CommonDreams Refugees

The comments on the post below have told me a couple of things.

1) There are actually people who read this site. At least occaisionally. Wow!
2) Anyone who is critical of Obama and the Democrats is being booted off of the CommonDreams website.

The latter makes me thing that people need a place to gather and discuss. Its better if we gather together and stay in touch. While the forums at CommonDreams used to be a place to do this, it seems apparent that the new Democratic censorship is going to make this hard to do there.

I don't know if this site is the place to do that. But, I'm willing to help where I can. CD refugees are welcome to comment here. I'd also be willing to open up the posting privlidges here to allow others to write here if they are interested.

And one thing that could certainly be done is if CommonDreams refugees want to post links or email to stay in touch, this thread could be a place to do that.

But, I'm also thinking maybe its time for a new site. I might try to get something started. Maybe have links to articles on other sites, but with the ability to comment freely on that site. So, for instance it could have a link to an interesting article on CommonDreams, but then it could also allow a free and uncensored discussion of that article.

If anyone is interested, leave a comment below. Not only about my ideas, but with your own.

A new era of Democratic censorship

Its amazing how if you scratch a Democrat, under the fake out outer covering, they act just like a Republican. I dared to post some comments on the CommonDreams site that tried to point out that everything might not be as rosy as the Obamabots are saying it is in the glow of their victory. They tended to point out that Obama still supported the wars, was pushing the wall street bailout, and generally hadn't really promised anything 'progressive' during the campaign. And that he won the campaign with record amounts of corporate money in his accounts, topping the amounts Bush had run on.

Do that on a Democratic site like Common Dreams, and that gets you blocked and banned these days. The Democrats are as intolerant of dissent as the Republicans. That's going to be one of the interesting things to watch in the coming months, as all the 'progressives' start to wake up to that fact. Especially since the Democrats and Obama won't be enacting a progressive agenda and won't be following a 'progressive' foreign policy. When the true progressives start to raise their voices. When they try to do exactly what the Democrats said during the campaign that they should do and try to 'hold the Democrats feet to the fire.', when that colides with the little fact that the Democrats are as intolerent of dissent as the Republicans, then it will start to get interesting.

Progressives. Those who oppose the wars. Now is the time to act.

To all who oppose the war.  To all who really call themselves 'progressives'.  This is the time to act.
We can see the course of this election.  Obama and the Democrats win this in a landslide.  That's the big course of things and its set and its already in motion.
We are going to see an Obama administration with the Democrats in control of Congress.  We also know that the Democrats won't want to listen to us.  That they'll still want to continue the wars.  That they won't want to prosecute the Bush criminals.   That they'll want to give our money to their rich friends on Wall Street.  That they'll want to call us 'idiot liberals' and ban us from the room.  We know this from the Democrats.  We have seen this from them over the last few years.
How do we make an Obama administration respect us and listen to what we want?  We keep hearing that we have to be the ones to 'pressure' an Obama administration.  How do we do that?
The only language they understand is political power.  We need to show it.  We need to have every Democratic Representative or Senator looking at the combined Nader\McKinney vote in their district or state and saying  'holy cow!'.  The more votes we put on the board right now, the more we get their attention and the more respect we get.  By putting votes on the board right now, we show real political power.
Its a safe vote.  Obama wins this in a landslide.  The Democrats win this in a landslide.  The states 'in play' are traditional Republicans ones like Indiana, Virginia and North Carolina.  To even think about winning, McCain has to sweep every state where he's even within shouting distance of Obama, and then maybe even one or two more.  Obama and the Democrats have this one in a lock.
Spread the word.  Now is the time. If there was ever a moment to vote your conscious and vote for an alternative to the corporate parties, it is this election.  Its a safe vote.  Obama wins big regardless.  The key point for right now is that actually, the closer we make this, the better it is for us.  If the Democrats are holding their breath on election night saying 'oh my gawd!' while they watch the numbers roll in with state after state they thought was solidly in their win column instead becoming razor thin with big vote totals for Nader and McKinney, then that's great for us.  We want to give them a heart attack.  That's the only way they'll take us seriously.
Do you want to really stop these wars?  Then vote your conscience.  Register a political earthquake the Democrats can't help but feel.
Do you really want to protect the environment?  Do you really want to turn the tide seriously back against global warming?  Then vote your conscience.  Register a political earthquake the Democrats can't help but feel. 
We want every congressional  Democrat looking ahead to the 2010 elections while seeing a strong Nader\McKinney vote in their districts. We want each of them shuddering at what the prospects of an angry, progressive, antiwar, third party campaign in 2010 in their districts would do to their congressional careers.  Do you want to really change things?  That's how to do it.
Now is the time.  This is the election.  This is the moment to act.

Police attack journalists at RNC

Democracy Now! has video on today's show of the police attacking their journalists trying to cover the police riot at the RNC peace march.

