God, I Can’t Get the Stench of Ick Off Me!

Tags

individual freedom, national security, terrorism

I mean seriously. Suddenly Geraldo Rivera is making sense? I’m in the same camp as Ms. Lindsey? This can only mean one thing.

I’ve been transported once again in my sleep by aliens to a far, far distance universe. I wanna come home!

It all started innocently enough.

You know me, speak first, think later. It’s been a lifelong methodology for me. Being nimble of mind, I usually can wriggle myself into some sort of explanatory pose without looking the complete fool. (Some would say–my no-named detractors, all noted I might add for an inability to add 2 + 2 and get 4 regularly, where was I? Oh yes, my detractors might claim I’m a complete fool all the time, but of course they are wrong).

Anyway.

Yesterday, in view of the revelations of one Glenn Greenwald and the Guardian, I was pretty down on the President. I’m not, and never have been a Patriot Act fan, neither liking the term patriot, which seems always used by those who really aren’t,  nor liking the flag-waving exceptionalism it tends to signify. Therefore hearing that the Obama Administration has continued a policy of sorting through my telephone calls gave me reason to lament his policy, all the while suggesting that the GOP in general would have a tough time railing against something they wrote (the Patriot Act) and passed on several times already under President Bushy. I also noted that of course faux news groups like Fox would forget all that history, and condemn their favorite whipping boy with nary a dropped beat.

So, then I actually learned what this is all about.

And I’m not nearly so upset as I was, since facts have a weird ability to actually turn wild speculative gut reactions into calm reasoned understanding of truth.

Okay, so let’s review. Under Bush, the government started this data mining process of collecting phone records. It began the process in around 2002, and without authorization from the FISA court which had been started in 1978. They were proceeding without court authority. This monitoring was done to foreign persons and American citizens.

Sometime around 2006, FISA was brought into the mix and the program continued to the present albeit with FISA oversight procedures in place. Congress regularly is called upon to renew the government’s ability to proceed, and so far it has. In fact Senator Diane Feinstein indicated that the issue of data mining of phone records has been debated by her committee, the Senate Intelligence Committee, no fewer than twelve times.  Ultra conservative Senator Lindsey Graham also suggested that he was not at all troubled by the “revelations” announced and that he found there was “nothing to worry about.”  Ditto Republican Mike Rogers, chair of the House Intelligence Committee.

Of course, the fact that it started under Bush is not some imprimatur upon the practice to be sure. In fact it might be close to the opposite. But it behooves us to look at what the practice actually entails before we condemn it as government overreach, no matter how legal it may be–and no one suggests it was illegal.

What goes on here is called metadata  mining.

Metadata, essentially, is data about data. Data mining programs use computer algorithms to search large collections of data for patterns.

Still sound like gobbledygook? It works something like this. Billions of phone calls are made daily. The numbers are gathered along with length of conversation. It’s essentially dumped into a data base. In other words, one computer downloads its billions of numbers into another computer. There it sits. When a terrorist suspect comes under scrutiny, his specific number is plugged into the database and “hits” are looked for. The computer has the ability (which no human could do) to see patterns in the calls this person X makes. For instance. X is in Istanbul. He is a “known” terrorist. He places a calls Yemen, Colorado, and Miami. The numbers in Yemen make calls to New Jersey and Miami and Charleston. The number from Colorado makes calls to New Jersey and Charleston.  Charleston called Colorado. A pattern is established.

At this point, (with perhaps other surveillance information)  as I understand it, the government goes to the FISA court and requests a warrant to subpoena the actual names of those persons in the pattern. And with further investigation it may lead to actually looking at the actual conversations or lead to wiretaps.

Similar things are done with the Internet, now a preferred means of communication between terrorist cells.

So nobody is reading your e-mails. Nobody is listening to your calls, or noting that you called Cousin Dotty last month. It’s just numbers and no human is even looking at the metadata at all, since it is meaningless anyway.

Geraldo Rivera suggests that this leak of the program, is directly related to the anger of the journalistic community at the subpoenaing journalist phone records in an attempt to uncover leaks by government employees. It’s a “in your face” sort of response.

