Not only has the G.O.P spent years trying to fool everybody in sight with its phony-baloney, dime-store philosophies, it’s now trapped in the patently pathetic phase of fooling itself.
[ Bob Herbert ] Herbert: “This is not a party that can be trusted with the leadership of the country. John McCain was ready to have Sarah Palin a heartbeat away from the Oval Office and reportedly wanted Phil Gramm to be his Treasury secretary. Michael Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee, has the strategic sense and attention span that you’d expect to find in a frat house on Saturday night.”
“Americans are aghast at what happened to the country while the G.O.P. was in charge. Iraq and Katrina come to mind, not to mention the transmutation of the Clinton surpluses into the Bush budget deficits and the collapse of the entire economy.”
“Trickle down. Weapons of mass destruction. Torture. Deregulation. You name it. The Republican-conservative know-it-alls of the past several years (all-too-frequently with feckless Democrats following closely behind) brought destruction and heartbreak to just about everything they touched.”
“…And yet the G.O.P. behaves as though nothing has changed. Even in the face of a national economic nightmare, the party is offering nothing in the way of policies or new ideas that might give a bit of hope or comfort to families wrestling with joblessness, housing foreclosures and bankruptcies.” [ READ MORE ]
Join SPLC President Richard Cohen and Intelligence Project director Mark Potok as they discuss the growing number of hate groups in the United States. They have documented 926 hate groups in the U.S. – an increase of more than 50 percent since 2000.
Hate groups are trying to swell their ranks by exploiting the election of President Obama, the struggling economy and immigration fears. Listeners will be able to submit questions before and during the event. The webcast will be Wednesday, March 18 at 2 p.m. Eastern. Register today.
Minorities blamed for mortgage crisis
The new issue of the Intelligence Report examines how right-wing commentators are spreading propaganda that falsely blames minorities and immigrants for the subprime mortgage meltdown.
————————————————————————————————————————————————– Stand Strong Against Hate in Your State
Join the thousands of Americans on the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) interactive map standing strong against the hate, racism and intolerance infecting our communities.
Visit: www.StandStrongAgainstHate.org — Support the work of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) — Help them the fight against hate – make a gift today. ….and become part of the Wall of Tolerance with your donation.
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Review: Understanding the reality of racism in America, January 30, 2009
By Michael P. Rabbitt – See All Reviews.
This book is a gripping “must read” for understanding the truth about racism in America. Tim Wise clearly and accurately articulates why America is not post-racial, despite the election of the first black President in U.S. history.
He offers an excellent perspective on the 2008 presidential election campaign, the Rev. Wright controversy, New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and much more on America’s long and sordid history of racial oppression and injustice. Wise connects us with the real world experiences of African Americans, while integrating indisputable facts and data, including the overwhelming evidence of existing racial disparities in education, employment, housing, health care, wealth, and the criminal justice system.
Wise’s paradigm of Racism 1.0 and the modern version – Racism 2.0 – is brilliant. The author finishes with a strong call for white responsibility to oppose and eradicate racism, in partnership with people of color.
Michael Rabbitt Chicago, IL
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The Wall of Tolerance is a public tribute to thousands of Center supporters and others who have advanced the cause of tolerance in America. It is a prominent feature of the Civil Rights Memorial Center in Montgomery, Alabama. Names are digitally projected onto a curved 20-by-40-foot surface and “rain” down like the water that flows over the Civil Rights Memorial. The Wall and Memorial are in the heart of civil rights history. The spot where Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat is nearby and Dr. Martin Luther King’s Dexter Avenue pulpit is around the corner. Thousands visit these civil rights sites every year.
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From telegraph.co.uk: UK government suppressed evidence on Binyam Mohamed torture because MI6 helped his interrogators.The Government suppressed evidence on the torture of terror suspect Binyam Mohamed because the documents reveal that MI6 helped his interrogators.
Mr Mohamed, 30, an Ethiopian, was granted refugee status in Britain in 1994. He was picked up in Pakistan in 2002 on suspicion of involvement in terrorism, rendered to Morocco and Afghanistan, tortured and then sent to Guantanamo Bay in 2004. All terror charges against him were dropped last year. [ READ MORE ] + See Video Below
I am, the seer, the mystic, the all-knowing, and the best damn swammy around. After all, didn’t I predict Hurricane Katrina a week before it happened, the tragic death of the crocodile hunter, and others? (If you want proof you can read these stories).
Here is a list of predictions for the year 2009.
1. The Palestine/Israel conflict will rage for a time and then sputter out like these little wars always do, with both sides offering concessions, with neither seriously intending to observe them.
