of any other president, before or since; more than 300.

His deregulation mantra was a direct contributor to the Michael Milken/Ivan Boesky junk bond fiasco and the Michael Keeting/Neil Bush/Jeb Bush/John McCain S&L meltdown that US taxpayers bailed out to the tune of tens of billions during the Reagan administration!

The two deepest and longest and most destructive recessions since The Great Depression occurred on his watch; 1983 and 1987; 10.2% unemployment rate in 1983, 11.3% in 1987.

In 1987, President Reagan presided over the most severe stock market crash since 1929!

Prior to Bush II, the largest government deficits in US history — including during WWII — occurred through almost the entirety of the Reagan years, and saw the national debt double.

Although he signed the bill, Mr. Reagan bitterly opposed designating any day as a memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and had Nobel Peace Prize winner Nelson Mandela designated a terrorist, and Mandela’s African National Congress as a “terrorist organization.” Prior to and through the crumbling of the apartheid system in South Africa, Reagan supported that odious regime by vetoeing sanctions against it.

Reagan supported the brutal dictatorships of Pinochet in Chile and Suharto in Indonesia.

In 1983, Reagan responded to the murder of 241 Marines in Lebanon by cutting and running, only to later invade Club Med in Grenada.

Through the entire 8 years of his administration, Reagan supplied Osama bin Laden with military equipment and intelligence.

Ronald Reagan sent Donald Rumsfeld to Baghdad three times, to shake the hand of Saddam Hussein and to supply the dictator with the seed chemicals for the WMD the Iraqi president would use on his own Kurdish population in 1987. The entirety of the Reagan administration stood stone silent over the travesty! Exactly as he did when terrorists blew up the Pan-Am jet over Lockerbie, Scotland!

During the Reagan administration, the United States became the world’s largest and most prolific trafficker in illegal arms and drugs (Iran Contra).

And Debra, I haven’t even gotten started. I’d hope a school teacher would have a better grip on history than the miserable level of ignorance you manifest. But then, that has been the Republican way.

— Ed Tubbs

by Ed Tubbs (232 articles, 1 quicklinks, 28 diaries, 75 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 8:01:33 PM

  (0+)

Ronald Reagan, a great president? You decide how high that bar is.

Kick-started his 1980 campaign in Nashtoba County, Mississippi with the coded call on behalf of “states rights.” Oh, Nashtoba? That’s the country where Philadelphia, MS is. You do remember Philadelphia, MS don’t you? Try Mississippi Burning, in 1964.

Prior to 1980, RR strongly opposed the Voting Rights and the Equal Rights Acts. What a bonhomie fellow, that Ronnie was, eh?

More members of his administration were investigated, indicted, tried and convicted on felonies than in the administrations of any other president, before or since; 138 total.

His deregulation mantra was a direct contributor to the Michael Milken/Ivan Boesky junk bond fiasco and the Michael Keeting/Neil Bush/Jeb Bush S&L meltdown that US taxpayers bailed out to the tune of tens of billions during the Reagan administration!

The two deepest and longest and most destructive recessions since The Great Depression occurred on his watch; 1983 and 1987; 10.2% unemployment rate in 1983, 11.3% in 1987.

In 1987, President Reagan presided over the most severe stock market crash since 1929!

Prior to Bush II, the largest government deficits in US history — including during WWII — occurred through almost the entirety of the Reagan years, and saw the national debt double.

Although he signed the bill, Mr. Reagan bitterly opposed designating any day as a memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and had Nobel Peace Prize winner Nelson Mandela designated a terrorist, and Mandela’s African National Congress as a “terrorist organization.” Prior to and through the crumbling of the apartheid system in South Africa, Reagan supported that odious regime by vetoeing sanctions against it.

Reagan supported the brutal dictatorships of Pinochet in Chile and Suharto in Indonesia.

In 1983, Reagan responded to the murder of 241 Marines in Lebanon by cutting and running, only to later invade Club Med in Grenada.

Through the entire 8 years of his administration, Reagan supplied Osama bin Laden with military equipment and intelligence.

Ronald Reagan sent Donald Rumsfeld to Baghdad three times, to shake the hand of Saddam Hussein and to supply the dictator with the seed chemicals for the WMD the Iraqi president would use on his own Kurdish population in 1987. The entirety of the Reagan administration stood stone silent over the travesty! Exactly as he did when terrorists blew up the Pan-Am jet over Lockerbie, Scotland!

During the Reagan administration, the United States became the world’s largest and most prolific trafficker in illegal arms and drugs (Iran Contra).