The Rivera claims are in fact real. Terrorists do learn from our leaks and move to new ways of doing business. It is thought that it is this reason that caused the Obama Administration to move into the Internet data mining arena. At least Nicolle Wallace, former communication chief for Bush suggested this on Morning Joe this morning.

So, in all, I’m a lot less upset now than I was.

But of course I now find myself in a quandary. I recall that I was supportive of the leaking of the Pentagon Papers back in the Nixon years, and I have been similarly supportive of Bradley Manning and his leaking of information about the wars in the Middle East. But I find myself rather supportive of the government’s attempts to stop leaks from those who may in fact be more interested in harming a president than they are about the “immorality” of that which they leak about. (I’m of course reading that in).

So I am conflicted. I don’t think that the Pentagon papers situation or the Manning leaks compromised “security”, but rather reflected our government’s being deeply involved with corruption without those countries. Perhaps my memory is faulty. Here I see real attempts to undermine THIS government as a political ploy to gain advantage for a party or group within a party. Predictably Rand Paul is screeching that 1984 has arrived. Paul of course would be happiest without any government at all, and his squawking has to be held in that context. It should be noted that Paul introduced an amendment last year to ban this stuff when it was PASSED once again in December.

So are my positions irreconcilable or not?

Hopefully some of you can assist me, for a mind divided cannot stand. (Unless you’re a fundamentalist, and then all bets are off).

So help me out here guys.

For an excellent timetable of the Patriot Act/FISA/NSA database, see What you Should Know about the Government Massive Domestic Surveillance Program.

 

Related articles

• Senator Franken Calls for FISA Court Opinions to be Made Public When Possible (politicususa.com)
• Patriot Act at the center of the storm (cnn.com)
• Intelligence chief blasts NSA document leaks (cnsnews.com)
• guardian tecnologia: Fisa chief judge defends integrity of court over Verizon records collection (guardian.co.uk)
• ‘Fox and Friends’ suddenly against wiretapping they supported under Bush (rawstory.com)
• What You Should Know About The Government’s Massive Domestic Surveillance Program (kstreet607.com)

The Stupid Chronicles April 27, 2013

Tags

conspiracies, crap I learned, gay rights, homophobia, Humor, racism, terrorism

Look closely at the picture attached here. This is the face of lunacy. You now know exactly what to look for when you casually saunter down the street. When you see lunacy, run!

This man’s name is James Tracy. No not Dick Tracy. He bears not brain-sharing with the great detective of comics. No James is one of those rare nuts who actually somehow made it through grad school and got a degree, and purports to teach our youth.

If you have a child enrolled in Florida Atlantic, I’d suggest you shut off the funds now, and get your kid immediately.

James is certifiable. James “teaches” (I use the term loosely of course) communications and, get this, conspiracy theory. James is a conspiracy. A conspiracy to appear like a normal human being.

James believes the Boston Marathon bombing was “staged”. For all the world, to him, it looks like a pre-organized drill.

In short, the event closely resembles a mass-casualty drill, which for training purposes are designed to be as lifelike as possible. Since it is mediated, however, and primarily experienced from afar through the careful assemblage of words, images, and the official pronouncements and commentary of celebrity journalists, it has the semblance of being for all practical purposes “real.”
….

With the above in mind, photographic evidence of the event suggests the possibility of play actors getting into position after the detonation of what may in fact have been a smoke bomb or similarly benign explosive.

And goody of all goodies there is a video!

And you can read more of Tracy’s insanity at his own blog.

New Hampshire makes another appearance in the crazy parade with an entry from their state legislature. Stella Trembley, oh STELLLLLLA, what have you done now?

Stella no doubt in communication with Mr. Tracy, has her own theories about the Boston Marathon bombing.

Stella pays attention to that great witless Beck, so she posted this on Beck’s site:

Just as you said would happen. Top Down, Bottom UP. The Boston Marathon was a Black Ops “terrorist” attack. One suspect killed, the other one will be too before they even have a chance to speak. Drones and now “terrorist” attacks by our own Government. Sad day, but a “wake up” to all of us. First there was a “suspect” then there wasnt. Infowars broke the story and they knew they had been “found out”.
http://youtu.be/axQtAFtmtVA

Yes, I’m sure that Stella believes that George Bush ordered the 9/11 tragedy as well.

