This fall, the descendants of slaves, millions of ethnic and religious minorities from other lands, African-Americans and immigrants -- Latinos, Asians, Europeans -- and women, as well as working- and middle-class Americans, will decide whether to claim their future. We are all in this together. All Americans will have a chance to move Lincoln's vision forward to help close the opportunity gap, to end the economic inequality resulting from government policies that favor a handful over the many who work equally hard. Abraham Lincoln would be proud to see the progress we have made. But he also would understand that there is still more work to do. Together. Claim it.
Not for the first time in our nation's fractious history of presidential elections, we are debating what it means to be free in The United States of America. Not for the first time, a U.S. President is arguably staking his mandate to lead the country on the body politic interpretation of the freedom of the individual. And, not for the first time, but presumably for the last time, "We the People" are coming to grips with Thomas Jefferson's seemingly unassailable dictum that "all men are created equal." By becoming the first U.S. President to come out in support of same-sex marriage, President Obama has boldly illuminated bone-deep and often ugly differences of opinion dividing Americans, and exposed them to open civil discussion. Comparisons to Abraham Lincoln and his stand on slavery a century and a half ago are ample and inescapable.
Lincoln's Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation of 1862, and the course of US History, Stanley Harrold, The Times and Democrat, September 22, 2012. Critics at the time and since have pointed out that the Final Proclamation did not affect slavery in the border slave states, or in portions of the Confederacy occupied by Union troops. Yet, with the Final Proclamation, slavery could not survive in the Border South. More important, from Jan. 1, 1863, onward, Northern troops fought for black freedom as well as preservation of the Union. Slaves became free immediately as Union armies advanced into Confederate territory. The war to restore the Union as it had been before December 1860 ended on Jan. 1, 1863. An old U.S. Constitution that recognized slavery died; a new Constitution that recognized black freedom stirred to life. The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments formalized this change. Black freedom suffered a terrible setback as Reconstruction ended in failure. It took the mid-20th-century’s civil rights movement to revive that freedom and extend it. Still, without the Preliminary Emancipation Proclamation, the path to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 may have been much different and more difficult.
Lincoln's Great Gamble, Richard Striner, New York Times Opinionator, September 21, 2012.
Lincoln’s gamble was dangerous indeed. But he did what he believed he had to do. It was not, in the end, a political calculation. According to the diary of Navy Secretary Gideon Welles, Lincoln told his cabinet on Sept. 22 he had made a promise to God. “He had made a vow, a covenant,” Welles recounted, “that if God gave us the victory in the approaching battle, he would . . . move forward in the cause of emancipation.” And so the stakes of the war would be raised to a level commensurate with all of the carnage and all of the sacrifice. The meaning of the war would be changed — forever changed — by Lincoln’s proclamation. Freedom and Restraint, John Fabian Witt, The Opinion Pages, New York Times, September 21, 2012.
The pocket-size pamphlet quickly became the blueprint for a new generation of treaties, up to the Geneva Conventions of 1949. Strong nations like Prussia and France had long suspected that law-of-war initiatives were little more than maneuvering by weaker countries and closet pacifists hoping to make war more difficult. Lincoln’s code broke that diplomatic logjam: It contained no hidden European agenda, and no one could accuse the Lincoln administration of trying to hold back strong armies.
Tim Minchin's musical and philosophical genius via stormmovie.
"Science adjusts it’s views based on what’s observed. Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved."
Tim Minchin, Storm.
It is actually a beautiful, calm, sunny Sunday morning here in the midwest. I was hoping for a nice dark and stormy night to post this, but this video and the Sunday inspiration contained within is impossible to pass up in spite of the inconveniently pleasant weather.
This is an account of the kind of thing experienced by many scientifically-literate humanists. Tim Minchin describes the unexpected confrontation, the attempt to simply keep one's head down and not make waves, and the ultimate inability to stay quiet in the face of egregious and even harmful lies.
Many of us have had this uncomfortable experience, and few of us can manage to stay quiet right to the end of the evening. Tim couldn't either, but his magnificent rant is worth the outburst.
And he does it all with that pitch perfect, amazingly talented Tim Minchin humour!
