MRI of the brain during "normal", manic and depressed moods
So I’m bipolar. So what? How does this make me an expert? It doesn’t. I’m no authority on the subject whatsoever. I can only write about what my experiences have been and about what I’ve learned while searching for answers to this very complicated multifaceted mental illness.
There are several stock responses when I tell someone I’m bipolar. “Oh, my dear, I can just imagine the hell you go through.” Or, “Oh sweetie, talk to me anytime. My great-aunt/mother/brother/wife/ daughter has it. I know all about it.” Well meaning but it’s pure horse hockey. You ain’t got a clue unless you have it.
Another is: “We all get blue sometimes.” True, “we all” do just that. Someone dies, we lose our job or our kid gets sick. Or our house burns down while the firefighters stand there and do nothing. Any of these things alone is enough to depress anyone. But . . .
It is a situational depression. It is nowhere nearly as extreme in intensity or longevity. It isn’t so debilitating that you don’t want to get out of bed for weeks or months at a time. It doesn’t cause you to self-mutilate, or worse, to kill yourself. It may even last for a couple of years but not for a lifetime. And you can’t just talk yourself out of it.
Another is, “Well, gee, I have periods when I’m more energized than at other times.” Of course and that’s perfectly normal. You just got a raise, won some money, moved to that farm you’ve always wanted. Or, maybe it’s something simple like the sun shining and it’s a beautiful spring day. But . . .
This feeling of elation is thousands of miles away from the intensity and destructiveness of a manic episode. You don’t lose your judgment. You don’t make reckless decisions, spend boat loads of money you don’t have, or dance naked in a fountain, or self-medicate with drugs and alcohol.
Oh, there’s one more: “Well, I’m sure if you pray and talk to the Lord, you’ll be just fine.”
So what is this thing called manic depression anyway? What causes it? Is it contagious? Can’t you just take a pill to get rid of it? What are the symptoms?
According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness: “Bipolar disorder, or manic depression, is a medical illness that causes extreme shifts in mood, energy, and functioning. These changes may be subtle or dramatic and typically vary greatly over the course of a person’s life as well as among individuals.”
Too clinical. Too cut and dry says I. What are missing here are all the complexities of mood disorders, all the varieties which come in all sizes, shapes and even colors and the multitude of symptoms which overlap. There’s major depression. There’s manic depression. There’s schizophrenia. Each of them presents themselves differently and all of them have similarities, making diagnosis a complicated affair.
Even manic depression has variations on a theme. One is rapid cycling where moods go up and down like a roller coaster ride. The other is mixed states where mania and depression are experienced at the same time. Mixed states are bad enough. Rapid cycling is pure hell and they're both hard to control because just the tiniest dose of a medication, too much or too little, can send a person spiraling in the other direction. And there are even a few more, but that’s really getting too technical for this blog.
Scientists have been trying to find a genetic link to bipolar for decades, but so far it has eluded them. There was a huge study of the Amish about 15 years ago because they have such a high rate of bipolar and not a small amount of inbreeding. The study was a dud, unfortunately. But clinical trials continue at Columbia, John Hopkins, Duke and other major universities and centers. It is well documented that manic depression, and related mood disorders, is passed down through the generations.
A few cut and dry, but revealing, statistics from NAMI:
- Approximately 20.9 million – or 9.5 percent - of American adults over the age of 18 have some form of mood disorder.
- Manic depression affects about 5.7 million adults in America, or about 2.6 percent.
- The median age of onset is 32. (Note: children as young as six or seven are being diagnosed. More about this later).
- Ninety percent of people who commit suicide have a diagnosable mood disorder.
As mentioned earlier, bipolar is such a complex disorder that it is impossible to do it justice on a blog. What you’ve seen here and in my previous post (HERE) is a superficial look at best. But I think readers need this tiny bit of information to understand what follows.
Everything with us is an extreme. There's no such thing as smooth sailing. It’s a stormy sea with periods when a body, mind and soul can be pushed to the depths, raised up in turmoil and only occasionally have peace and calm.
Notions on the war in Afghanistan are tumbling through my mind and tugging on my emotions, demanding to be processed, refusing to coalesce, and threatening me with the dreaded bugaboo, cognitive dissonance. Don't want to write about them; can't stop thinking about them; let's see what happens when I throw them into the blog blender.