And Debra, I haven’t even gotten started.

by Ed Tubbs (232 articles, 1 quicklinks, 28 diaries, 75 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Feb 8, 2008 at 8:04:21 PM

  (0+)

That it is a gangster group running american ,has been since jfk died.

both sides of the coin are run by gangsters ,they silenced Mike gravel and Denis Kucinich in the same way they did Ron Paul.

the only power left to Americans is to stop spending untill the country is bankrupted ,this will make them angry  because all their friends (Elites ) will be losing money.

America is being consumed by monsters today,ungodly and are ready to hand it all to the UN ,to a global Govt.

I understand your pain 20,000 Americans leave America  each year they have given up.most of the 20,000 are  people with bussiness savy , for each one  of these that leave they need  to  invite 500 illegals into the country to offset the taxes they lose.Even a third party has  little chance the voting is rigged,Where in a democracy does court appointed presidents fit in.

by dave stanley (5 articles, 1 quicklinks, 7 diaries, 286 comments) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 2:53:52 AM

  (0+)

if you look into real history not  the garbage propaganda you get in schools.

You will find they did the same to Lincoln ,lincoln is hailed today as the guy who freed the blacks,he was a rascist. firstly he freed only the blacks in the south as a means to cripple the south. secondly he openly argued that the blacks were not  to be  made equals in anythingm that the whites  are to be the masters above them.

John Brown is the one who fought to free the blacks yet where is he in History books . a foot note at best. Reagan brought America down a notch,ever since Reagan each president did the same .Today bush wants to end America ,all that stands  in his way is his proclaiming marshal law .

by dave stanley (5 articles, 1 quicklinks, 7 diaries, 286 comments) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 3:03:59 AM

  (0+)

I’m happy that people are questioning Republican ideas, but there is something else that I’d like to address.

My father grew up during the depression and fought in WWII. He definitely understood what fascism was and how the failure of classic liberalism opened the door for the fascists in Germany, Italy, and Japan. That’s why people overwhelmingly voted for Roosevelt and the social democratic reforms of the New Deal. Liberalism and democracy could not have survived without the intervention of the federal government. My father, my uncles, and my grandfather all worked for the CCCs and the WPAs during the Depression because all of the mills had closed. They knew how close the country had come to revolution, and they were thankful that the federal government stepped in. If you asked them about fascism, they equated it with wealthy financiers, mill owners, and industrialists. People who lived in company owned mill towns intrinsically understood what fascism was.

Fascism is totalitarian capitalism, where corporations and government merge and corporations play the dominant role: hence, the corporate state. Corporations and monopolies naturally occur in capitalism because they bring maximum profits to their wealthy investors. Fascism is the result of free market capitalism.

Hitler and Mussolini were only able to come to power with the financial backing of wealthy industrialists. Nazism is a mixture of fascist economics and racism.

by Mark Whittington (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 30 comments [9 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 3:38:13 AM

  (0+)

Mark,

It's hard to know where to start with your post.

"My father grew up during the depression and fought in WWII. He definitely understood what fascism was and how the failure of classic liberalism opened the door for the fascists in Germany, Italy, and Japan."

What failed was the government's interventionism in the economy. There are specific reasons why the worst depression in history happened after the proggressive eras "reforms".

"That’s why people overwhelmingly voted for Roosevelt and the social democratic reforms of the New Deal."

Actually, FDR ran on an austerity platform & critisized Hoover for being a big spender. The New Deal was just a way to buy votes, a Tamany Hall writ large.

"They knew how close the country had come to revolution, and they were thankful that the federal government stepped in."

Sadly, a lot of people still think that way. What they don't realize is that the economic problems were caused by the gov's interventions.

"Corporations and monopolies naturally occur in capitalism because they bring maximum profits to their wealthy investors. Fascism is the result of free market capitalism."

Corporations are not free market entities, they are a creation & extention of the state.

Monopolies can occur in the early stages of new industries when the first producers have to create the market. They never last in a free market as other players will always appear to compete.

So, Fascism is the result of the gov's destroying Capitalism.

"Also, fascism and socialism are polar opposites...."

Actually, Fascism is a form of socialism. Remember that nazi stands for national socialist. Not only that but Mussolini was a socialist. He was the editor of Avanti, a socialist newspaper. He went on to found Il Populo D'Italia, another socialist newspaper. It was only when he realised that 1) socialism didn't work & 2) that the Italian people wouldn't support it that he repudiated socialism & dreamed up fascism.

"If the nineteenth was the century of the individual it may be expected that this one may be the century of "collectivism" and therefore the century of the State."