Sit back, read, listen and enjoy.
Storm
Inner North London, top floor flat
All white walls, white carpet, white cat,
Rice Paper partitions, modern art and ambition
The host’s a physician,
Bright bloke, has his own practice
His girlfriend’s an actress, an old mate of ours from home
And they’re always great fun, so to dinner we’ve come.
The 5th guest is an unknown,
The hosts have just thrown us together for a favour 'cause this girl’s just arrived from Australia
And she's moved to North London and she’s the sister of someone or has some connection.
As we make introductions I’m struck by her beauty
She’s irrefutably fair with dark eyes and dark hair
But as she sits, I admit I’m a little bit wary 'cause I notice the tip of the wing of a fairy tattooed on that popular area just above the derrière
And when she says “I’m Sagittarian”, I confess a pigeonhole starts to form
And is immediately filled with pigeon when she says her name is Storm.
Conversation is initially bright and light hearted but it’s not long before Storm gets started:
“You can’t know anything, knowledge is merely opinion!”
She opines, over her Cabernet Sauvignon, vis-à-vis some unhippily empirical comment by me.
“Not a good start” I think
We’re only on pre-dinner drinks
And across the room, my wife widens her eyes, silently begs me: “Be Nice”
A matrimonial warning not worth ignoring
So I resist the urge to ask Storm whether knowledge is so loose-weave of a morning when deciding whether to leave her apartment by the front door
Or the window on her second floor.
The food is delicious and Storm, whilst avoiding all meat happily sits and eats
As the good doctor, slightly pissedly holds court on some anachronistic aspect of medical history
When Storm suddenly insists:
“But the human body is a mystery! Science just falls in a hole when it tries to explain the the nature of the soul.”
My hostess throws me a glance
She, like my wife, knows there’s a chance I’ll be off on one of my rare but fun rants but I shan't
My lips are sealed, I just wanna enjoy the meal
And although Storm is starting to get my goat I have no intention of rocking the boat
Although it’s becoming a bit of a wrestle because - like her meteorological namesake - Storm has no such concerns for our vessel:
“Pharmaceutical companies are the enemy
They promote drug dependency at the cost of the natural remedies that are all our bodies need
They are immoral and driven by greed.
Why take drugs when herbs can solve it?
Why use chemicals when homeopathic solvents can resolve it?
I think it’s time we all return-to-live with natural medical alternatives.”
And try as I like, a small crack appears in my diplomacy-dike.
“By definition”, I begin,
“Alternative Medicine”, I continue,
“Has either not been proved to work, or been proved not to work.
Do you know what they call 'alternative medicine' that’s been proved to work?
Medicine.”
“So you don’t believe in any natural remedies?”
“On the contrary Storm, actually
Before I came to tea, I took a remedy derived from the bark of a willow tree
A painkiller that’s virtually side-effect free
It’s got a weird name, Darling, what was it again?
M-masprin? Basprin? Oh yeah! Asprin!
Which I paid about a buck for down at the local drugstore.
The debate briefly abates as our hosts collects plates
But as they return with desserts Storm pertly asserts:
“Shakespeare said it first:
There are more things in heaven and earth than exist in your philosophy…
Science is just how we’re trained to look at reality,
It doesn't explain love or spirituality.
How does science explain psychics? Auras? The afterlife? The power of prayer?”
I’m becoming aware that I’m staring, I’m like a rabbit suddenly trapped in the blinding headlights of vacuous crap.
Maybe it’s the Hamlet she just misquothed or the 5th glass of wine I just quaffed
But my diplomacy dike groans and the arsehole held back by its stones can be held back no more:
“Look , Storm, sorry I don’t mean to bore you but there’s no such thing as an aura!
Reading Auras is like reading minds or tea-leaves or star-signs or meridian lines
These people aren’t applying a skill, they're either lying or mentally ill.
Same goes for people who claim they hear God’s demands or Spiritual healers who think they've magic hands.
By the way, why do we think it is it OK for people to pretend they can talk to the dead?
Isn't that totally fucked in the head?
Lying to some crying woman whose child has died and telling her you’re in touch with the other side?