[But, first, the disclaimer: I support Democratic candidates, except where they are obviously unqualified, in which case I support the Green candidate (think SC, where they let me vote). I think Obama has done an heroic job. I think it's time for liberals and progressives to pull together. Having said that much, perhaps I should just stifle my issues with the war. Robert McNamara once said, when he was damned if he did and damned if he didn't on Vietnam, "And I would rather be damned if I don't," meaning that he'd finally decided it was time to STFU. Because, of course, he'ds actually been damned for what he did. So, should I bring this controversial topic up at a time when we need to pull together? Damned if I won't.]
Charles Krauthammer's Op-Ed for the Washington Post, Monday, Oct 4, 2010: "Has Obama Abandoned The Troops He Sent To War?"
"What kind of commander in chief sends tens of thousands of troops to war announcing in advance a fixed date for beginning their withdrawal? One who doesn't have his heart in it. One who doesn't really want to win but is making some kind of political gesture."
Krauthammer goes on to Bob Woodward's book, O'bama's Wars, and the quotation by the CinC that can be spun so many ways: "I can't lose the whole Democratic party." Krauthammer's spin is:
First, isn't this the party that in two consecutive presidential campaigns--John Kerry's and then Obama's--argued vociferously that Afghanistan is the good war, the right war, the war of necessity, the central front in the war on terror? [....]
Did he suddenly develop a faint heart? Or was the party disingenuous about the Afghan War all along, using it as a convenient club with which to attack Geroge W. Bush over Iraq, while protecting the Democrats from the charge of being reflexively anti-war? [....]
One can only conclude that Obama now thinks Afghanistan is a mistake. Maybe he thought so from the very beginning.
Krauthammer is shrewd. He's given the "weak president" spin to what had to have been and continues to be the toughest decisions a president is called on to make. That spin is predictable, despicable, typical of the right at the moment.
What I recall is that in the first days the new president was under enormous pressure from top military advisors to go all out in Afghanistan, to throw everything we had at a war he had doubts about. What I recall is that the surge and withdrawal target date announcement struck me as compromise, forcing me to trust that the President knew things I didn't...had come to know things he hadn't known during his campaign.
I continue to believe that the compromise was not politically based, but was chosen because Mr. Obama saw some possibility that a troop increase could further the goals of our war with Al Qaeda, but wanted to see smaller scale results before committing all our treasure and all our soldiers to the effort.
As to the effects of Bob Woodward's "revelations," I haven't yet read the book, but I have read more articles and blogs on the book than I can count. I've assumed that pundits like Krauthammer have culled what they consider to be the most damning quotations and I think they fail to damn. What I find damning is Krauthammer's conclusion in this piece:
"Sen. Kerry, now chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, once asked many years ago: 'How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?' Perhaps Kerry should ask that of Obama.
"'He is out of Afghanistan psychologically,' says Woodward of Obama. Well, he may be out, but the soldiers he ordered to Afghanistan are in.
Some will not come home."
I had my doubts about the surge then and I have them now. I wanted the soldiers home then and I want them home now. And I wish the President had worked harder to communicate with us about his decisions. But I find Krauthammer's conclusion to be a cheap shot in a profoundly significant discussion.
I believe these statements by the President, also quoted in Woodward's book and reported in the NYTimes and Washington Post, depict a leader wrestling with the best information and advice he could get his hands on, including interviews with former Sec'y of State Colin Powell, who advised, “don’t get pushed by the left to do nothing. Don’t get pushed by the right to do everything.”
“I’m not signing on to a failure,” President Obama is quoted saying near the end of this book. “If what I proposed is not working, I’m not going to be like these other presidents and stick to it based upon my ego or my politics — my political security.”
************
“Everything we’re doing has to be focused on how we’re going to get to the point where we can reduce our footprint. It’s in our national security interest. There cannot be any wiggle room,”
***********
“In 2010, we will not be having a conversation about how to do more. I will not want to hear, ‘We’re doing fine, Mr. President, but we’d be better if we just do more.’ We’re not going to be having a conversation about how to change [the mission] ... unless we’re talking about how to draw down faster than anticipated in 2011.”
