(PHOTO: John McCain - Stark, Raving Mad, And Coming To An Executive Mansion Near You!)
I used to think this was funny, that these people were just clowns in a circus.
But?now I hate?them with all my being for what they have done to my country.
Sorry, Lord.
I tried.
?
?(PHOTO: New Yorkers posess these by the thousands, the NYPD wants to make these people criminals)
The NYPD's?deputy commissioner for counterterrorism wants to ban private ownership of Geiger-Muller counters, air sampling pumps,?and carbon monoxide detectors. The city 'government' of Bloombergia-On-The-Hudson, hot on the heels of forcing chain restaurants?to list the calorie counts of their menu items directly on the menu (but not New York City-based restaurants),?seems to believe?that the time is right to take away the right to sample and monitor the air in the city without a city permit;
Dave Kotelchuck, deputy director of the New York/New Jersey Education and Research Center, pointed out the absurdity of having police regulate and permit research science. "Think about industrial-hygiene folks who are going from Boston to Atlanta to measure, and have atmospheric detectors," he said. "They land in LaGuardia and JFK. As soon as they land, because possession is a misdemeanor, they've committed a misdemeanor. They're not going to test in New York City; they're just travelling through. But possession, which is the way the law has stated it, alone is a misdemeanor?not use. Not attempting to make measurements?just possession. That is just unwarranted."
The ostensible reason for this extraordinary action is that unscrupulous vendors are selling defective detectors to the public, a ludicrous explanation. The real reason might be a?bit more sinister;
Dave Newman, an industrial hygienist for the New York Committee for Occupational Safety and Health, claimed that under this law, the West Virginia air-quality experts who tested the air after 9/11 would have been a bunch of criminals (emphasis mine.)
I should note that I am a Certified Industrial Hygienist, who, as well as having planned and worked on some of the biggest environmental cleanups in the city,?has probably transported or posessed hundreds of such instruments on thousands of trips throughout the Five Boroughs, and while the idea of being a kind of righteous outlaw in the city is somewhat dashing and romantic on one level, it would quickly become a gigantic pain in the ass.
More seriously, this attempt at ass-covering on the part of the multiply culpable city government is both a local fascist power grab and a federally-encouraged experiment to find out if similar repugnant legislation could be fastened on to the American people at large;
There are currently no guidelines regulating the private acquisition of biological, chemical, and radiological detectors," warned Falkenrath, adding that this law was suggested by officials within the Department of Homeland Security.
Nevermind professional people, for technical people, hobbyists,?ordinary citizens, academics, and students who want to take basic measurements relating to environmental quality in the most polluted city in North America (and possibly soon, elsewhere,) this ordinance would be an unmitigated disaster, and a wholesale abrogation of rights.
UPDATE: The American Industrial Hygiene Association, of which I am a proud couldn't be prouder member, has weighed in on this?on their website, and has?sent an official letter to Mayor Bloomie and the city council in opposition to the ordinance.
(Photo from Bunniestudios, link from boingboing)
(PHOTO: What passes for discourse (comment? humor?) among the Liberventionists)
...is much less than it at first appears. I actually sat down and read? all the excerpted quotes in the newsletters themselves (no, I don't own them, the article links to them). Kirchick correctly identifies quotes that many people would find offensive, which is completely what a journalist should do. But he quotes selectively and out of context to make the remarks seem as racist as possible, not the model of objectivity, I am afraid, from a publication and author who are rabidly pro-Jailiani, the candidate who stands the most to gain by dredging this stuff up right now.
Out of all of the newsletters he links to, I could only find one or two things that were patently offensive, and more to my point, almost nothing that was not pretty standard conservative cant at the time. It's widely known, for instance, that MLK plagiarized in his PhD. dissertation and cheated on his wife (the FBI had it on tape, moreover it was a big issue at the time because of Arizona's refusal to pass an MLK day holiday.) We are only a couple of political seasons removed from widespread public conservative criticism of "the Gay Agenda". And after 9/11, we seldom hear about the Waco incident, but it was grist for the conservative mill at the time, not just for wacky militia members..
Limbaugh, Buchanan, Hannity, et al were saying arguably worse things back in the day, so much so that then-president Clinton tried to blame the "right-wing media" for the 1994 OKC Murrah building bombing.