I think that’s fundamentally sick
Do we need to clarify here that there’s no such thing as a psychic?
What are we, fucking 2?
Do we actually think that Horton Heard a Who?
Do we still believe that Santa brings us gifts?
That Michael Jackson didn’t had facelifts?
Are we still so stunned by circus tricks that we think that the dead would wanna talk to pricks like John Edwards?
Storm to her credit despite my derision keeps firing off clichés with startling precision like a sniper using bollocks for ammunition
“You’re so sure of your position but you’re just closed-minded
I think you’ll find that your faith in Science and Tests is just as blind as the faith of any fundamentalist”
“Wow that’s a good point, let me think for a bit.
Oh wait, my mistake, that's absolute bullshit.
Science adjusts it’s views based on what’s observed.
Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved.
If you show me that, say, homeopathy works, then I will change my mind
I’ll spin on a fucking dime
I’ll be embarrassed as hell, but I will run through the streets yelling
'It’s a miracle! Take physics and bin it!
Water has memory! And while it’s memory of a long lost drop of onion juice seems Infinite
It somehow forgets all the poo it’s had in it!'
You show me that it works and how it works
And when I’ve recovered from the shock
I will take a compass and carve 'Fancy That' on the side of my cock.”
Everyone's just staring now,
But I’m pretty pissed and I’ve dug this far down,
So I figure, in for penny, in for a pound:
“Life is full of mysteries, yeah
But there are answers out there
And they won’t be found by people sitting around looking serious and saying 'Isn’t life mysterious?'
'Let’s sit here and hope.
Let’s call up the fucking Pope.
Let’s go watch Oprah interview Deepak Chopra.'
If you wanna watch tele, you should watch Scooby Doo.
That show was so cool because every time there was a church with a ghoul or a ghost in a school
They looked beneath the mask and what was inside?
The fucking janitor or the dude who ran the waterslide.
Because throughout history every mystery ever solved has turned out to be
Not Magic.
Does the idea that there might be knowledge frighten you?
Does the idea that one afternoon on Wiki-fucking-pedia might enlighten you frighten you?
Does the notion that there may not be a supernatural so blow your hippy noodle that you'd rather just stand in the fog of your inability to Google?
Isn’t this enough?
Just this world?
Just this beautiful, complex, wonderfully unfathomable, natural world?
How does it so fail to hold our attention that we have to diminish it with the invention of cheap, man-made myths and monsters?
If you’re so into your Shakespeare, lend me your ear:
“To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, to throw perfume on the violet… is just fucking silly”
Or something like that.
Or what about Satchmo?!
“I see trees of Green,
Red roses too,”
And fine, if you wish to glorify Krishna and Vishnu in a post-colonial, condescending bottled-up and labeled kind of way then whatever, that’s ok.
But here’s what gives me a hard-on:
I am a tiny, insignificant, ignorant bit of carbon.
I have one life, and it is short and unimportant…
But thanks to recent scientific advances I get to live twice as long as my great great great great uncleses and auntses.
Twice as long to live this life of mine
Twice as long to love this wife of mine
Twice as many years of friends and wine
Of sharing curries and getting shitty at good-looking hippies with fairies on their spines and butterflies on their titties.
And if perchance I have offended
Think but this and all is mended:
We’d as well be 10 minutes back in time, for all the chance you’ll change your mind.
"The people of the Flat Earth Society believe that this place is one of the four corners of the world...
... the very edge of the earth.
Ah now, that's just foolishness.
Isn't it?"
This beautiful brief video is balm to the weary spirit on the first day of autumn. I wonder if, when the late-20th century murmurings of revisionist history and anti-science began, did people similarly think it was not something to be taken seriously?
The lure of myth, legend and what the heart wants to believe when overwhelmed - with beauty or with fear or with awe - is a very powerful thing. What is true often hasn't a chance when it is held up against what people prefer to believe.
Confused, perplexed and coldly furious: Mitt feels entitled to win, dammit!