What I want to know is, what's the Right's position on Afghanistan? Are they still sorting that out? Michael Steele was roundly condemned for calling Afghanistan "a war of Obama's choosing," and, "not something the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in," (July, 2010). For once, Lindsey Graham said something I value in response to Steele's idiocy: "It was an uninformed, unnecessary, unwise, untimely comment. This is not President Obama's war, this is America's war. We need to stand behind the president."
The Republican Pledge To America acknowledges that we are a nation at war and makes not one statement on how it intends to deal with the war in Afghanistan other than that tired old phrase about supporting our troops, as if only Republicans fight. As if only Republicans care or worry for those who fight.
Last night, I watched "The Fog of War," a documentary based on a long interview with Robert McNamara on the Vietnam War. Certain quotations haunt me:
On the workings of President Johnson's mind, "People did not understand there were recommendations and pressures that could carry the risk of war with China and of nuclear war."
On allies, "If we can't persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we'd better re-examine our reasoning."
On escalation, "This has gone from being a nasty little war to a nasty middle-sized war."
"How much evil must we do in order to do good."
Quoting LBJ for a memorandum on the war, "This morning, Senator Scott said,'The war which we can neither win, lose, nor drop is evidence of an instability of ideas.'" (my emphasis)
I cannot sort out the jumble. I am relieved that Obama set a date to begin withdrawal, pending conditions (which ones?!). Must we maintain another presence in the region to contain Iran? Is Afghanistan our only door to terrorist training camps? Does the warrior nation mentality, which Obama opposes, demand that we keep an active front somewhere, always, and--if not in Iraq--well, then we never should have lost our focus in Afghanistan? That may well be the mindset of what Andrew Bacevich calls the Washington rules, but that is not, to my understanding, the mindset of Barack Obama.
Bob Woodward on Sept. 28th, to George Stephanopoulos:
He is an intellectual, as we know. He's the law professor...And so, intellectually, he realizes [that the situation is] real, real, hard. He knows as commander in chief, he has to do something.
And for the first time, you can see his internal struggle, his intellectual struggle. His dealing with the military. He's dealing with his political advisers.
I see a country, its political advisors, its military advisors, and its President struggling hard to do the right thing in Afghanistan--right for the Afghans, right for the Americans, right for the soldiers. There is another total review of the war scheduled for December. That process will be exhaustive, of that I am sure, because that is this President's way.
Charles Krauthammer turned this agonizing national decision into political fodder by exploiting our pain and our anguish about the human costs of war. Those costs are too real to be politicized. To imply, as Krauthammer does, that President Obama has lost interest in Afghanistan, that he doesn't care about the soldiers he's committed to that war, is the ultimate in irresponsible partisanship. Mr. Krauthammer would have been better off following McNamara's STFU motto, "I'd rather be damned if I don't."
P.S. For an excellent review of the President's decision process on the surge and withdrawal date, go to the Washington Post's Interactive Timeline for the period of September through December of 2009.
The individual who coined the phrase “you never see anything on the Interstate” must have just finished driving through Kansas. In all directions are fields of grain which dance with wind that never takes a break. Trees, probably planted to break the never ending bluster, have few leaves. The highest structures are an occasional silo or overpass.
The state with its hard working farmers and wonderfully warm and friendly people is flat, boring and monotonous as hell.
I left Kansas City, elev. 774 ft., one sunny morning and headed west for Denver and the beautiful majestic Rocky Mountains. After passing through Topeka the monotonous terrain began to cause my eyes to droop and my spirits to sag. With each mile it became increasingly hard to stay awake and it took every ounce of will power to concentrate on the driving.
My body began to feel sluggish and I had to fight to stay awake. I yawned, I squirmed, I opened the windows and turned the volume up on the CD player and then switched to the radio searching for some upbeat music. Nothing helped and the noise of the music was more an irritant than a benefit, so I turned it off. And then I turned it on again. Off again,on again. I just wanted to crawl into a warm cocoon and go to sleep for a long, long time.
For hundreds of miles of unbearable boredom I battled the overwhelming desire to snooze. I tried gallantly but unsuccessfully to fight off the sinking spirits which were threatening to consume the whole of my body and mind. As hard and fast as I tried to drive there was this little black cloud that seemed to be weighing down the car and its driver and pulling them back. The speedometer read 80 mph but it felt more like a sluggish 35.