Note as well that the YouTube link she gave on her comment is from none other than career nut Alex Jones.

We did mention that Ms. Stella is a Republican didn’t we? No? Well you knew that anyway didn’t you?

One thing you can be sure of, the stupids are well, really really stupid. That’s why they are so endearing, when they are not annoying gnats in need of swatting.

Such is the case of Representative Tom Shaw, who resides at the Iowa State House, where he plays tiddlywinks most of the day long until it’s time for his chocolate milk and nap break.

Tommy is still mighty angry at the justices of the Iowa Supreme Court, who several years ago had the temerity to actually follow the constitution and declare Iowa’s refusal to allow gays to marry, well, unconstitutional.

Tommy figured out a neat plan to punish the four remaining justices (three were defeated for re-election after a tissue of lies campaign forged by one VanderPlatts and his homophobic friends).

Tommy has offered up a bill directed just at these four justices, cutting their salaries from $163, 200, to just $25,000.

Tommy thinks it’s constitutional.

Tommy is of course an idiot.

Tommy can usually be spotted at the capital building in Des Moines, being led around by his thinking-brain dog Charles.

Tommy also wears Depends and poops in them regularly, so people learn to take a wide berth when seeing him.

From Iowa, we move a bit north and east to my original neck of the woods–Michigan.

Here we find Gloria Platko, a Democrat up in Buena Vista County. She doesn’t seem particularly fond of township supervisor Dwayne Parker, whom she referred to with the “N” word.

She also adjectived that word with “arrogant”.

Gloria, poor dear, was unaware that she was being taped when she made the remarks.

She regrets them of course. NOW.

She assures us she is no racist, because in that time-honored defense, “she’s eaten Thanksgiving dinner at the homes of blacks before.”

She said she probably should have used the word ignoramus.

Sorry, Gloria, that word is taken. You have that dubious distinction of owning the word.

Give back your salary.

It’s always a good bet that Donald Trump can make a stupid list.

The first question or observation one makes about The Donald, is how could stupid make that much money?

Donald doesn’t like Jon Stewart much.

That would be obvious, since Stewart, like all good thinking people tends to point out Donald’s numerous stupid moments.

Donald has another major flaw other than being stupid. He’s very thin-skinned and fights back, hate to use the phrase, but it fits, “like a girl.”

You know what I mean, all snotty and so forth.

So to “get back” at Stewart for being, well, really brilliant at what he does, Trump said,

I am smarter than Jon Stewart will ever be because he is so stupid and because his real name is not even Jon Stewart. It’s something much more Jewish-y. So, ha! Also: he is overrated.

He tweeted it too.

So there, Jon Stewart: It’s all out now. You’re a JEW!, or Jewish-y at least. Take that!

Trumpet head remains, as always,  an idiot.

Oh Gosh, that was a joke Donald, don’t sue me!

Related articles

• N.H. State Rep. Stella Tremblay – “What am I going to apologize for? Asking questions?” (willyloman.wordpress.com)
• Boston Marathon Bombing Conspiracy: Attack Was U.S. False Flag, Says Florida Professor (latinospost.com)

Why Are We So Crazy?

Tags

conspiracies, editorial, government, terrorism

I’ll leave it to you to wrap your head around the events in Boston. I woke as usual, turned on the TV, and was bowled over with lockdowns of neighborhoods and then the entire city of Boston, the death of a young man who only yesterday was only a face, and the race to locate the brother who was trying to escape.

I shake my head in disbelief, for after all my 63 years of experience, I have yet to understand what motivates people to do these things.

I’m not interesting in speculation at this point. Rather I speak to the first issues that now come to those of us who are “normal.”

The Contrarian breathed a sigh of relief. “At least they entered the country well before Obama took office. That will stop the usual blame-it-on-the-Black-Man.” I too joined in with the hope that the remaining suspect would be brought in alive. This for the obvious reason that I hate our murderous tendencies in the first place, but admittedly because I hope the young man might inform us as to his motives. That might stop some of the conspiracy theories about them and their intentions. Of course it will never stop all of them. We are the best conspiracy theorists in the world I think.

