aaayup

Posted at July 16, 2008 6:17 PM in response to Bush and Congress Want to Raise Your Taxes to Help out Fannie and Freddie's Management and Shareholders

Yes, that's exactly the right point. Also, it should be made abundantly clear what happens with some that money that lands in the hands of Big Oil. It feeds the power grab on so many levels.

Next up we have the nuclear power industry waiting in the wings. Another chance to transfer wealth into the maw of the plutocratic power machine.

It is fundamentally a structural problem within the current political system.

Posted at July 16, 2008 11:08 AM in response to The Long Hard Slog

but...but...but I thought high compensation meant high talent.

Posted at July 14, 2008 10:30 AM in response to Bush and Congress Want to Raise Your Taxes to Help out Fannie and Freddie's Management and Shareholders

Who thinks this would be the first time Cheney & Co. have used the services of bin Laden?

Posted at June 30, 2008 1:44 PM in response to Cheney's Secret War In Iran

Yeah, I've noticed this too. I first started noticing it a few months ago. I've actually wondered how he'll make it through the campaign, but then I remembered W.

Posted at June 18, 2008 9:52 AM in response to Does John McCain Know What He's Talking About? (And Who Cares?)

I admire your empathy for those that must find "family" on the tube but find that your comments actually illustrate what seems to be at the core of what is wrong here.

You describe an alienation in which people seek the succor of family from the mass media while also being able to click the remote to eliminate any unwanted reactions that may arise from experiencing this relationship. In the world of yore, when family members were both a joy and a pain the relationships that developed were beyond the egocentric. One had to accommodate, one had to work to understand the needs and feelings of the other. One had to go beyond their selves and in so doing developed beneficial characteristics such as social responsibility.

The family mediated by the media allows a shallow imitation in which one may wallow in a sense of grief without really having lost anyone actually close to them. They do not have to adjust for lost earnings, dispose of the lost member's property, rearrange family hierarchies, etc. In a word they do not have to actually experience all of grief, only that part in which they wish to indulge. And at the same time there is no opportunity to see young family members grow into new roles to fill the vacancy.

This media created simulacrum satiates without nourishing. This affects not just those that willingly or inadvertently fall into this trap but the wider society as well and hence the rest of us who dwell within it. I have no clicker that can switch off this society.

Posted at June 17, 2008 10:37 AM in response to Going Overboard on Russert

...while Joe Lieberman never managed to see through the fog of lies and manipulation?

Say what? Joe L. was spreading that fog of lies intentionally. Talk about not seeing what's going on...sha-eeesh.

Posted at June 12, 2008 10:23 AM in response to The $3,000,000,000 Question

Who trained them? Well there was once a place called the School of the Americas if I remember correctly.

Posted at May 22, 2008 1:46 PM in response to Today's Must Read

To demonstrate how powerful they are to themselves as well? The whole crew does seem to have issues.

Beyond that of course torture instills fear into any potential adversaries, domestic or foreign.

Posted at May 22, 2008 1:45 PM in response to Today's Must Read

How about fighting as if you were serious about it. How about actually believing in your own rhetoric. How about fighting as if you really wanted to make a real change. If the Democrats did that, then....

Posted at May 16, 2008 10:20 AM in response to President Bush's Despicable Attack on Barack Obama