December 30, 2014

what is the best price anyone can get for selling themselves out?

NAFTA?
TPP?
endless war on poor people?
third world wages and working conditions?

what would you like to get for your vote next election?

December 28, 2014

SHOULD the homeless have a voice? would you give them one?

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/17th-homelessness-marathon


http://news.homelessnessmarathon.org/

there is a paucity of lobbying interests for the homeless themselves.
profiteers and service providers have no problems speaking of their needs.
is that the same thing?
no, it is not.

IF (I know it isnt an "if" thing for most here) you feel injustice strikes hardest
at the poor and truly oppressed folks who have their safety disregarded by those
meant to ensure all of ours?
Please consider sending one or two bucks to this organization. It may be all they have
that really gives them a megaphone and an opportunity to speak the truth of their circumstances.
just one or two bucks from any number of people could make the biggest of differences.

December 28, 2014

selling war to peacemakers

https://consortiumnews.com/2014/12/25/selling-peace-groups-on-us-led-wars/

December 22, 2014

How are VZ detractors positioned in light of Cuba's prospects?

I suspect a tangled web between Putin/Russia/VZ commentators and the potential for a new future with Cuba.
Anyone else smell bacon burning?

December 20, 2014

Is it me, or is there a lot of DEATH WISHING going on here?

posters advocating annihalation for hackers and japanese whalers?
is due process a thing of the past here?
please let me know when killing ever improved something.

December 15, 2014

How do YOU prefer to petition your government for redress?

Seems like a number of ways to do this.
Seems like a few issues exist that need this done effectively.
what works for you?

December 10, 2014

The DANGEROUS BEAST that is America

when record numbers gathered worldwide to
oppose the war plans of an unelected criminal,
the dangerous beast that is America refused to yield.

when witnesses and victims, leakers and whistleblowers told us about torture and abuses so vile the world should have ground to a halt,
demonstrators and independant journalists tried. but
the dangerous beast that is America refused to yield.

just as the stolen election went unmet by legitimate American justice,
protestors were not in short supply, particularly those willing to represent their intentionally disenfranchised constituents in the CBC.
the dangerous beast that is America refused to yield.

at some point, the responsibility will fall completely on the shoulders of a citizenry
who allowed the dangerous beast not to yield.
the criminals who profited will not look as culpable as the taxpayers and foolishly confident balloteers will in historical retrospect.
a bunch of loons who thought the solution was in the already stolen ballot box.
a bunch of hypocrites who pass around right wing lies and ponder the latest cable mindfuck.
you can blame Bush or whover you want, but in the end, reality will point out
who is fully at fault.

December 9, 2014

Torture didnt work, we HAD to resort to blanket warrantless surveillance.

just because they lied about it then doesnt mean they arent telling the truth now.
but how stupid would you have to be to believe sworn liars?

December 9, 2014

Fresno California homeless problem? McClatchy paper flies in the face of facts to upsell failure

http://www.fresnobee.com/2014/12/08/4276598_fresno-one-of-nations-neediest.html?sp=/99/217/&rh=1

"The city ranked 147th out of the 150 largest cities in the United States in an analysis of data for a range of different economic and social factors. The lower the ranking, the worse off a city is in the survey.

The proportions of Fresnans who are in poverty or homeless, unemployed and on public assistance weighed heavy on the city’s ranking, which is largely based on data from 2013. Under the information considered by WalletHub, Fresno’s unemployment rate of 12.1% (reported in December 2013) ranked 146th out of 150 cities — the same ranking as the 9.8% of households in which families receive some form of public assistance such as welfare or food stamps."

of course the city voice has a different take on today's Fresno

"Standriff, the city’s director of communications, discounted the WalletHub report for using old data that he said no longer reflects Fresno’s current reality.

“We’ve seen studies like this before that use old and dated information to make conclusions without any context,” Standriff said. “Instead of focusing on a faded snapshot of Fresno’s past, we’re more interested in the news of Fresno’s continued recovery. Unemployment is at pre-recession lows, our economic outlook is improving daily and our efforts to end chronic and veterans homelessness by the end of 2015 are recognized nationally.”


they in fact may be more interested in a different news topic.
They get plenty of assistance from the McClatchy Bee there.
in recent weeks stories have been published about the high numbers of homeless schoolchildren in Fresno and nationally.

http://www.fresnobee.com/2014/09/10/4116464/thousands-of-school-children-homeless.html

http://www.fresnobee.com/2014/11/17/4239494/child-homelessness-at-historic.html

so how do they respond to these PRECISELY documented facts and figures?

they grab poorly collected figures from a point in time where they had dispersed the homeless populations and made them
extremely hard to census.

http://www.fresnobee.com/2014/11/17/4237933/fresno-and-madera-counties-see.html

and print this along with the previous article. Presumably to salvage the future prospects of recently failed
State Controller candidate and still Mayor
(of the town she would not name on her Candidate bio)

http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article2608718.html

the disparity between good info and bad was a little too much dissonance for the same day.

What the Bee has refused to tell Fresnan's in their paper is that the homeless won many individual settlements
a few weeks ago. Must not have been the news Swearengen needed, and one mention of those settlements
in the comments section of that article got all comments removed. isnt that something?

some older stories on this subject

http://www.fresnobee.com/2011/05/21/2397471/more-people-than-ever-homeless.html

and another puff piece for her highness, who had the largest camp of homeless you can imagine
(built up by city police keeping the homeless in that area) so she bulldozed them down
and proceeded to violate the agreements made under the Kincaid vs Fresno settlement. Putting the
taxpayers at risk for the settlements that the local paper will NOT tell anyone about?

http://www.fresnobee.com/2014/02/25/3791199/homeless-workshop-highlighted.html

all the faux noise in the world on a failing shadow of what was a decent paper DOES NOT
blind the city residents to the truth before them.

THIS is why our country cannot make traction towards recovery.
our system of information is polluted with corruption.

December 9, 2014

Gallup: suffering in Afghanistan hits global record high

http://www.gallup.com/poll/179897/suffering-afghanistan-hits-global-record-high.aspx

"Already the worst in the world in 2013, Afghans' ratings of their lives declined even further in 2014. More than six in 10 Afghans evaluate their lives poorly enough to be considered "suffering" -- the highest figure ever recorded for any country since Gallup started tracking life evaluations in 2005. As in 2013, no Afghans rate their lives highly enough to be considered "thriving."