The infamous $50,000 a plate dinner video (47% video turning point?) has been discussed a lot this week - and I hope people will continue to discuss it. The usual tendency for the media to move on after important revelations have been discussed for a day or two must be resisted because this is a story of ongoing relevance. The video and Republican reactions to it (44% of Republicans polled by Gallup said the "47%" remarks made them more likely to vote for Romney) was a glimpse into the raw, unvarnished truth about the attitude and motivations of not only Mitt Romney but also of his supporters.
"And to think I spent 30 years building that before I got laid off four years ago." (Jeff Parker)
There really is a class war going on in the United States. It is a war being waged by the wealthiest 1% - individual citizens and "corporate citizens" - on the middle class and the poor. In this war, the most privileged and powerful class has mobilized every weapon in its impressive arsenal against the millions of Americans whose labour produced the very wealth the elite now crows they "built" the old-fashioned way. Millions of middle class and poor working Americans are beginning to wake up to the fact that the system is rigged against them: that Reaganomics ushered in thirty years of so-called "business-friendly" government which has been nothing short of catastrophic for the American working class. The awakening giant that is the American workforce is the nightmare that haunts the 1%.
A mobilized majority of working Americans who understand that they have been had, and who can still vote (hopefully) for real change which will benefit them and millions of their fellow Americans poses a real threat to the corporate elite's control over the wealth of the nation. Romney understands this and his powerful backers expect him to reverse the tide and subjugate the masses to the service of the wealthy once and for all.
But perhaps the most sickening revelation from Romney's remarks was what it revealed about who the candidate really is, and what kind of people his candidacy is meant to represent. One of the most pernicious effects of the widening gulf between rich and poor in the United States is the revival of the old European aristocratic notion that those who are poor and struggling are in that position because of their own inherent moral failings (laziness, stupidity, weak character, perhaps even genetic inferiority) - the corollary to which is that those who are rich and successful are in that position because of their inherent moral superiority (industriousness, intelligence, integrity and perhaps even genetic superiority). Those people are where they are because they are simply lesser people; they choose to be in that position (welfare queens, freeloaders, moochers). The contemporary buzzword for this self-serving attitude is "meritocracy" - and it allows no room for consideration of the fact that few people start out on a level playing field.
The barely leashed disdain for those less fortunate than himself is at the core of all of Mitt Romney's actions. He will not discuss his various "plans" to restore America to prosperity because he does not think he ought to have to explain himself to anyone, least of all to those people. He is outraged that he has been asked to show his tax returns because he believes that he is above other people and should not be subjected to the same scrutiny that other candidates willingly undergo. How dare those people try to treat him like just any ordinary American. He is not an ordinary American, by god, he is an American aristocrat! He literally believes that he should be given the trust, the admiration and the votes of the people because in his own mind, he is entitled to these things.
The lesson we should take away from every contemptible revelation about the true character of Mitt Romney this week is this: here is a man who really believes that the Presidency of the United States is his own personal entitlement.
Here was Romney raw and unplugged—sort of unscripted. With this crowd of fellow millionaires, he apparently felt free to utter what he really believes and would never dare say out in the open. He displayed a high degree of disgust for nearly half of his fellow citizens, lumping all Obama voters into a mass of shiftless moochers who don't contribute much, if anything, to society, and he indicated that he viewed the election as a battle between strivers (such as himself and the donors before him) and parasitic free-riders who lack character, fortitude, and initiative. Yet Romney explained to his patrons that he could not speak such harsh words about Obama in public, lest he insult those independent voters who sided with Obama in 2008 and whom he desperately needs in this election. These were sentiments not to be shared with the voters; it was inside information, available only to the select few who had paid for the privilege of experiencing the real Romney.
(David Corn)
Here's the thing: the effects of income tax in discouraging work are far stronger at the low end of the income spectrum than at the high end. The logic behind the flat personal exemptions in the tax code, and behind the earned-income tax credit, is that you end up with huge numbers of otherwise-dependent poor people entering the labour force and working productively if you tip the scales in their benefit. That's why the Clinton administration expanded the EITC, and it's been very successful. But the genius of the "they-don't-pay-income-taxes" complaint is that it takes the tax cuts that were implemented in order to get poor people off of welfare and encourage them to work, and uses them to accuse poor people of being shiftless and dependent on government. This creates a sort of permanent resentment machine, a renewable fuel source for class warfare of the rich against the poor. And so we switch smoothly from one tax two-step to another. Do-si-do your partner and sashay down. (M.S.) Does Romney Dislike America? E.J. Dionne Jr., Washington Post, September 19, 2012.