By the time I reached Colby the little cloud had turned into a huge black turbulent mass that sat on top of bright blue skies. Perfect conditions for a tornado. The car automatically headed for the little town out in the middle of nowhere and to the well-known motel that I already knew offered solace in the way of solid food, lively music and drinks as powerful as the ones at the Denver Press Club. I had a good time with my old friend Jack for a few hours before crawling into that cocoon I had longed for all during the day.
The sky is endless in Kansas and the next morning the sun shone brightly as I headed for my car. Just as I was getting in I noticed my little black companion hovering nearby. I knew I was looking forward to more of the same and sank into the driver’s seat feeling totally deflated. More boredom. More tediousness. More flat land. More depression.
Over 200 miles later, I stopped in Burlington, Colorado for gas and a bite to eat. The man behind the counter bragged about their historic carousel. “Not bad for a tiny town on the plains with an altitude of 4,219 feet,” he said. An altitude of 4,219 feet? Who was he kidding? Not once did I feel I was gaining in altitude.
Even though eastern Colorado is a mirror image of western Kansas, I began to feel a tingle of excitement as I started out once again. My spirits rose higher and higher with each mile and the little black cloud began to dissipate. I slammed down on the gas pedal and soared toward Denver. No longer did the car feel sluggish. No longer did I feel lethargic. No longer did I feel flat. I was flying. I was in control.
Several hours later I could see the snowy peaks of the Rockies and became even more excited but didn’t dare drive any faster. And then the Denver skyline started taking shape and I could hardly contain myself. I was about to burst wide open and began singing at the top of my lungs with Willie, “On the Road Again.” God, it felt good to feel good.
Since I had a few days before I had to report back to work I recklessly decided to head for Estes Park, the "Gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park." I couldn’t contain my energy and impatiently honked at Sunday-go-to-meeting drivers as I barreled past giving them the International Sign Language. Once I got through Boulder the traffic thinned and I was Queen of the Road. I drove up steep curvy mountain roads as if I was back on the flat straight interstate in Kansas.
I was euphoric. I was energized. I was as manic as a gerbil on a perpetual motion machine. My mind was taking off in flights of one fancy after another. I was going to do this, buy that and create this, that and the other. In the meantime I kept increasing my speed. I was no longer in control.
The crash was sudden and hard. I went careening down a steep embankment into a big black hole where the sun didn’t shine.
NOTE: Congress declared the first week of October as Mental Illness Awareness Week in 1990. Because of all the voodoo surrounding this subject I am going to dedicate a few posts to bipolar illness over the next few days. It is what I know best. I hope I can bust a few myths for anyone who cares to read about it.
I was having a late lunch with a friend of mine yesterday, Russ, who volunteers for the Martin Heinrich campaign. And he mentioned a campaign mailer that he helped send out, which showed Heinrich's opponent, along with McCain, Palin and other Republicans. This is one of the basic messages from Democrats this year. "OK, so we suck. But they suck more!"
That's not really a message that raises people's spirits, is it? Not really inspiring hope, right there.
But that seems to be the nature of this political season. Go negative, as hard as possible. And while you might be expecting this to be a Republican tactic (after all, if you have no new ideas of your own, what do you campaign on?), it's coming from the Democrats, too.
Was there ever a time in America when politicians would just run on their accomplishments? Or at least show how your political beliefs are improving the country?
Well, we can thank that media narrative being advanced by the right-wing press, who want us to believe that a Democratic White House and a Democratic-controlled Congress are getting nothing done. Or worse, destroying the country.
Some Democrats are just leaving Obama out of their ads (and at least one tongue-kisses George W. Bush). Because, after all, Obama hasn't been able to get anything done, has he?
Which, of course, is complete bullshit. But try telling that to the media.
(Perhaps this is why Bush's "No Child Left Behind" focuses more on children regurgitating what they've been told recently, and less on critical thinking. A compliant electorate, used to being fed the answers and not thinking about the questions, is easier to fool.)
Now, admittedly, anything that the Obama administration has accomplished has been over the intractable resistance of a Republican party who would watch the country to fall to ruins before they'd allow a Democratic President to succeed. Hell, they're already planning, if they "win" the midterms, to do absolutely nothing except smear the president. (You know, like the end of Clinton's term, only with less ethical investigators and a compliant press.)
Obama took an economy in free-fall, and has managed to stop the plummet. It's true that everything isn't perfect. But consider what this country was up against.