Conspiracy is a simply defined crime: the agreement between two or more people to commit an unlawful act. In a few places one overt act toward the commission of the crime must be taken, in most not. It is known as a crime with an active actus reus, meaning that people can join the conspiracy at any time and be fully culpable of the entire enterprise, whether or not all parties are known, or even when some are acquitted.

As any lawyer will tell you, it’s a crime that almost never goes undetected for long. If “loose lips sink ships” well, people who are criminally liable for serious offenses are all too willing to spill their guts to save their own skins. Somebody gets an attack of conscience. Somebody thinks “things went too far”. There are as many reasons as there are words to explain why conspiracies don’t work.

Yet, to the American public there is a conspiracy under every rock. And more to the point, they are almost always massive, involving tens of thousands of co-conspirators and lasting over decades and sometimes longer. We have always loved conspiracies, for some reason they make us giddy. It’s as if we and we alone have uncovered this intricate, vast, complicated plot. We feel deliciously smart. Yet we are actually silly, and not a little unhinged.

We are prone to believe that inexplicable events can be explained by reference to covert groups of various sorts and sizes. They effect our political, social and economic well-being. In the end, it’s just easier to posit a conspiracy than to dig deeply and see all the various factors that contribute to any particular situation. It’s also a good way to attack something when you have no other good reason for doing so.

Ulterior motives figure prominently in the creation of conspiracy theories, and that may be the key to understanding why they are so popular. You tell me that President Obama is not a legitimate president because he was not born in the USA. The evidence for that may be weak to non-existent, but of course since I hate him for my own reasons, I’m more than willing to believe this conspiracy exists. For indeed, if it’s obvious that he is not a citizen, there must be those who are “covering up” that fact for “nefarious” reasons. The conspiracy widens and deepens as you adopt it.

Usually conspiracy theories relate to the government. But there are two big ones that don’t. One is the conspiracy to teach evolution when as everyone really knows, God created the earth as enunciated in Genesis. This theory is held by fundamentalist Christians and includes by requirement that the not only biology scientists are involved in this massive conspiracy, but also astronomers, physicists, geologists, archeologists, paleontologists, and a host of others are also in on the deception.

The other one, that tangentially involves the government is that of climate change. This is a direct attempt by Democrats to favor green technologies and give them tax breaks in lieu of oil and gas interests. It’s all about getting grant money for scientists in universities.

These conspiracies cross all countries and are international in scope. They involve scientists who are all “part of the lie” and who are by choice wasting their professional careers to help sustain them. They have gone on for a couple of hundred years in the case of evolution, and a good hundred years when it comes to climate change.

Here are a list of general categories of conspiracies prominent today or recently:

1. The central banking institutions are the means by which large organizations seek to impose a “one-world government”.  Just assume that everything is being orchestrated by  shadow people–including wars,  and depressions.
2. False-flag operations are devices used by the OWO groups to deflect attention from themselves. If the terrorists in Boston are all killed, inevitably, whatever answers law enforcement gives as to their motives, some will assume it is to deflect attention from the real reasons, and the real perpetrators. There are some who believe there is such a false-flag conspiracy regarding 9/11. The same is true of the Kennedy assassination.
3. Wars are sometimes thought to be begun by the “military-industrial complex” for their own purposes. Iraq is often believed to have been started not for noble goals of eradicating WMD but for oil. There are some who believe that our own Civil War was started for other purposes than those who learn as children.
4. Most assassinations are subject to conspiracy theories. JFK of course, but also RFK, and King and Malcolm X are commonly thought of as conspiracy cases. Diana, Princess of Wales is another death thought by some to be the result of a conspiracy.
5. There is the whole “Clinton body count” which claims that Clinton regularly assassinated his enemies and there has been a conspiracy to cover it up.
6. The unbelievable list of Obama conspiracies–his birth, his college record, his law license, his religion. They have may twists and offshoots.
7. Various conspiracies involving religions–Jews drink the blood of Christians, Catholics sacrifice babies, Jesus was married.
8. Various claims that we have technology that is being deliberately supressed, such as electric cars, super cheap energy, cures for diseases.
9. Conspiracies to hide the fact that the government is developing cloaking technology, invisibility, mind-control, time travel, weather control, man-made earthquakes.
10. Conspiracies that involve military technology gone awry–which accounts for various “accidents”-death rays, electromagnetic weapons, and various other top-secret weaponry that sometimes causes things like the Haitian earthquake.
11. Media technology is being used by some to institute Big Brother or mind control. The use of movies and television shows to “desensitize” us to some events so that the government can conduct such things in the future.
12. Medicine routinely suppresses “cures” to keep their businesses going, as well as creating diseases to destroy races or groups of people.
13. Alien conspiracies which posit that alien races have visited the earth regularly and are involved in shaping the earth to their purposes, evil or otherwise.