This is from "Doctrine of Fascism"

( http://www.historyguide.org/europe/duce.html ) written in 1932 by Mussolini. Note the collectivist basis of fascism. 

by Darren Wolfe (15 articles, 400 quicklinks, 141 diaries, 1031 comments [84 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 7:55:52 AM

  (0+)

Fascism occurs whether it's the government controlling every aspect of production, etc.. or when corporate/business interests control government. It is about a consolidation of power that controls the people's ability to work, support themselves, have access to food, water, everything, and uses that power and control to oppress and subjugate the people. Fascism as in Italy emerged under the auspices of socialist politicians, but fascism also would come about under any form of Marxism, as well as under neo-conservatism, which is far right wing. Both political extremes are pretty much the same thing, when you look at outcomes. A few elites running roughshod over the rights of the many.

by J Perry (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 12:50:17 PM

  (0+)

My, my...never did I expect such mind-opening comments when I wrote this article.  I thank everyone who posted their opinions, which in turn, has given me some excellent food for thought; and I do have lots of thoughts.

But the one I want to address  is to Mr. Tubbs...Did you not read my post directly above yours?  I admit that I had probably drank the Kool-Aid when it came to Ronald Reagan because I have been watching too many Republican debates where all you heard is how everyone compared themselves to  him.  In my adult life, Ronald Reagan is the closest thing I know of being a somewhat decent President especially when compared to the George Bush regime. Besides, who really wants to admit that a party they have believed in hasn't had any real leaders in the last 30 years? 

I am also biased towards Reagan for another reason. He made an impression on me in how he stood up to the Air Traffic Controller's union.  What politician would have the guts to do that today?  NONE of them, particularly Obama and Clinton.  

I'm not a union fan because as a member of one of the nation's largest union--the teachers' union-- I see that my own has done NOTHING, or at least little to help public schools.  All I see them do is screaming for "more money" while ignoring real issues, like why we schools have no power when it comes to simple things like making kids attend school.  According to some of these posts, other people would also include the mis-education of our society. But my rants on the problems in education is a topic for another day.

I just feel our country has lost focus and the vision of what we are supposed to be. We aren't supposed to be a society so dependent on our government for every need. It would be one thing if it was a "good" government, but it's not. It's corrupt and dysfunctional. I will never believe that's why our American Revolution was fought for us to end up like this.

While I've never considered myself a conspiracy theorist, sadly, that is changing. I'm beginning to agree more with comments like "Dave Stanley" when he wrote..."That it is a gangster group running american ,has been since jfk died. both sides of the coin are run by gangsters ,they silenced Mike gravel and Denis Kucinich in the same way they did Ron Paul."

And as I keep repeating, we could actually face another 8 years with the Bush-Clinton dynasty continuing?

It's not the way it is supposed to be and something needs to be done about it.  At some point those of us who care, cannot just sit back and be complacent. Unfortunately, I just don't have the answer on what we need to do.  

by Debra Craig (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 8 comments) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 6:01:24 AM

  (0+)

I have been a democrat all my adult life, up until a few weeks back when I reaffiliated as an independent. I voted uncommitted here in Michigan because I could not, would not vote for Hillary Clinton. I was an Edwards supporter, he  was the only candidate committted to ending or renegotiating NAFTA, CAFTA and all other bad trade deals, including MFN status for China. The state legislature, the governor and Senator Carl Levin with a few others colluded to frontload our primary with Clinton, and she violated an agreement not to run here to pressure Michigan to move the primary date  back a week. She broke her promise and was one of our few choices to vote for.

I voted for Bill Clinton twice in the '90s and wish I could take those votes back. While he did some good things, they are far outweighed by the negative things he did. He helped push through bad trade deals that ransacked our country, destroying our middle class, ensuring that poor Americans would be pushed out of the job market. He leveraged the corporate interests abiity to impose domination over our government and citizens rights. He, and his wife, Hillary Clinton helped corporations like Monsanto, big oil and pharmaceutical companies to have a seat at the table writing legislation. Face it, Bush couldn't have gotten away with half of what he has, had Clinton not greased his way.

Prior to Bill attaining the presidency, Hillary Clinton as a partner in the Rose Law firm worked for Monsanto, Tyson Foods and Walmart, and she continued promoting their interests as first lady. Since aquiring her senate seat she has continued to do their bidding, and has become the darling of foreign governments and their corporate interests. She is more closely allied to India and Saudi governments than she is to her citizen constituency.

When Hillary Clinton announced a fundraiser "Rural Americans for Hillary" late last year, she didn't provide the interesting particulars to the public that the fundraiser was held at the lobbying headquarters of Monsanto, on K St in Washington, DC. Do rural Americans own, like Monsanto, 56 brownfields in the US? The guestlist was filled with similar corporate interests, oil and company execs, including Alan Quasha, who was the Harken Energy money man who bailed George W. Bush's failed Arbusto Oil Company out and brought him into Harken Energy, and helped buy Bush's way into the white house in 2000, and has been a big backer of Bush and his interests ever since.