Oh, EJ! Romney only dislikes the America where all citizens expect a fair shot at success in life; Mitt Romney loves the America that provided the tax breaks, resources and cheap labour that made him and his elite class rich and powerful. You know, America the Republicans intend to take back.
The most incisive reaction to Mitt Romney’s disparaging comments about 47 percent of us came from a conservative friend who e-mailed: “If I were you, I’d wonder why Romney hates America so much.” A bit strong, perhaps. But the more you think about what Romney said, the more you wonder how he really feels about the country he wants to lead.
What kind of nation are we if nearly half of us are lazy, self-indulgent moochers who will never be persuaded to mend our ways? “I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives,” Romney said, thus writing off a huge share of our citizenry. (E.J.Dionne Jr.)
You may be wondering whatever became of Ryan, who was such a big sensation when Romney first picked him as a running mate. Since Tampa, he seems to have fallen off the face of the earth, resurfacing every now and then to put up another ad for re-election to his House seat in Wisconsin. It’s not all that unusual for a vice-presidential candidate to go low-profile. And it is totally not true that Mitt Romney strapped Paul Ryan to the top of a car and drove him to Canada. Stop spreading rumors! (Gail Collins)
Mitt earned everything he has the old-fashioned way: by being born into wealth and privilege just like princes and nobles did before the American notions of equality, liberty and the idea of a social contract changed the world.
Another illustration of radicalizing self-delusion comes when the son of a governor and corporate chief executive says that “everything that Ann and I have, we earned the old-fashioned way, and that’s by hard work.”
Romney has proved himself right: We manifestly do have a problem with people who see themselves as victims even as they benefit from loopholes in the tax code. One is running for president. (Nicholas Kristof)
“When people show you who they are believe them; the first time.”
That comes from the inimitable Maya Angelou (via the equally inimitable Oprah). And I agree.
So I’m inclined to take Mitt Romney at his word when he disparages nearly half the country to a roomful of wealthy donors on a secretly recorded tape. (Charles Blow)
What about those who came here not to found businesses, but simply to make an honest living? Not worth mentioning. (Paul Krugman)
But here’s the question: Should we imagine that Mr. Romney and his party would think better of the 47 percent on learning that the great majority of them actually are or were hard workers, who very much have taken personal responsibility for their lives? And the answer is no. For the fact is that the modern Republican Party just doesn’t have much respect for people who work for other people, no matter how faithfully and well they do their jobs. All the party’s affection is reserved for “job creators,” a k a employers and investors. Leading figures in the party find it hard even to pretend to have any regard for ordinary working families — who, it goes without saying, make up the vast majority of Americans...
...In the past, however, even Republican politicians who privately shared the elite’s contempt for the masses knew enough to keep it to themselves and managed to fake some appreciation for ordinary workers. At this point, however, the party’s contempt for the working class is apparently too complete, too pervasive to hide. (Paul Krugman)
In NBC's first battleground map since the conventions and a slew of new state polling, President Obama has expanded his electoral-vote lead over Mitt Romney -- but only slightly. There are now 243 electoral votes in Obama’s column and 191 in Romney’s, with 104 in the Toss-up category; 270 are needed to win the presidency. Obama's Convention Bounce May Not Be Receding, NYT FiveThirtyEight blog, Nate Silver, September 21, 2012.
Note: FiveThirtyEight blog is highly recommended for ongoing and thorough poll analysis.