There are more. The groups involved that you hear about regularly include the Bilderberg group, Freemasons, Scull and Bones, the Illuminati, Jews, Opus Dei, the Trilateral Commission, the Mafia. There are more of these too.

Of course, after Boston, there will be more. What makes us so prone to this stuff? Are we just looking for the “quick” answer? Are we unwilling to delve into the myriad threads that actually cause events to occur? Are some conspiracies more plausible than others? If so, is it because we like the claims of some and not others?

Jump in and share your thoughts.

List of conspiracy theories–Wikipedia (source)

Related articles

• Conspiracy Website Not What You Think (huffingtonpost.com)
• Anonymous, the Boston Marathon bombing, and conspiracy theories (sago.com)
• Boston Marathon Truthers Begin Conspiracy Theories (conservativebyte.com)
• A Thought on Conspiracy Theories (unseenvariable.wordpress.com)
• Top 10 Conspiracy Theories in the World (americanlivewire.com)
• General Conspiracies – Poll: 28% of Americans Believe in a “NWO” Conspiracy (disclose.tv)
• Conspiracy Theory Poll Results (publicpolicypolling.com)

I Really Hadn’t Thought About It

Tags

America, Juan Cole, terrorism, white terrorism

To say that America is a violent country is to say nothing new. To say that the a large number of fringe groups dedicated to hate of one kind or another inhabit our country is also to say nothing very new.

We continue to be subjected to white supremacist groups and nothing has changed much except that perhaps we don’t pay much attention to them, although their numbers have, I believe, been on the increase.

I’m not one to reprint other people’s work and dust off my hands, thinking, “well, there’s another post completed,” but Juan Cole is someone you should pay attention to regularly, both because of his superb reporting, but also for his superb analysis.

Usually I would point you to his post, but I think that it is better to reprint it here. Have you thought about how the press reports on incidents of internal terrorism? Juan has. And you should listen:

Top Ten Differences between White Terrorists and Others:

1. White terrorists are called “gunmen.” What does that even mean? A person with a gun? Wouldn’t that be, like, everyone in the US? Other terrorists are called, like, “terrorists.”

2. White terrorists are “troubled loners.” Other terrorists are always suspected of being part of a global plot, even when they are obviously troubled loners.

3. Doing a study on the danger of white terrorists at the Department of Homeland Security will get you sidelined by angry white Congressmen. Doing studies on other kinds of terrorists is a guaranteed promotion.

4. The family of a white terrorist is interviewed, weeping as they wonder where he went wrong. The families of other terrorists are almost never interviewed.

5. White terrorists are part of a “fringe.” Other terrorists are apparently mainstream.

6. White terrorists are random events, like tornadoes. Other terrorists are long-running conspiracies.

7. White terrorists are never called “white.” But other terrorists are given ethnic affiliations.

8. Nobody thinks white terrorists are typical of white people. But other terrorists are considered paragons of their societies.

9. White terrorists are alcoholics, addicts or mentally ill. Other terrorists are apparently clean-living and perfectly sane.

10. There is nothing you can do about white terrorists. Gun control won’t stop them. No policy you could make, no government program, could possibly have an impact on them. But hundreds of billions of dollars must be spent on police and on the Department of Defense, and on TSA, which must virtually strip search 60 million people a year, to deal with other terrorists.

Kind of brings you up short doesn’t it?

And it would be well worth your time to read about the culture of hate that is being cultivated in this country by the rich, whose interests are not at all patriotic but who use pursue Muslim hate as a means to frighten unsuspecting Americans into supporting them, and thus giving them the power base they need for their real agenda.

Believe it or not, there are wealthy interests in this country who have much to gain from continued and increased violence in the Middle East and elsewhere.