Nicole Salazar being arrested for filming police at RNC.


Amy Goodman's arrest for daring to asking what's happening to her reporters.

What kind of extremists will we be?

"This is horseshit" by Cindy Sheehan

It is not if we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists will we be -- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr

Love that quote. Probably need to put it up on the website somewhere. Maybe right next to the George Carlin line. :)

You know, I don't care if it's not proper for a Congressional candidate to say: "horseshit." I don't care if it is not a good "tactic" to get kicked out of a Congressional non-impeachment hearing that was just a bunch of horseshit anyway.

If people can't see how this nation is teetering on the precipice of financial ruin and dragging the rest of this planet down with us as we destroy our ecology, too…and if people don't realize how desperate our situation is, then I must say, that's horseshit!

That's Cindy Sheehan in the article referenced above. Go to her campaign website on that is linked over on the right side of this page to donate or volunteer.

Actually, I'd say its a cornerstone of the American political system, at least as it was designed by the writers of the Constitution, for a candidate to say "This is horseshit." That's the nature of a democratic and free society. The very strength of a democratic and free society is that someone can run for elected office saying "This is horseshit!".

If we restrict that in the quise of proper language and proper behavior, we've lost something. In fact we've lost something vital. Because it is vital that our political system be able to look at horseshit and call horseshit by its proper name.

When we see a political leader, like Ms. Nancy Pelosi, who is leading the country into war, torture, police-state spying, horrible deficits on a useless military, we need to have candidates who can stand up and call anti-American horseshit by its proper name. In fact its critical that someone stand up and say "This is horseshit!"

And especially when a political leader, like Ms. Nancy Pelosi, breaks the solemn oath of office that she gave to 'protect and defend the Constitution of the United States', and does so for only grass political gain, it is critical that someone stand up and say "This is horseshit!"

All of our American freedoms are based on the principle of a government divided into three separate and co-equal branches which all provide checks and balances against each other. The writers of the Constitution knew that there was a danger of one branch getting out of control and seizing too much power for itself. Especially the Executive Branch. These were people who had just fought a bloody and nasty revolution for nearly a decade to get themselves out from under a tyrant who had done just that. So, they were very careful to try to design for America a political system that would try to prevent the need to ever do that again.

Yet today, we see Ms. Pelosi and the Democrats destroying that system. And they are doing so purely for their own political interests. They are doing so for the small, crass motive of more political power for themselves and their party. America be damned is what they are saying. The Constitution be damned is what they are saying. If they think it increases the chances of a Democrat victory in the next election, they'll gladly toss it all away.

By the time the Democrats took the majority of Congress in early 2007, there was already a long record of abuses and usurpations by this current administration that demanded a serious investigation into whether impeachable offenses had been committed. The war in Iraq is one. Signing statements are another. Traveling around the world kidnapping people and disappearing them into secret prisons would be on the list. As well as torturing the people in those prisons. Unconstitutional, warrantless spying on the American people would be on that list.

Any one of these would certainly be a 'high crime' and worthy of impeachment. And each of these Democratic Congresspeople stood up and took an oath to 'protect and defend the constitution of the United States'. Given that oath, beginning an impeachment investigation would seem to be a mandatory and neccessary FIRST act of that new Congress.

Instead, the Democrats have violated that oath. They are destroying the structure of checks and balances the founders envisioned as neccessary to keep us free. And they've done so for only the crass political reason of trying to sieze power for themselves in the next election. At no point have the Democrats refuted all of the arguments leading towards impeachment. Instead they only talk about politics.

When Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Reid took impeachment 'off the table' long before the last election, they didn't do so for legal or constitutional reasons. They did it for political reasons. When they've consistently ignored the evidence that demands impeachment, they did so for political reasons.

If there is anything that should make almost all of the current Congressional Democrats declared unfit for office, it is this violation of a sacred oath and the abandonment of this sacred duty. They've declared themselves to be anti-American. They've made it clear that they would destroy America and its Constitution in order to obtain high political office. And that should be a clear sign that they shouldn't be given even the responsibilities of a local dog catcher.

There should be more than one of us saying, "This is horseshit!"

Money, Civil Disobedience and other stuff

Money .... can't help but to notice that the little Maplight.org widget above these posts has updated with June numbers on campaign finance. Obama must have raised about $50 million last month compared to McCain with $25 million.

Its striking to someone who's followed politics for a long time that its the Republican who's taking the public financing route for an election, and criticizing the Democrat for not doing so. That alone speaks volumes about the current campaign. Along with the numbers showing that Obama is out fund-raising McCain by Republican-like numbers.

Follow the money, and usually it will show you the winner in American politics. And, you can count on a candidate not biting the hand that feeds it. Want to know why Obama is disavowing everything even moderately progressive that he said or even hinted at to get the Democratic nomination? Just watch the dollar amounts tick over on that little Maplight.org widget and you'll know the reason why. That and the "AT&T Convention" handbag for the corporate party here in Denver tell you all you need to know.