"Hey, you've had two years to clean up what we took eight years to break! Aren't you done yet?"
Despite what the GOP desperately want you to believe, Obama's stimulus program worked. It didn't work well enough, because Obama and his advisors were too conservative - it didn't go far enough, but it still worked.
In the words of Alan S. Blinder (professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, vice chairman of the Promontory Interfinancial Network, and former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board):
TARP must be among the most reviled and misunderstood programs in the history of the republic. Voters are clearly appalled by the idea that their government spent $700 billion bailing out banks.
The only problem is: It didn't. Even if we count insurance giant AIG as a bank, no more than $300 billion ever went to banks. TARP's total disbursements, including the auto bailout, never reached the $400 billion mark. The money went for loans and to purchase preferred stock; it was not "spent." In fact, most of it has already been paid back—with interest and capital gains. When TARP's books are eventually closed, the net cost to the taxpayer will probably be under $100 billion—far under if General Motors ever repays.
Spending perhaps $50 billion of taxpayer money to forestall a financial cataclysm seems like a bargain. Yes, I know it's maddening to hand over even a nickel to bankers who don't deserve it. But doing so was a necessary evil to save the economy. Think of it as collateral damage in a successful war against financial armageddon.
Oh, and he also passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, to essentially prevent businesses from saying "Hey, she let us fuck her for four months before she complained. It must not be an issue! So we can keep on fucking her!"
He has installed not one, but two female Supreme Court justices; Elena Kagan actually started her new job on Friday. There have been twenty Supreme Court Justices appointed since 1960 (date chosen arbitrarily as the second wave of the Feminist movement). Only four of them have been women: they make up 51% of the population, they're equally affected by the law, but only four have been appointed to the Supreme Court; and Obama is responsible for doubling that number. And, by the way, we also have the first Hispanic Justice, Sonia Sotomayor.
(Think of that number for a second, by the way. Fifty years, and only twenty Justices. You wonder why American jurisprudence is so freaking slow? Where's the anti-incumbent crowd on this issue?)
You know that a lot of the provisions in healthcare reform just kicked in, right? Yes, it could have been better, it could have had a public option, it could have given puppies and kittens to every child in the United States. But it's also the first major healthcare change since the Medicare and Medicaid legislation was passed almost half a century ago.
And despite the panicked cries of the ignorant and ill-informed (as well as the blatantliars), it's entirely market-based, without even a tinge of socialism.
George Santayana once said "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." But at the moment, maybe we should just work on understanding current events.
What is it about the office of state attorney general that attracts autocratic social controllers who will violate your civil liberties and impose their ideas of:
What you can think?
What you can say?
What kind of person you ought to be?
Who is entitled to equal rights under law?
What constitutes academic freedom?
With whom you can sleep?
Who will be prosecuted and persecuted?
Here is my gallery of rogue state attorneys general who think the office confers a right to enforce dogma and social conformity and tyrannize over decent citizens:
Andrew Shirvell. The assistant attorney general in the State of Michigan has launched a personal vendetta against a gay student at the University of Michigan. Shirvell singled out Chris Armstrong, the first openly gay student to win election as president of the student assembly. In Shirvell’s twisted mind, winning a student election means Armstrong has become a public figure and a legitimate political target; and Shirvell thinks he is justified in superimposing Nazi swastikas over Armstrong’s photograph, in visiting Armstrong’s house at 1:30 AM, in smearing Armstrong’s parents and friends. Here is Anderson Cooper's interview of Shirvell:
This CNN interview affords us a clear and disturbing example of what mental health professionals call reaction formation. It is a fancy term for insisting that the pot is not a pot, at least in public, by adamantly persecuting the kettle. Here are other examples:
The anti-gay family values senator from Idaho whose ‘wide stance’ in a public restroom got him arrested in Minneapolis (Larry Craig);
The anti-gay cofounder of the Family Research Council who was caught with a male prostitute at Miami airport (George Rekers);
The former Speaker of the House who lead the impeachment of President Clinton over an affair with an intern while the Speaker himself was having an affair with an intern as his wife lay hospitalized and dying of cancer (Newt Gingrich).