The language used, to modern eyes, is as disturbing as it is because, I submit, of how far we have come as a people with regard to race, sexual orientation, etc. It is certainly worth pondering whether someone who authorized such speech in 1992 can legitimately claim to be neutral with regard to those characteristics, as Paul emphatically does. But what has been done here is a smear, an attempt at destroying the candidacy of a man who while imperfect, offers arguably the most antiracist platform in the Presidential race extant -ending the War on Drugs, ending the Iraq War and the Empire, ending the tyranny of Federal Reserve inflation, Social Security, and the IRS which all disproportionately harm the poor and the aspring black middle class.
When people at CATO, and Reason, and The New Republic, and the major Old Media outlets that had previously been friendly to Ron had the choice of believing in old words, or currently stated intended actions, they decided that the old words were more important. They decided to throw the only Republican who has anything of substance to say about the war, the economy, the destruction of civil liberties and the increase of central tyranny under the proverbial bus (or subway car, as it were).
Sure Ron's excuse was lame, and the reasons for the lameness of the excuse are the subject of innuendo and anonymously cowardly speculation.?I'm not excusing the newsletters, just trying to put in perspective what has been presented a little bit. And the smug, self-satisfied losers who revel in Ron's troubles as though what he did makes him evil, while their own twisted pride is not are not the type of 'enlightened' people I envision as libertarians. And, by definition, anyone who supports a thug like Giuliani cannot be, by definition, a libertarian if they follow someone who, more recently, said this;
"We look upon authority too often and focus over and over again, for 30 or 40 or 50 years, as if there is something wrong with authority. We see only the oppressive side of authority. Maybe it comes out of our history and our background. What we don't see is that freedom is not a concept in which people can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do."
Nothing Ron ever said or implied in those newsletters, I submit, is as anti-libertarian, or anti-freedom, as that Giuliani statement. The very idea that anyone who could support such a megalomaniacal, authoritarian thug is enough to exorcise them from the libertarian movement, TOLERANCE BE DAMNED.
(PHOTO: What Ford is literally doing to its reputation among its most hard-core customers)
UPDATE: I shouldn't have fired off this tirade before checking my sources. Apparently it is Cafe Press, and not Ford who are the source of the trouble. I guess the New Republic smearfest of Ron Paul still has me bugged.
It's because they waste time and resources pissing off their most fanatical customers by doing outrageously stupid?stuff like this;
I got some more info from the folks at cafepress and according to them, a law firm representing Ford contacted them saying that our calendar pics (and our club's event logos - anything with one of our cars in it) infringes on Ford's trademarks which include the use of images of THEIR vehicles. Also, Ford claims that all the images, logos and designs OUR graphics team made for the BMC events ...at this point we will not be producing the 2008 BMC Calendar, featuring our 2007 Members of the Month, solely due to Ford Motor Company's claim that THEY own all rights to the photos YOU take of YOUR car.?
You are hemmohaging red ink, your pet unions want to bleed you dry of what little life remains, and you have the GALL to?tick off some of your most loyal customers, by siccing a gaggle of lawyers on them, commandeering?THEIR photos of THEIR cars which they paid for with?THEIR money?
How unbelievably stupid?ARE you?up there in Dearborn anyway? As long as you insist on such shortsighted, reactionary, self-defeating actions, I will personally tell anyone who asks me about Ford cars what a screwed-up company produces them.
(from Black Mustang Club via BoingBoing, photo from thebidclub.com)
?PHOTO: Some people will say anything to get your change
An article on the Americans For Tax Reform No Tax Pledge?revealed that John McCain, Fred Thompson, and the entire Democratic field had refused to sign the seemingly rather straightforward promise not to raise income taxes.
Given the propensity of both the president and the congress to malignantly increase spending over the past 8 (at least) years, this is disturbing, but scarcely surprising - politicians like to tax and spend, ho hum, right? After all, the rich people pay most of the tax dollars, so it isn't like this behavior harms or threatens the poor or middle class, right?
Wrong, wrong, wrong. Tax policy in the US, both its sources and effects are completely obscured to the public, even in an election year when it should be front and center. It is SO?f-ed up, so pressed down upon the poor and the middle class, and so beneficial to the wealthy, it isn't even fair to call it armed robbery. It is more like forcible financial sodomy and murder. We'll explain.