Now Quasha is funding the wife of Bill Clinton, for the same reason. The Clinton's have shown themselves to be willing to sit in the pockets of anyone who would pay them. Neither I, nor the majority of Americans can see themselves voting for her.

 I was receptive to voting for Mitt Romney, because he wasn't a bad candidate, if Edwards wasn't the democratic nominee. I can never vote for McCain. I am looking at Obama, but I'm still not sure. If it's a choice between Clinton and Obama, I'd vote Obama.

There is talk of Bloomberg, but he's a neo-con, not a democrat or a moderate republican. He's tied to the same corporate interests who promote globalization and the NAU/SPP.

I'd be content to vote Obama and help vote more good republicans into the congress, so as to vote out bad, corporate democrats. I think this is the only strategy we have with the insane way the primary has been manipulated. We have to save our country and don't believe we have another election to waste.

We can not afford four more years of the same policies and interests being promoted.

by J Perry (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 13 comments) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 12:40:27 PM

  (0+)

Henry Ford is reputed to have opined that “history is bunk.” The adjectival words, phrases, sentences and paragraphs that attend any report of it, unquestionably can indeed turn it into that. The consequent predicate being “can.”

Regardless that a miller’s daughter might be viewed by some as actually spinning gold from straw, the bare-knuckle facts will always remain unchanged; it will be straw, and the only gold will be that which finds its way to the eyes of those who would twist it.

History is rather like that.

Of course, where is the harm, if some or many would twist bare-knuckle facts into fiction?

Perhaps “nowhere” is an answer, though I submit otherwise, though I submit the harm is extreme.

On the one hand, the unchallenged practice degrades history as an honorable study while it concomitantly insults the intelligence of those the spinners presume to be too ignorant to recognize both the insult and the misstatement of facts. 

On another plane, it can be insidiously devastating on a population and a world caught up and subjected to what is after all a lie, or a series of lies. History is replete with a retelling of the deceptive efforts and their terrible products.

I would beg your indulgence to permit me to provide a few examples.

Fiction, yes. But the movie Atonement is a tale how a wholly innocent man’s life can be utterly destroyed by a vengeful young girl’s made up story of the man’s improper sexual advance upon her. However the movie is a fiction, it has happened.

In our own country, innocent men have been lynched on nothing more consequent than the idle imaginings of those bent on the evil.

But even more current, thousands upon thousands of innocent Iraqis have perished, multiples of times more have been mutilated and forced from their homes, and 4,000 of our military have lost their lives as at least fifteen times that number have been disfigured physically and untold countless others have been emotionally and/or psychologically scarred. Our national security has been terribly weakened, as pan-global populations distrust us and loathe us. Our scarce treasure has been disemboweled at the very moment that the forces of global competition demand we upgrade every aspect of our infrastructure. And not the least at the end of a lengthy scroll of miscreant deeds, the contents of the most sacred document this country can cling to, our Constitution, has been treated like it was cheap toilet tissue. And all of it on spun straw.

Bare-knuckle facts matter. And they must always be seen to matter, most importantly to teachers, those all of us rely on to elevate our youth to their rightful place as informed citizens. But when the teacher is him- or herself uninformed, the students he or she is responsible for can never hope to be. And . . . for want of a nail . . . the nation was lost.

It is always a good thing, to welcome into our cause as many as we can; like a furniture retailer gathering inventory from the truck. Nonetheless, should we overlook the marred pieces, simply to build that inventory? Those pieces might be amenable to refinishing, but until the blemish is erased by whatever efforts might be necessary, it will remain and will diminish the overall value of the stock thereby.  

The words from Ms. Craig’s offering that struck my heart savagely are these: “For the past eight years, I have been embarrassed by a president hoping [sic] his nightmarish tenure was just an aberration on the successful track record of the political party who [sic] proudly boasts Ronald Reagan as its most beloved member.”

The GOP’s extended effort has proven itself to be a successful application of the “Big Lie.”

If Ms. Craig had identified herself as anything other than a teacher, I might have felt less aggrieved. But, for starters, the GOP is the party of Lincoln. Would Ms. Craig, in her educator role, contend to her charges that somehow President Reagan was, or even ought to be, held in higher esteem than our 16th president? 