Does Shirvell have reasons to be jealous? Meanwhile Shirvell’s boss, Michigan State Attorney General Michael Cox, thinks defamation, harassment, intimidation, and stalking are legitimate forms of free speech … if the victim happens to be gay and the perpetrator is an ally and colleague.
Next …
Kenneth T. Cuccinelli. Scarcely two weeks in office, AG Cuccinelli continued to represent a private client in court … thus committing a violation of professional ethics. Cuccinelli is all too willing to abuse his official powers to advance a radically ideological agenda that includes, among other things, a visceral hatred of environmental science. Drawing upon tactics reminiscent of the McCarthy era:
Cuccinelli filed what amounts to a subpoena ordering the University of Virginia to hand over … all available documents, computer code and data relating to Mann's research on the five grants. He also demanded all correspondence, including e-mails — from 1999 to the present — between Mann, now at Pennsylvania State University in University Park, and dozens of climate scientists worldwide, as well as some climate sceptics. The order stated that Cuccinelli was investigating Mann's possible violation of the 2002 Virginia Fraud Against Taxpayers Act — although no evidence of wrongdoing was given to explain invoking the law, which is intended to prosecute individuals who make false claims in order to access government funds.
Cuccinelli has filed briefs in federal court challenging EPA jurisdiction over greenhouse gas emissions and fuel efficiency standards for cars and trucks. "We cannot allow unelected bureaucrats with political agendas to use falsified data [my bold] to regulate American industry and drive our economy into the ground,” he insists. His extremist agenda includes opposition to abortion, sex education, gay rights, and the recently enacted healthcare reform bill, which he has challenged in Federal court. Finally, Cuccinelli is a Birther.
Next ….
Tom Corbett. As Attorney General of the State of Pennsylvania, Corbett seems to have an exceptionally thin skin - especially when accused of hypocrisy and misfeasance in office. To question Corbett’s integrity is tantamount to violating state law. Earlier this year, Corbett subpoenaed Twitter:
… to provide “any and all subscriber information” of the person(s) behind two accounts – @bfbarbie and @CasaBlancaPA – who have been anonymously criticizing [Attorney General Tom Corbett] …
The information that Twitter is ordered to provide includes “name, address, contact information, creation date, creation Internet Protocol address and any and all log in Internet Protocol address”.
Here are the Tweets that caused Corbett to issue his subpoena:
”Is it wrong to mix campaign work with taxpayer business? Apparently not when Tom Corbett does it - bonusgate #pagovrace”
“Quiz! Who sputters with indignation over failure to recuse from cases involving contributors? - #bonusgate #pagovrace”
These Twitter subscribers accuse Corbett of duplicity, hypocrisy, and conflict of interest in prosecuting political opponents for the same offenses committed by Corbett:
Sandy Segal said he didn’t know what to think when he received the letter this week.
The envelope, labeled as coming from “Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett,” bore the message: “Please give me your immediate attention.”
He opened it to find Corbett was seeking a contribution in his run for governor. Corbett is seeking the Republican nomination.
“It looked like a pretty official kind of letter to me, at least the envelope,” said Segal, 62, of Susquehanna Twp.
Segal, who said he is a Democrat, later saw small print at the bottom of the envelope that read, “Not Paid For At Government Expense.” On the back, the envelope says, “Corbett for Governor.”
As Corbett has led an investigation of lawmakers accused of using taxpayer money and resources to bolster election campaigns, he is increasingly taking criticism from Democrats on his campaign activities.
As a former lobbyist for Waste Management, Inc., Corbett has blocked community efforts to enforce environmental ordinances. Along with Cuccinelli, Corbett is also challenging the healthcare reform bill in Federal court.
Next …
Bill McCollum. The following is a true account of my personal experience with Florida’s Attorney General. On Wednesday, May 19, 2010, at approximately 2:30 PM, there was a loud knock on my front door; not the customary ‘tap, tap’ of a delivery person bearing packages, but a determined ‘bang, bang.’ When I looked through the security peephole, there was a fisheye image of two men standing outside. When I opened the door, they flashed badges and demanded answers to “a few questions” starting with: “Did you send an electronic message to Attorney General Bill McCollum?” For readers unfamiliar with Bill McCollum and the nature of my “electronic message,” let us recall the story of George Rekers and the infamous rent boy scandal that broke earlier this year (with commentaries by our own Bloggingdino and Captain Fogg). George Rekers is the disgraced neuropsychiatrist and Christian Fundamentalist cofounder of the Family Research Council who went on a European junket with a rent boy and was ‘outed’ by a Miami newspaper reporter. After the story broke, a liberal nonprofit group known as Progress Florida circulated this petition:
Tell Bill McCollum’ “We Want Our” Money Back!