The Definition Game - What Is A Tax?
The first game that is played is obscuring the tax burden by pencil-buggering it - by defining taxes out of the public view. A tax is defined in wikipedia as follows;
Taxes consist of direct tax or indirect tax, and may be paid in money or as unpaid labour. A tax may be defined as a "pecuniary burden laid upon individuals or property to support the government [?…] a payment exacted by legislative authority."[1] A tax "is not a voluntary payment or donation, but an enforced contribution, exacted pursuant to legislative authority" and is "any contribution imposed by government [?…] whether under the name of toll, tribute, tallage, gabel, impost, duty, custom, excise, subsidy, aid, supply, or other name.
Seems relatively straightforward, right? Dear reader, do not be so naieve! The only tax that is ever discussed in the Old Media is the income tax, and only ever, it seems, in retrospect (George Bush's / Ronald Reagan's / John Kennedy's tax cuts are good / bad and need to be continued / rescinded). These inept sleight-of-hand artists still manage to keep the focus on marginal changes?to the only arguably progressive federal tax. This serves to keep public attention off of the fact that overall the income tax is not all that progressive, as well as?to direct attention away?from two other major regressive taxes, The Social Security / Medicare Tax (FICA) and the Inflation Tax.
The Progressives And Neocons Are Equal Opportunity Robbers
Both "sides" of the taxation debate believe in taxes, though the 'conservatives' claim to favor 'cutting' taxes 'across the board', while 'liberals' claim to favor cutting taxes on 'the middle class'. Both groups claim to care about the Americans who are overtaxed, in their own view. Both are liars. Both raise spending which necessitates, sooner or later, raising taxes.
The one substantial difference I have noticed between "liberals" and "progressives" on one hand, and "conservatives" and "neocons" on the other is that, when discussing tax policy?the former really don't want to call Social Security witholding a "tax" when they talk about why the population is not overtaxed, while the latter will not mention the fact that the truly wealthy pay a vanishingly small percentage of every dollar of their income in tax.
The confusion is, in my view, deliberate. The three main taxes, in order of regressivity are:
Social Security / Medicare (FICA) - even the poorest minimum-wage worker has this 16% slice taken off the top of every dollar they ever make in their lives, which statistically are so short (against the ever-rising
retirement age) that they will never ever get out of it their principal, much less any "interest". Meanwhile, the tax zeroes out at $86,000, so the truly wealthy see this tax disappear on virtually all their earnings.
The Income Tax - Progressives and conservatives note, somewhat approvingly, that most poor people pay little of this, due to the EITC and such. Middle-class people get a small break if they buy a house, that is until they run smack into the AMT. Really rich people have the bulk of their compensation given in the form of participation (stocks, options, etc), taxed at the top capital gains rate of 15%, if at all. (not to pick on Terry Semel, with a $600K salary (taxed at 35%) and $230 MILLION in stock compensation (taxed at 15% when it vests, or possibly never).
The Inflation Tax - Progressives and liberals, along with neocons completely ignore this tax, along with most conservatives. The poor and middle class see this steal any savings (along with other taxes), making saving a losing proposition and increasing the attractiveness of debt, since debts incurred today are paid off later (if ever) with depreciated future dollars (with interest, of course). Meanwhile, the bankers, Wall Street, and the Merchants of Death (Defense contractors) all reap fantastic rewards from this tax, because they get the new money first, before it is depreciated.
The bottom line is that the poor ARE regressively (some say aggressively)?overtaxed, and so are the middle class, the wealthy (while, I will note, pay the bulk of the DOLLARS of tax) are much more lightly taxed, while enjoying benefits unavailable to the masses. Of course, this is interpreted by the progressives, liberals, and neocons as an excuse for even more tax depredations.
So How Can We Fix This?
This dishonest, horribly regressive stack of taxes would be called, rightly, if imposed upon us by a foreign enemy, a war crime. Taken together with all of the other effectively regressive consumption taxes, it is a system that stealthily (and not so stealthily) steals the meagre wealth of the masses and hands it over to the truly rich (not the two-income professional couples the liberals love to call the rich, as in "let's tax the rich".)