It’s disheartening yet predictable that sadly uneducated and malleable individuals can become enamored of hate-centered groups. It is more than likely that the latest example, Mr. Page, thought he was striking out at Muslims, utterly and stupidly unaware that Sikhs are not Muslims at all.

It is worse than disheartening when we hear various elected officials appear to fuel the fire by finding a Islamic jihadist under nearly every bed. The fact that most of these hate-spewers are Republican is probably predictable given their ties to the interests who would promote surreptitiously an agenda of war.

We cannot keep ignoring these people as irritating nuisances. They are dangerous and must be stood up against everywhere.

On a lighter note, Juan Cole has a lighter side: I thought this was cute.

Photograph on road from Tripoli to Misrata, Libya, May, 2012, by Juan Cole

 

Related articles

• FBI: Right-wing terror is real (salon.com)
• Why the Reaction Is Different When the Terrorist Is White (theatlantic.com)
• A Double Standard of Terrorism (jodylancastle.wordpress.com)
• The Sikh Temple Tragedy and White Supremacist Terrorism (rootedinbeing.wordpress.com)
• Republicans Blasted Obama Administration For Warning About Right-Wing Domestic Terrorism (thinkprogress.org)
• Experts: White supremacist groups experiencing resurgence (wtvr.com)
• A Weak White Supremacist Movement Is Even More Threatening Than a Strong One! Donate Now! (reason.com)

The Changing Face of Dearborn Michigan

Tags

bigotry, Dearborn Michigan, Muslim Americans, racism, terrorism

I spent most of my life living in Michigan. And I spent a year living in Dearborn, Michigan under the mayorship of Orville Hubbard, pictured at the right.

So I have some knowledge.

Dearborn, is probably like a lot of small towns. If you look at the history of any small town, you will probably find some fascinating changes that have occurred over the time span of the 1700’s to today.

But few would exhibit the amazing changes that have occurred in this seemingly unimportant suburban community outside Detroit, Michigan.

Originally of course, much of Dearborn was occupied by members of the Algonquin family of tribes. But that soon changed with America’s revolution, and white folks populated the area and named it after Revolutionary patriot and Secretary of State under Jefferson, Henry Dearborn.

For a long time Dearborn was of no consequence. That was until areas surrounding it (still in farm land) caught the eye of resident, Henry Ford. Some of that land became the Ford estate, the Ford Motor Company World Headquarters (The Glass House), Ford Proving Grounds. People still come there to see the Ford Museum, which features so much stuff that I can’t begin to tell describe it all.

Along came a man named Orville Hubbard who became Mayor in 1942 and retained that job until 1978 (I lived there in 1972-73 I believe).

Now you have to recall that Detroit at that time was in its growing pains. Car companies thrived in and about the city, which steel was forged at the Rouge plant down the river. Building cars was big business. And African-Americans, beaten down by Jim Crow laws throughout the South were migrating north to find a better life. Many found it in Detroit where employment in the factories were plentiful.

A few years later, in the aftermath of President Kennedy’s assassination, the Civil Rights Act was passed and then the Voting Rights Act.

Orville looked out upon this landscape, and came to a few conclusions. Hubbard has been styled by some as the “suburban face of resistance to racial integration.” And he was.

He had an abiding and hideous hatred of African-Americans. He was all that one would expect of a Southern plantation owner and more. He describes being in Haiti in the Marines and claims they practiced cannibalism, even “eating a few Marines.” He once called the “bullet-ridden body” of a black man found in the city as “a clear case of suicide” and ordered the case closed. He ordered his local police to “shoot looters on sight” during the 1967 insurrection in Detroit.

The slogan of his administration which continued until 1978, was “Keep Dearborn Clean” which was widely recognized to mean, “Keep Dearborn White.”

The way it worked was simply this: white folks found “reasons” never to sell to blacks, and whites who were rumored to be doing that were vandalized. Of course he didn’t think much better of Jews or the Irish, and later, the Arabs either.

The Arabs that first moved into Dearborn were almost all Lebanese Christians. They were later followed by Muslims from various countries. After Hubbards retirement blacks slowly moved in, but today, still nearly 85% of the population is “white”. However, 34% of that “white” demographic is Arab.