2. Caroline Kennedy will easily win elective office.
3. A catastrophe will overtake a portion of the Southwest U.S. I see people fleeing in panic with smoke and debris.
4. A respected television journalist will be diagnosed with a terminal illness.
5. Barack Obama will see the opposite in popularity polls to the outgoing Bush. Whereas Bush was popular back when he started his Iraq adventure, then lost popularity when the war turned out not to be the cakewalk he thought, Obama will enjoy a brief period of high popularity after taking office, but will make a novel attempt to deal truthfully with the American people (unlike Bush), and ask them to sacrifice. This will cause Obama to sink in the polls as Americans don’t like to sacrifice and be told the unpopular truth. Eventually, Obama’s presidency will be vindicated in the eyes of the people as Bush’s was not. However, Bush four years from now will claim credit for setting up the pre-conditions for Obama’s success.
6. Rosie O’Donnell’s horrible TV variety show will be cancelled.
7. I see the color green and I don’t know why. Something about the color green will have a big impact on the economy, and not for the better.
8. The stock market like a diseased heart will continue to flutter up and down, up and down. The boom times are over. Americans will alter their driving and spending sociologic habits (doing with less), which in turn will help take some pressure off the planet’s ailing ecology (less driving less pollution). However, the end is in sight for solitary American hegemony in the world, one super power and all the smaller countries begging favors. America will have to learn the painful reality of being just one country among more equals, its former monopolistic power status diminished when faced with China, and emerging regional coalitions, for example, a united Europe, and others.
9. Vice President-elect Joe Biden will say something that will get him in trouble.
10. A storm that will make Katrina look like child’s play is brewing this year in the Gulf of Mexico.
11. A new study will find out that coffee is good for you after a previous study said it’s bad for you.
12. The on-going enmity between India and Pakistan is bad news in 09.
13. A major film or music star will suffer disgrace.
14. Major fires will again ravage parts of California.
15. A liberal politician well known to many Americans will die.
16. Expect a big return on your money if you possess gold or gold-related stocks.
17. Some kind of new discovery to battle a major disease like cancer will become known, as will treatments for diabetes and heart disease. However, the gains will continue to be offset by bad habits, wrong eating and obesity among children that will reach near epidemic proportions.
18. The Dallas Cowboys will have a good year.
19. An underwater earthquake triggers a big wave.
20. The prospect of some form of health care for all Americans will take shape in 2009.
I don’t think George W. Bush should be allowed to slip quietly out of town. There should be a loud, collective angry howl and demonstrations over the damage he’s done to this country. — Bob Herbert
You don’t hear much from him anymore. The last image most of us remember is of the president ducking a pair of size 10s that were hurled at him in Baghdad.
We’re still at war in Iraq and Afghanistan. Israel is thrashing the Palestinians in Gaza. And the U.S. economy is about as vibrant as the 0-16 Detroit Lions.
But hardly a peep have we heard from George, the 43rd.
When Mr. Bush officially takes his leave in three weeks (in reality, he checked out long ago), most Americans will be content to sigh good riddance. I disagree. I don’t think he should be allowed to slip quietly out of town. There should be a great hue and cry ? a loud, collective angry howl, demonstrations with signs and bullhorns and fiery speeches ? over the damage he’s done to this country.
This is the man who gave us the war in Iraq and Guantanamo and torture and rendition; who turned the Clinton economy and the budget surplus into fool’s gold; who dithered while New Orleans drowned; who trampled our civil liberties at home and ruined our reputation abroad; who let Dick Cheney run hog wild and thought Brownie was doing a heckuva job.
The Bush administration specialized in deceit. How else could you get the public (and a feckless Congress) to go along with an invasion of Iraq as an absolutely essential response to the Sept. 11 attacks, when Iraq had had nothing to do with the Sept. 11 attacks?
Exploiting the public’s understandable fears, Mr. Bush made it sound as if Iraq was about to nuke us: “We cannot wait,” he said, “for the final proof ? the smoking gun that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.”
He then set the blaze that has continued to rage for nearly six years, consuming more than 4,000 American lives and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis. (A car bomb over the weekend killed two dozen more Iraqis, many of them religious pilgrims.) The financial cost to the U.S. will eventually reach $3 trillion or more, according to the Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz. — [ READ MORE ]
Herbert: “This is not a party that can be trusted with the leadership of the country. John McCain was ready to have Sarah Palin a heartbeat away from the Oval Office and reportedly wanted Phil Gramm to be his Treasury secretary. Michael Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee, has the strategic sense and attention span that you’d expect to find in a frat house on Saturday night.”