The only way, as congressman Ron Paul says, that we can fix this mess is to stop the excessive spending which necessitates the taxation;
Stop The Iraq War.
Stop The Afghan War.
End The Korean War.
End The Spanish-American War?2
End The Hawaiian Incursion
End The Mexican War.
And, while we are at it, end The Civil War already.
?
(PHOTO: Funny image of the periapatetically-smirking Fox host Chris Wallace after a Ron Paul debate drubbing, from David Feldman Comedy)
Fox News is excluding Ron Paul from a televised "Roundtable" debate it is sponsoring just two days before the New Hampshire primary in a transparent attempt to hurt his chances of what is shaping up to be a very good showing there.
This is about the most blatant anti-democratic move yet by the Old Media, and it won't help them stop Ron, but they need to hear from all fair-minded people exactly how wrong what they are doing is, moreover, so do their advertisers. I suggest you write or call Fox and all of its advertisers too. Here is my letter to them;
Ladies and Gentlemen,
How sad I am to have to write this note regarding Fox's decision to exclude Representative Ron Paul from this likely influential media event. I have watched Fox News as long as it has been available in my cable service area(s), and while I on occasion take issue with the views expressed by certain hosts on Fox News' shows, generally I have found that the editorial content presented has been largely in comport with the taglines; "Fair and Balanced", and "We Report, You Decide".
However, Fox's decision not to invite Dr. Paul may have serious repercussions for Fox, its advertisers, and the country. Dr. Paul has raised, and continued to raise important, fundamental questions in this campaign regarding the relationship of the United States to the rest of the world (including borders and immigration policy as well as the Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and brewing trouble with Iran and Pakistan), the effects of Fed policy on the US and the world economy, and the proper Constitutional size and role of the federal government itself.
Recent events in Pakistan bear out the importance of Ron's non-interventionist critique of US foreign policy, and to exclude him from the NH roundtable, on this point alone, is an egregious breach of journalistic duty and ethics on Fox's part. Given the surging support for Ron in the early primaries, Fox's decision will undoubtedly offend, and seriously erode its own viewership among people who are either Paul supporters, have a favorable view of Ron, and anyone who has a sense of fair play.
Even more important, the role of independent journalism in a free society is fundamental to the maintenance of that freedom. The exclusion of Dr. Paul from the roundtable appears to be an attempt by the management of Fox News to abrogate that role in favor of suppressing the voice of the leading advocate for freedom in the 2008 race on either side of the political aisle, for what reasons one can only speculate. I hope Fox News realizes the seriousness of its omission, and invites Ron to the roundtable immediately.
However, if Fox decides not to invite Ron to the NH roundtable, I will join tens of thousands of other fair-minded people in alerting your advertisers of the serious erosion of national discourse this represents, informing them that I and anyone else I can influence will refrain from patronizing them, permanently. I will send a copy of this letter to each of those sponsors and additionally I will post it to my web site.
Please consider this message to be offered in a spirit of fairness and open discourse critical to the continued survival of the republic. Please invite Representative Paul to the NH Roundtable.
Sincerely,
Vince Daliessio
The Liberty Guys
Promoting Liberty, Peace, and Free Enterprise
libertyguys.org
www.ronpaul2008.com
(PHOTO: The New York Times Has A Long History Of Principled Journalistic Integrity, as exemplified by?reporters like Stalin-Boy Walter Duranty).
Pity the poor New York Times. Buffeted by scandals of plagiarism, made-up stories, outright government war-propaganda-mongering, and collapsing readership /?stock price, the sometime crypto-apologist for Stalinism, and august house organ of the Eastern Establishment now has to contend with the rising presidential candidacy of a real Jeffersonian republican, Ron Paul.
When the editorial gods of the paper first became aware of Congressman Paul's candidacy (about four months after everybody else did), they tried to paint the good doctor as a hopeless idealist, hoping,?we suppose that a fluff piece would help seal his fate as a "second-tier candidate". Inadvertently, they headed the story with the by-now iconic shot of Ron flashing the peace sign (taken by photographer Richard DeYoung) against a red backdrop - whoops! And Ron's popularity marched on...
Next, they tried to go back to ignoring Ron. Then the first 'money bomb' on November 5th happened, and they went like "whoah, dude, how'd he do THAT?", yet failed to detect that anything was amiss. And Ron's popularity marched on...