The largest Mosque in North America is found there.

And well, sadly it has now become the focus of hatred in another vein.

I don’t know much about the show. Actually I know nothing other than there is a “reality” based show about Muslim families in Dearborn, and how they incorporate their faith with their patriotism for America. As with all commercial television shows, it has corporate sponsors who buy ad time (known as commercials)  throughout the program.

A fringe group, Florida Family Association, whose sworn duty is to promote all things biblical, has launched a campaign against the show and more particularly against the sponsors of the show, being some 67 companies. They claim that 65 have now pulled their ads. Some of these companies are: McDonald’s, Bank of America, Campbell’s Soup, Dell, Estee Lauder, General Motors, Goodyear, Green Mountain Coffee, Sears, Wal-Mart, and most famously Lowe’s.

What is insane, is the FFA objects to the show because it fails to present Muslims as terrorists! In other words, the show is not “fair and balanced” showing only law-abiding, patriotic, good citizens.

Well, it’s all insane. This is bigotry at its worst. This is un-American. This is absurd. It is reprehensible. It cannot be allowed to stand.

Go to SignOn.org to register your anger.

Or go to Lowe’s Facebook page: and register your views directly.

 

**Orville Hubbard: the ghost that still haunts Dearborn

    Wikipedia:  Dearborn Michigan

It’s Not About the How Your Carburator is Doing!

Tags

GOP, Herman Cain, Humor, Media, Middle East, Military, MSM, Obama, physics, quantum mechanics, racism, Syria, teabaggers, terrorism, Wall Street

Take quantum mechanics. What does that conjure up? Thoughts of grease-monkeys working on very tiny cars?

Actually, it’s pretty heady stuff. It deals with that portion of physics that deals with tiny particles and their wave-particle actions. (Remember that light particles (photons) are both particle and wave packets.

Well, the thing about quantum mechanics is that is works perfectly in ordering the world and making new things work out right. It is impossible to understand it however, since it is full of paradoxes. Objects are in more than one place at one time. They are “changed” by the very act of looking at them. They are not what they are until they are actually measured, and normal speed of light calculations don’t seem to apply.

Now I know it’s Saturday and there are lots of things to do, but surely one of the most important might be to go read the article and learn even more exciting things about things too small to be seen.

For instance: we might understand wavefunction collapse if only we understood how gravity played into it, thus we need to marry quantum theory and general relativity. Now, I know you are excited by that!

♦

There is a must read over at the Nation which is got the blogosphere all alight. I heard it mentioned on MSNBC this morning and ran into it over at wearespectablenegroes just now. By the way, read Chauncey de Vega’s fine piece as well about liberal racism. It’s much-needed thinking for the progressives.

Melissa Harris-Perry has written the piece at the Nation entitled Black President, Double Standard: Why White Liberals are Abandoning Obama.

♦

What if they gave a protest march and nobody came?

Well, not exactly. You see, THOUSANDS have been protesting across the nation against banks and other finance reforms. And guess what? the MSM has almost entirely ignored the whole thing.

A bunch of women were pepper sprayed in NYC and unless you watch Olbermann or the Daily Show, or Colbert, you probably didn’t know.

And the media is one vast left-wing conspiracy ain’t it Foxy Noise?

♦

Is it just me or have people like the morning morons on Foxy and Hannity, and Rush, just not worth the effort of sophisticated bloggers and readers any more? I mean aren’t they really the fodder for the newbies? One expects utter nonsense from their mouths ALL the time, and what’s the point?

It’s a bit like quoting Michele any more. She’s beyond stupid. She’s beyond beyond, being beyond. The don’t count. Who cares?

♦

How do you feel about the latest US assassination? Al Awlaqi and two other high-ranking Al Qaeda operatives (Al Awlaqi and another were American citizens) were killed in Yemen the other day by a predator drone.

I really feel uncomfortable about all this. Juan Cole has a good piece on it at Informed Comment. Go see what you think.

♦

This from the Salon and their weekly Tweet contest, using the above hash #weekinatweet. Who knows, you may win next weeks!

♦

Do you continue, as I do, to be astounded and so amazed at the willingness of the Syrian people to stand up to a bully dictator? They go out every day and lay their lives on the line in the name of freedom and democracy.