In the 10 states that have generally been ranked the highest on our tipping-point list — Ohio, Virginia, Florida, Wisconsin, Colorado, Nevada, Iowa, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire and Michigan — there have been 21 such polls since the Democratic convention ended. Mr. Obama has led in all 21 of these surveys — and usually by clear margins. On average, he has held a six-point lead in these surveys, and he has had close to 50 percent of the vote in them. (Nate Silver)
(Excellent investigative article providing more background into the mind of Mitt Romney and the wealthy elites who are backing him)
The incredible untold story of the 2012 election so far is that Romney's run has been a shimmering pearl of perfect political hypocrisy, which he's somehow managed to keep hidden, even with thousands of cameras following his every move. And the drama of this rhetorical high-wire act was ratcheted up even further when Romney chose his running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin – like himself, a self-righteously anal, thin-lipped, Whitest Kids U Know penny pincher who'd be honored to tell Oliver Twist there's no more soup left. By selecting Ryan, Romney, the hard-charging, chameleonic champion of a disgraced-yet-defiant Wall Street, officially succeeded in moving the battle lines in the 2012 presidential race. (Matt Taibbi)
The glory which is built upon a lie soon becomes a most unpleasant incumbrance. How easy it is to make people believe a lie, and how hard it is to undo that work again! - Mark Twain in Eruption
There was a blast of hot, damp air out of the Gulf region last month, threatening to inundate the country in a nightmarish scenario not witnessed since the Bush era. No, I am not talking about Hurricane Isaac, though the timing was apt (thanks a heap again, MotherNature!), but about the hellish blasts of white hot lies that erupted out of the Republican convention in Tampa.
Mark Twain is quoted as having said that "A lie can travel halfway round the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." and it seems that the Republican party has set out to prove that assertion.
Does the truth even matter at all anymore to Republicans? Have they, finally, noticed that their base will not only vote against their own interests - sometimes with disastrous results for themselves, their families and their communities - but will even vote against their own consciences and against the very values that they purport to hold? So-called "values voters" talk a lot about Truth™, yet the easily verifiable lies of Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan and their surrogates simply do not seem to faze them.
In fact, they loved it. In spite of the constant and prominent references to God and the ubiquitous displays of religiosity, the delegates for God's Own Party seemed undisturbed by the steady stream of lies erupting out of the mouths of speaker after speaker, culminating in an almost wall-to-wall speech of lies and misrepresentation from the party princeling - and apparently habitual liar - Paul Ryan. Yet, perhaps this smug acceptance of what amounted to a probably record-breaking level of unprincipled dishonesty was not in spite of Christian morality at all...
What harm would it do, if a man told a good strong lie for the sake of the good and for the Christian church ... a lie out of necessity, a useful lie, a helpful lie, such lies would not be against God, he would accept them. (Martin Luther)
What exactly are the values of these voters? How do these people get away with claiming the higher moral ground? Why isn't the media challenging the tiresome narrative that these so-called "values voters" are somehow above questions about their motives and methods?
Maybe these articles can give us a little insight:
Greer notes that July brought multiple cases of huge corporate fines for cheating. The largest was $3 billion to be paid by GlaxoSmithKline, the huge British pharmaceutical firm, both for hawking antidepressants for unapproved uses and for not reporting safety data involving a big-selling diabetes drug. It also conceded that it wrongly marketed other drugs. Did you know that? Do you care? Imagine, a $3 billion fine for cheating and risking lives -- and it's just another one- or two-line bulletin on our smart phones, quickly forgotten by most. (from Fact-Checking Campaign Lies: Does Anybody Give A Damn?)
No member of Congress is farther to the right than Paul Ryan. He's an acolyte of the ideologue Ayn Rand, but the media, having done its obligatory story on her noxious philosophy, is perfectly content to use Ryan's recent brushoff of her influence on him as an excuse to drop the story. The vaunted Ryan budget is actually a roadmap for eliminating the safety net that has defined the American social contract since the 1930s, but explaining this takes time, which risks audience share, and in the face of a barrage of ads portraying him as the savior of seniors, it takes the kind of persistence that news executives fear hurts ratings. He is a hypocrite of the first order, a deficit hawk who voted to increase the deficit by hundreds of billions of dollars and whose tax plan is demonstrably fraudulent, but hey, how 'bout the six-pack on that dreamboat?(fromRomney/Ryan and the Lullaby of Lying, Marty Kaplan, Huffington Post, August 30, 2012.)