With the advent of the second, $6.2M Tea Party money bomb, the old media went into full panic mode. Continuing to follow the pattern of opposition to popular peaceful uprising elucidated by Gandhi,?the New York Times?produced, on Christmas Eve, the most uncharitable smear-job I have ever witnessed, against this sincere, gentle patriot, alleging that he regularly cavorts with neo-Nazis and is a closet racist,?on the say-so?of racist, hate-laden nutjobs, quoted through a website?whose blogposts are often populated by a bunch of fanatical, Arab-genocide-promoting war freaks.
I read the smear on Christmas Day, and I couldn't believe what the once-great "Newspaper of Record" was trying to pull. First, the vile blob of journalistic dung was published, not as a news item or editorial in the old dead-tree version of the paper, but in a "blogpost" (Note to self - ponder the question 'can a newspaper REALLY, LEGITIMATELY?be considered to have a "blog"?') in a "blog" called the "Medium", featuring news about, well, "blogs" (Note to self - when referring to such astroturfing dreck, use quotes around the word "blog").
Second, from the get-go, comments were disabled. I know, because I sent them?a comment, see if you think it should have been "moderated";
?"Is this what the great New York Times has come down to - using gossip and innuendo to imply that Ron Paul is a Nazi? Did you forget to mention his German ancestry? Or that he's a white male? This is a
prime example of why the the Times is in such dire straits, and, additionally, why watching its final death throes will generate so very few tears."
Third, they tried to hide what they did by removing links to the article. Then they decided to allow comments (although they still didn't publish mine, boo-frickin' hoo). Then the received over 250 reasoned, well-written, devastating critiques whose quality TOWERED over that of the Times' literary turd that occasioned them. Then they prefaced the entire mess with a smugly-worded retraction, instead of simply, shamefully removing the steaming pile of journalistic failure outright.
As Ron Paul supporters, we must gird our loins for one hell of a fight.
And someone, really should create and fund, as a idealogical counterpoint to the Pulitzer Prize, a "Duranty Prize", for debasement of journalism in service of fascist dictatorship.
?
?
(PHOTO: Iconic Image of Ron Paul, Defender of The Constitution, taken by Richard DeYoung)
The Ron Paul Blimp has flown.
Ron Paul drew approximately 5,000 people to his November rally in Philadelphia
The Ron Paul November 5th Money Bomb made history.
And, as of 8AM Eastern Time today, (The Tea Party '07 Money Bomb day)?he has shattered his 4th Quarter fundraising goal, and had already raised $1.5 MILLION on the day, already double the pace of the November 5th event.
Ron is being treated by the mainstream media, for the first time, as a serious, big-deal presidential candidate.?
Even Bill Moyers' PBS program NOW is taking the campaign seriously.
CBS Evening News will be at Ron Paul's campaign headquarters tonight, 6:30 pm Eastern, check local listings for your time.
Tim Russert, after studiously ignoring Ron for months, is going to have him on Meet The Press on December 23.
Glenn Beck will host Ron Paul on his December 18th show, after repeatedly smearing Ron and his supporters over an alleged "snub".
I think we have seen the beginning of the end of the?mainstream Old Media ?blackout.
UPDATE: $6.28 MILLION. The ALL-TIME ONE-DAY RECORD.
Even the smug, obnoxious Cokie Roberts mentioned it this morning on NPR.
(Graph from RonPaulGraphs.com)?
HOLY CRAP - This series of videos of?a recent interview of Dr. Paul by Howard Fineman of Newsweek is compelling, not because he does well (he does), not because we are big dorky Paul fans (Ronulans? Paultards?), but because here is a serious, big-deal national journalist asking Ron serious, focused questions on real policy issues that a president faces.
To Howard's great credit, he gets past the surface of Paul's position on Israel and the UN (something Fineman visibly cares deeply about) to the principle behind his position - VERY different from the platitudes and soundbites that are too often forced out of candidates and foisted upon us. Ron's positions on the issues can clearly be seen as serious, dramatically different policies that are aimed at solving?urgent problems facing the US. For his part, Ron comes across as serious, committed, and very practical, a credible alternative to Romney and the Huckster, to name two.
WATCH.