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Sometimes people are critical of the Palestinians for not opposing the Israelies non-violently like Dr. King or Ghandi might do. This article over at DissendentVoice.org tells you what happens when they do. "A West Bank Town’s Struggle to Survive"

I strongly believe that people should try to achieve needed change through legal means provided by society as their first option. In a place like America, that means contesting elections and using the courts to enforce laws when possible.

But, the question becomes, what do you do next if you find that the system is rigged to prevent change by those means? To me, the next stage is non-violent civil disobedience.

In order for non-violent civil disobedience to be effective though, you need a couple of things. One is that hopefully your opposition is willing to stay within the rules and not respond with violence in return. If that doesn't happen, you get the line from "V for Vendetta" :

"What's going to happen? What usually happens when people without guns try to stand up to people with guns."

Even that's not the end of the road for non-violent civil disobedience. Ghandi was met with violence at times. And the people just marched forward and let the police beat them.

But that only works when your opposition is willing to listen. What happens if this occurs, but no one knows about it.? Note the lead to the article about Palestine where it notes that this village that is attempting to resist the Israelis is only found in press searches 71 times. How effective is non-violent civil disobedience when no one knows that its suffering at the hands of a violent opposition?

And what are people, who are suffering and who legitimately have grievances, to do when legal attempts to ask for change are blocked and non-violent attempts to step outside the law are met with violence?

Self Evident Truths

Just because these words should always be said on this day. And the corporate media will stop at just acknowledging the right of the pursuit of happiness.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident,
that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,
that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

That to secure these rights,
governments are instituted among men,
deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends,
it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it,
and to institute new government,
laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form,
as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
Prudence, indeed,
will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes;
and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer,
while evils are sufferable,
than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations,
pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism,
it is their right,
it is their duty,
to throw off such government,
and to provide new guards for their future security."

-- The Declaration of Independence

Numbers and the mistake

OK, my background is mathematics and engineering. Sometimes I'm fascinated by the way numbers and statistics will help to illustrate or just plain see a pattern. Yeah, I know numbers and statistics can lie. But sometimes they can be very interesting.

Bill Quiqley, in a piece up on Znet gives numbers compiled by a magazine called Nuclear Resister on the number of anti-war arrests by year.
Since 2002, the NUCLEAR RESISTER has documented anti-war arrests for protestors each year:

2002 - 1800 arrests
2003 6072 arrests
2004 2440 arrests
2005 975 arrests
2006 950 arrests
2007 2272 arrests
2008 810 as of May 1

To me, this pattern, and the fact that the was is still continuing, shows the mistake the anti-war movement has made. One way to look at these numbers is to say that the number of CD arrests by antiwar protesters dropped at the time of the Kerry campaign in 2004. And they stayed down through the 2006 elections, only to start climbing afterwards.

The anti-war movement essentially committed itself to the Democratic Party over this time. They backed the Kerry campaign, didn't support an independent, and seemed to deliberately back off any independent action in that time. This seemed to both kill the momentum of the antiwar movement, and it silently delivered a message that working in politics to back Democrat was the answer.

The number stayed low through the 2006 election. Then it starts to rise again. And surely it starts to rise because the anti-war movement was figuring out that having the Democrats in power in Congress meant nothing to end the war because the Democratic leadership supports the war.

To me, the numbers after 2006 are encouraging. It shows a movement waking up from a delusion that the Democrats were the answer.

Meanwhile, the Democratic leadership is about to ensure passage of a war funding bill that fully funds the Iraq war into 2009 (at a cost of something like over a $160 billion). And they have taken any impeachment acts for lying the nation into war completely 'off the table'. Perhaps that was always a pun too since the mechanism to bury Rep. Kucinich impeachment resolutions is called 'tabling'.

Protection from a Pain Ray

Article from a physicist on how to defend against a pain ray.

Don't Bet Burned! By MANUEL GARCIA, Jr. courtesy of CounterPunch.org

"Fine, but how do you thwart it? The best protection is distance, just don't be the target! However, if one wishes to engage in a demonstration and be protected from this device, the best protection would be your own electromagnetic shielding or "Faraday cage." If you are within a conducting mesh (a Faraday cage), where the mesh openings are small with respect to the incident radiation, and with a ground wire that leads intercepted electromagnetic energy away from you, then you are safe. This remedy is not likely to be convenient, but then, perhaps creative talents can find effective refinements of this concept. A suit of armor with chains trailing from your ankles to leak currents into the ground may not be ideal protection. However, plastic shields with embedded meshing, even aluminum foil or aluminized mylar (shiny garbage bags?), behind which individuals could stand (huddle?, crouch?) might allow people to thwart the intent of the device. Once people understand the physics being used against them, they may be able to to fashion materials readily available to them into effective countermeasures; this requires some planning."