But as satisfying as the McLuhan moments are for partisans and reporters, this stuff actually doesn’t matter that much in terms of winning or losing a presidential election. The small number of undecided voters in tossup states who’ll actually decide this thing really don’t care whether Mitt Romney misrepresented a popular scientist’s thesis. The voters committed to Romney won’t have their faith shaken by the revelation that (pointy-headed) economists think his tax plan is based on misreading of their work.Mitt Romney's many "Annie Hall" moments, Alex Pareene, Salon, August 9, 2012.
So even the studies that the Romney campaign’s economists handpicked to bolster their case don’t prove what the Romney campaign says they prove. And some of the key policy recommendations that flow from those studies are anathema to the Romney campaign. And in perhaps the key policy area highlighted by these studies, the Romney campaign doesn’t have a formal policy. If this is the best they can do in support of their economic plan, well, it’s not likely to quiet the critics.Economists to Romney Campaign: That's Not What Our Research Says, Ezra Klein, Washington Post, August 8, 2012.
This really is a post-truth campaign. It's different. It's one thing to be nasty. All campaigns are nasty. It's one thing to twist and distort and mock. Every campaign does that too. Even the attacks on Al Gore in 2000, as vicious as they were, were mostly media inventions. The Republican campaigns had the distortions handed to them on a platter. But this is different. This is a presidential candidate just baldly making stuff up on the assumption that nobody will ever know. After all, they figure, who the hell reads Glenn Kessler aside from a bunch of Beltway nerds? And I guess they're right.Mitt Romney Sure Does Lie A Lot, Doesn't He? Kevin Drum, Mother Jones, August 9, 2012.
For a rundown of just this week's catalogue of lies, check out: Mitt's Mendacity, Volume XXXV*, Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, September 21, 2012.
16. On federal spending, Romney said, "[M]y test is this: is the program so critical that it is worth borrowing money from China to pay for it?" The implication here is that U.S. debt is financed by the Chinese, but this isn't true -- China only holds about 8% of the nation's debt. 17. Romney added, "The president has put us on the road to Greece." That's painfully untrue. 18. Romney also argued, "No wonder business start-ups are at a 30-year low." This still isn't true.
Or, you can just laugh about the (mostly)unchallenged lying (so you won't cry):
In his speech to the Republican National Convention last night, Vice-Presidential nominee Paul Ryan test-drove what the Romney-Ryan campaign says will be a major theme for the 2012 Republican campaign: “lying about everything.” “The question was, how many whoppers could you pack into one speech?” the campaign adviser Tracy Klugian said. “All I can say is, when Fox News accuses a Republican of lying, you know you’ve witnessed something historic.”(fromPaul Ryan Launches Campaign Theme of Lying About Everything, Andy Borowitz, The New Yorker, August 30, 2012.)
*Yes, that is the thirty-fifth (35th) installment of Mitt's Mendacity. Willard tells enough whoppers each week to keep bloggers very busy!
Two "stand-up" guys: "Let others lie, wantonly, gratuitously, if they will, but let you & me make it the rule of our life to lie for revenue only." (Mark Twain)
My favorite freethinking poet, Digital Cuttlefish posted a link to this amazing cartoon by (also my favorite!) always-thinking cartoonist, xkcd. The cartoon is called Click and Drag and that is exactly what you do - click on the image and drag your curser to open up a huge world of wonders. The artist presents landscapes, people, animals, intriguing mysteries, human innovations, surprises, funny quips, thoughtful moments and even Waldo™ all in his trademark black-and-white, silhouette technique.
It is, in a word, awesome.
One blogger (ComicMix) has mentioned that if you were to print this comic out large enough to read, it would cover the end zone in a football field. Another blogger (boingboing) mentioned that the comic pays tribute to the novel The House of Leaves, as the final panel expands to an enormous world far beyond what a normal cartoon panel could ever hold.
I just think the mountains and the valleys and the surprises and the cartoon people doing things all over this amazing hidden world inside a comic panel is really cool!
Do yourself a favour. Clear your calendar, have a friend hold your calls, and carve out a couple of free hours to enter xkcd's world of wonders. You'll be glad you did!
For those of us who just can't clear that much time at once, don't despair! You can click and drag at will using the permanent link above. I have it open in another tab and can just browse around when I have a few free moments...
