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POPSOnce Again The Animals Were Conscious of A Vague Uneasiness
It came then to pass that we received those tools. The Democratic president and Congress, and after some finagling even the sixty-seat majority in the Senate. I was advised to watch for the great change to come rolling over us like a flood; we would soon be awash in progressivism. Our boys would come home from foreign wars, we would close our illegal prison camps, abandon torture and rendition. The rich would again be taxed, environmental abuses rolled back, people put ahead of corporations. We would get universal health care. Some of this would happen immediately upon Barack Obama taking office. Much would be in place in a magical, marvelous "first hundred days." What great changes a year would bring. I don't have to tell you there is great and crushing disappointment among those who most fervently supported candidate Obama and his campaign for Change We Can Believe In. We are still wasting money and lives in Iraq. We are wasting money and lives in Afghanistan at the highest rate si
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POPSObama Running Scared Some 47 million Americans are uninsured -- many because some employers have dropped coverage in the economic downturn. Others lack insurance because pre-existing illnesses deny them access to private insurance. There also are millions with no way to pay for soaring health insurance payments because they have lost their jobs. Nearly all Republicans and some moderate Democrats oppose any public plan option. These are the same lawmakers who receive many government-provided perks including health insurance. In his remarks to the AMA, Obama warned against "scare tactics" and "fear mongering" by opponents of the public plan option, which the President said should be available to those who have no health insurance. Obama rejected the "illegitimate concern that's being put forward by those who are claiming that a public option is somehow a Trojan horse for a single-payer system." Obama should tear a page out of LBJ's vote-getting manual and shame the heartless opponents. The hea
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POPSRage Against Bad Captalism is Good The "bad news" is really an opportunity for progressives, unions and Democrats to build a bottom-up populist alternative to the "greed is good" politics of Wall Street, which has infested both parties. Obama should privately welcome "populist rage" as a stimulus to reform. If he does not, he may see right-wing populism making a comeback as soon as 2010. Some progressives, including even Warren Beatty, think it's time to introduce a discussion of socialism, if only to point out that our present course is one of socialism for the banks and corporations. Obama himself says good things about Sweden's nationalization of banks, but quickly demurs that Americans are not "culturally" ready for such an option. At the Washington Post, Harold Meyerson, a democratic socialist in the tradition of Michael Harrington, prefers re-regulation to either nationalization or socialism at this point: "to avoid socialism (to whatever extent throwing public money at banks is socialism) you need liberalism (
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POPSObama Must Get Out of Afghanistan Once again, as in the run-up to the War in Iraq, too few people in Congress and the mainstream media are asking tough questions. There are some notable exceptions--see Friedman and Herbert--and in Congress, there's Senator Russ Feingold who writes in a recent op-ed: Few people seem willing to ask whether the main solution that's being talked about- sending more troops to Afghanistan--will actually work. If the devastating policies of the current administration have proved anything, it's that we need to ask tough questions before deploying our brave service members--and that we need to be suspicious of Washington 'group think.' Otherwise, we are setting ourselves up for failure.
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POPSBush Last-Minute Rules Cement Obscene Environmental Legacy We'll be working for many years just to undue this insanity. Where is the Congress? Oh, yeah, busy bailing out failed capitalism with our tax money.... what a clusterfuck of "leaders" we have and what we leave our children gets more and more horrible...Thanks a bunch George, you insane asshole! I hope you die soon and in much pain. I've lost all compassion for you, buddy. And Yo Mama and Papa and brothers too!
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POPSMichele Bachmann--Another Bigot flaps her gums Why did Tweety even have this dimwitted twit on his show? I guess he wanted to challenge her but to even give a voice to this idiot is crazy. Which I just did by clipping her, hahahahaha...but exposing her kind of thinking is important I guess.
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POPSBush Seeks New Congressional War on Terror Declaration Another attempt by the Bushistas to keep us on a permanent war footing and economy. The War Profiteers no doubt will love this and may have even written it. (I expect Congress to kiss the Preznut's ass again on this) Corporate war crimes are the norm.
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POPSThe Truth about Wal-Mart, continued Since that long thread of differing opinions about the 'Merikan Dream and Wally world where I was attacked as being a non-productive, lazy Hippie (untrue--I was a semi-productive, Happy Hippie), I found this interesting, informative Anti-Wally site....see if you can defend these charges about Wally's relationship with Communist/monopoly Capitalist China and the US consumer rip=off, Willie, Esundby, and the rest of you bozos who think I was some non-productive lazy Hippie all my life.
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POPSAmerica's Economic Free Fall The bailouts are rewarding the very people and institutions whose reckless behavior caused this financial mess. Yet government demands nothing from them in return -- like new rules for prudent behavior and explicit obligations to serve the national interest. Washington ought to compel the financial players to rein in their appetite for profit in order to help save the country from a far worse fate: a depressed economy that cannot regain its normal energies. Instead, the Federal Reserve, the Treasury, the Democratic Congress and of course the Republicans meekly defer to the wise men of high finance, who no longer seem so all-knowing.
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POPSShould Conyers Impeach or Write Another Book About Bush's Crimes? Three years ago, Conyers' staffers on the Judiciary Committee produced a book about Bush and Cheney's impeachable offenses. Some of us helped them do it. After all, they were in the minority and couldn't do much more than write books. But now? In the majority? Now, should they be accepting that Congress no longer has subpoena power? Now, should they be accepting that Congress no longer has the power to legislate? Now, should they be accepting that Congress has no power of the purse? Now, should they be devoting tax dollars to the pointless vanity of doing what anyone else can do: writing yet another book on Bush and Cheney's latest impeachable offenses
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POPS4 Senate Dems urge EPA chief to resign I've watched this foot-dragging, Bush's-ass-kissing hack testify on C-SPAN and he is one of the most frustratingly not-so-subtle stonewallers ever to grace a Congressional hearing.
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