Sadly, tragically, few Americans today have the first whiff of a guess concerning the malevolencies that attended the Eisenhower administration — the global conspiracies of Allen, and his older brother, John Foster Dulles to support the most brutal of dictatorships [CIA support of Fulgencio Batista led inexorably to Fidel Castro; the 1953 CIA removal of popularly elected Mohammed Mossadeq and replacement by Shah Reza Pahlevi led directly to the Iran hostage crisis; CIA support of Alfredo Stroessner in Paraguay bred fed hostilities through the continent; the CIA-organized coup d’état overthrow of Patrice Lumumba in the Congo provided a clear path for Soviet expansion in the sub-Saharan region], and the docile acceptance by our 34th president of Senator Joseph “I have a List” McCarthy’s pogroms was a most egregious calumny that has been surpassed only by similar efforts by George W.

Putting lipstick on a hog (Ronald Reagan’s tenure [see my brief catalog — on this site — of the history]) has been extraordinarily effective. Much of America has bought whole hog the ruse, and it has led directly to the mass of sufferings that today’s, and tomorrow’s, populations have been and will be forced to endure. 

Should I have dissembled, been disingenuous by just letting it — the maintenance of the RR beatification — go? I have tried hard to fill in a few gaps here on Op-Ed News, when I found them. I’ve tried hard to elevate the discourse with thoughtful offerings that might serve to counter the excreta so prevalent on the smoke-screen Right.

Why not let your readers decide: do I stay, or go?

Thanks for permitting me my defense.

by Ed Tubbs (232 articles, 1 quicklinks, 28 diaries, 75 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 5:30:08 PM

  (0+)

GO!!! PLEASE GO!!!

by gary miller (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 2 comments) on Sunday, Feb 10, 2008 at 6:53:37 PM

  (0+)

Debra,

I thought you might find this funny. ************************************************

Libertarian Party sends condolences to the Republican National Committee

With the rise of John McCain, LP offers sympathy for the death of small-government values within the GOP

Washington, D.C. - Following a solid McCain victory in the Super Tuesday primaries, the Libertarian Party has sent Republican headquarters a funeral wreath marking the death of limited-government values within the Republican Party. The wreath was hand-delivered to the D.C. offices of the Republican National Committee. "We simply felt the need to express our heartfelt sympathy for the Republican Party as they undergo this tough time within their party," says Libertarian Party National Media Coordinator Andrew Davis, who delivered the wreath.

"Given that it has become readily apparent that Senator McCain will soon be the presidential nominee for the Republican Party," reads a card that accompanied the wreath addressed to RNC Chairman Mike Duncan, "we, the staff of the Libertarian National Committee, send our condolences to you upon the death of small-government principles within the GOP."

The note continues:

by Darren Wolfe (15 articles, 400 quicklinks, 141 diaries, 1031 comments [84 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Feb 9, 2008 at 8:16:48 PM

  (0+)

Outstanding!!!

Thank you... Please keep submitting articles...

I love the way you nailed it!!!

by gary miller (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 2 comments) on Sunday, Feb 10, 2008 at 6:37:50 PM

  (0+)

Every  four  years  we  have  two  options.

1. We  can  line  up  like  sheep  at  the  voting  booth  &  give  our  consent  to  four  more  years  of  corruption,  mismanagement,  pork  &  high  taxes  or

2.  Stay  home  &  complain  that  our  vote  doesn't  count.

What  I  am  proposing  is  a  third  option.  Because  the  rules  have  changed  &  our  vote  has  been  hijacked  by  privilege  &  special  interest.

We  must  find  new  ways  to  be  heard,  to  wrestle  control  of  our  government  out  of  the  hands  of  big  business  &  corporate  lobbyist.

What  I  am  proposing  is  that  we  don't  act  like  sheep  on  election  night  &  we  don't  sit  at  home  &  complain.  What  I  propose  is  that  we  stand  up  like  men  &  say  enough  is  enough!

This  proposal  was  born  when  I  saw  voters  come  together  &  effectively  stop  the  legislation  known  as  the  Comprehensive  Immigration  Reform  bill.  How  did  they  do  it?  So  many  voters  called  the  senate  switchboard  that  it  overloaded  the  switchboard  &  it  had  to  be  shut  down.

They  stood  up  &  said  enough  is  enough,  we're  mad  as  hell  &  we're  not  going  to  take  it  anymore!

We  need  to  do  the  same  thing  on  election  night.

          JUST  SAY  NO  TO  CORPORATE  (FUNDED)  POLITICIANS!

FOR  MORE  VISIT:  www.votestrike.com

by chris rice (111 articles, 144 quicklinks, 35 diaries, 233 comments) on Friday, Feb 15, 2008 at 11:50:52 AM

  (0+)