OOOhh! I see a giant jellyfish! TTYL!
This is a still photo of the cartoon. Please use the permanent link for the full click and drag experience.
(Reposting a Nifty PSA. Links to voter registration information at bottom of post.) "In the United States, voter registration is the responsibility of the people, and only 70 percent of Americans who are eligible to vote have registered." (RegistertoVote.org)
Let's do the math: There are more than 300 million citizens of the United States. 30% of 300,000,000 is 90 million people. Even if only half of those people are over 18 years old and eligible to vote, there would be 45 million eligible voters who have not yet registered to vote.
Among the 70% of eligible citizens who have registered to vote, the number who actually do vote is shockingly low. The per centage of actual voters by age cohort ranges from less than 30% for registered 18-29 year olds, to a high of just over 60% for 60-69 year olds. There is not a single age cohort from age 18-49 years old which has a voting record of more than 40%.
Why is it that in a nation that fought a historic battle for independence - not to mention the right to representative self-government - so few of the people today actually exercise that right by voting? In a world where self-government and constitutionally-guaranteed individual freedoms are a rare and precious commodity, it beggars belief that people who have it do not appear to cherish it and fail to guard it vigilantly. The assumption seems to be that gains once made can never be lost. But history teaches another, grimmer, lesson.
"...that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth." Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg Address.
There is a lot of talk right now about a tiny cabal of extremely wealthy and influential people pouring billions into the upcoming election in order to ensure an outcome which will suit their own interests and not those of the people of the United States. In a democratic Republic, the idea that wealthy or religious elites could rise to such power and influence that they could establish a de facto feudal economic system and authoritarian theocracy - almost exactly the conditions over which this country fought the War of Independence - could only be possible if a majority of the people allow it to happen, through ignorance, through apathy, through intimidation.
But the American people are made of sterner stuff than that.
Don't just stand there...do it!
When all eligible voters in the country performed their civic duty at every election, and when all eligible voters made it their business to stay informed about the issues that face the nation, then it becomes far more difficult for any one group, no matter how well-organized and determined, to seize control of the government.
Make sure you are registered to vote. Don't assume that you are registered. During the primaries, thousands of people were shocked to discover that their names had been stricken from the voter lists without their knowledge. Florida has purged nearly 200,000 names from its voter list, including seniors and veterans. Pennsylvania is preparing to deny voting rights to nearly 10% of its eligible citizens.
Voter suppression threatens our Republic, but there are still enough voters to put a stop to it, if only every citizen who can vote, does so. There are as many eligible voters who do not vote as there are who do -more, in fact. Voter turnout could potentially be double what it has historically been. The current voter suppression tactics - ambitious though they undeniably are - would not disenfranchise enough people to overcome the will of the people if only the majority would take a stand, register now and vote in November.
Your vote counts. It really is that important.
Remind your friends and family to be sure to register and be sure to vote.
Resources for Eligible Voters: Can I vote? Need help with voting? You've come to the right place. This nonpartisan web site was created by state election officials to help eligible voters figure out how and where to go vote. Choose a category below to get started.
Rock the Vote Rock the Vote is a nonpartisan nonprofit organization in the United States whose mission is to engage and build the political power of young people.
Our Time.org Declare Yourself is a national nonpartisan, nonprofit campaign to empower and encourage every eligible 18-29 year-old in America to register and vote in local and national elections.
League of Women Voters The League is proud to be nonpartisan, neither supporting nor opposing candidates or political parties at any level of government, but always working on vital issues of concern to members and the public.
Register To Vote. org In the United States, voter registration is the responsibility of the people, and only 70 percent of Americans who are eligible to vote have registered. RegistertoVote.org is a nonpartisan organization committed to reaching the remaining 30 percent. We simplify the voter registration process, making it faster and easier for you to get involved and become an active voice in our democracy.
The cooler fall days are sweeping in on a fresh autumn breeze. Soon the whale season in Newfoundland will be drawing to a close as the humpbacks head back down to the Gulf of Mexico to over winter. But before they go, there is always time for a little more exuberant fun in their northern playground!
These are busy times - take a deep breath and relax for a minute!