It’s fallen by the wayside of the MSM for the most part now, but the courage exhibited by these people is something we need to remember every day.

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Oh, Michele said some more stupid things about abolishing food safety regulations. And Perry said some more stupid things about the intel on Al Awlaqi “probably came from Gitmo” without any evidence that it did. And Herman or “Herb” as our gal Sarah calls him, still thinks that the win in the Florida straw poll were votes for him and not votes against Perry and Romney.

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Oh and this is good to know. Pat Buchanan assures us all that Herman Cain was correct in saying the African-Americans were “brainwashed” into voting Democratic all these years. White man says Black man is correct in saying other Blacks are stupid. Well, now that’s some endorsement isn’t it. Mr. House Negro Cain, must be so pleased. Buchanan also referred to liberalism as the “plantation”.

Ahh, ain’t it grand when the racists try to steal the language? This little ditty was posted at the Blaze. So maybe I’ll take a look and see if we can do a little Nincompoop post on this bit of trash.

Blaze is all up into this report cuz you know Cain is their main black man.

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What’s on the Stove? Spaghetti with Bolognese sauce, garlic bread and salad. Eat your heart out. The recipe will be posted on What’s on the Stove? later today I suspect or tomorrow at the latest.

Related articles

• Jesse Jackson to Herman Cain: ‘Don’t Let My People Go’ (thewesternexperience.com)
• WATCH: Pat Buchanan Makes His Own Shocking Comment About Black Voters (huffingtonpost.com)
• Jackson blasts ‘plantation’ comments (politico.com)
• Herman Cain 2012: The Secret Behind Presidential Contender’s Momentum (huffingtonpost.com)

In the Name of All That is Holy

Tags

African Americans, Christianity, fundamentalism, GOP, Humor, ice cream, Italian, Joe Walsh, Pizza, teabaggers, terrorism

In order to protect my last shred of sanity, we are going to chat about just about anything OTHER than the debt ceiling and the children who claim to be governing us. Indeed the foxes are in charge of the hen-house.

So take a moment, relax, grab a cuppa joe and let’s see if we can find any remnant of a world we can still hang on to.

There is a really good post (most all of them are) over at we are respectable negroes about the backlash the right is giving to the notion that a Christian fundamentalist reeked the horror in Norway. From Beck’s claiming that the children murdered were attending a Hitler Youth-like camp to O’Reilly’s silly claim that he can be “defined” out of being Christian by his unChristian acts, we see a desperation on the part of the right not to be associated with terrorist acts. Chauncey DeVega weighs in.

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I was looking at a neat little recipe site the other day, and was reminded of a simple way to make “pizza” when you don’t have much time or are feeling lazy. While not as good as “real” pizza, it’s a nice substitute and heck, it’s down right perfect for those lazy football afternoons coming soon. It’s as simple as using flour tortillas as the “crust” and then adding your favorite toppings. Take a look at the recipe at JustaPinch and take it from there. The cook there calls her simple version, Pizzatillas.

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Joe “Hey Chris” Walsh, the blowheart that takes to YouTube to lecture the President and call him a liar, is a bit of a douche. Well a lot of a douche. The man who dares to claim he has all the answers of fiscal responsibility, and who is a loud-mouth TeaNutz® idiot, is a dead-beat dad. In Illinois, Joey owes his kids something over $117 THOUSAND bucks. Didn’t stop him from loaning his own campaign $35,000, but hey, that was important. Taking care of the kids? Not so much.

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Political Irony has a delicious piece entitled “To be a Republican You Need to Believe.” It is true, and funny, and sick, and ironic and well, it’s what a GOPer is, nuttier than a fruitcake. Don’t miss it.

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Like to make homemade ice cream? Not many people bother, mostly because left over ice cream becomes hard as a rock. This recipe is quick and promises that that will not happen. All you need is an inexpensive ice cream maker (usually under $40). It’s a rich recipe but only takes about 15 minutes to prepare + the machine time. I’m sure gonna try it.

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Just because it was cute!

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And because it’s true:

(h/t to Political Irony)

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Well, frankly there ain’t a lot going on in the blog world except debt ceiling blah blah blah, and so that’s it today!