Attorney General Bill McCollum gave $120,000 of our money to a discredited, anti-gay hypocrite named George Rekers. The courts had already deemed Rekers' "expertise’ junk science, and McCollum insisted on doubling Reker's pay to $120,000 from $60,000, ignoring the terms of a written agreement between Rekers and the cash-strapped Department of Children and Families. Finally, Rekers' anti-gay credentials were naturally called into question after he was caught traveling with a gay escort who advertised his services on a porn site. Bill McCollum wasted our tax dollars on a bigoted, ideological crusade that keeps children away from loving homes. Sign our petition below and tell McCollum: We want our money back!
Your intrepid Octopus went a step further. I linked to the website of the Florida Attorney General and used this online contact form to file a complaint against Bill McCollum ... accusing him of defrauding Florida taxpayers. Weeks later, in retaliation, McCollum dispatched two officers to my door with orders to tell me to STFU.
We might be inclined to view Messrs. Shirvell (slant rhymes with ‘gerbil’), Cuccinelli, Corbett, and McCollum as comical if there were no injustices, i.e. if no Americans were harmed by their brand of wedge politics. Regrettably, these AGs are ruthless social conservatives whose standard operating procedure includes bullying, harassment, and oppression.
Here is a grim statistic: The suicide rate among gay teenagers is 3 to 4 times higher than other youth – attributable to discrimination, bullying, and social ostracism at an emotionally fragile time in their lives. And here is my Charles Dickens prediction for a dystopian future if social conservatives and their rabid rabble gain control of our government:
Wedge politics, designed to demoralize and polarize the electorate, will lead to a sharp increase in bias crimes;
The repeal of Roe v. Wade will mean victims of rape and incest will be forced to bear the children of sexual predators;
If a woman has a naturally spontaneous miscarriage, she will be automatically suspected of murdering the fetus;
Women with expired or anencephalic fetuses will be forced carry them to full term, thus endangering their lives;
Victims of domestic violence will not be able to divorce their tormenters;
Poverty and violence will fill the streets.
I refuse to be intimidated or silenced by rogue politicians. If Messrs. Cox, Cuccinelli, Corbett, or McCollum object to the language of this post (and my surly attitude), I dare them to subpoena Blogger or Twitter and discover my true identity. I double dare them to dispatch henchmen to my door and harass me. At my station in life, what do I have to lose? If I chose martyrdom, the cause is worthy. In the end, bad actors on the political stage do not get to write the final drama, and historians do not treat demagogues and despots kindly.
Liberals used to be exciting; we tended to think outside of the box and we believed in the power of advocacy. We championed peace; fought for justice; attacked racism and sexism with gusto. But not any more, here lately we whine a lot about what President Obama has not accomplished and insist that he needs to be more aggressive.
I think phrases like "be more aggressive" are meaningless. Be more agressive in what way? What would you have Obama do that he has not done on those issues? He has no authority to compel Congress to do anything. To get the cooperation of Congress is a process of negotiation; there is no presidential authority to push any legislation through Congress.
What would you have him do? I want to know precisely what it is any of the folks who keep saying that the president should be more aggressive on progressive issues want him to do? I don't mean some nebulous concept such as act tough, I mean what specific actions do you think that he should take that he has not taken? He supports repealing DADT and has said as much to Congress; he even got the military leadership to state that it favored repealing DADT. What now, pimp slap John McCain and the other recalcitrant senators?
Some assert that this administration should prosecute the former administration for its use of torture. The actions of the previous administration were immoral but they were argubably within the parameters of executive authority and not, therefore, prosecutable. As for the Patriot Act, bad law but once again it is not within the authority of the president to simply declare that it no longer exists. Guess who? Congress. Instead of undermining the president, how about we direct our resources towards holding Congress accountable and insisting on changes.
Some of my friends insist that the president's efforts at bipartisanship are a demonstration of weakness. They think that we need to be tougher, adapt the tactics of the right for our own use. I reject that notion, not because I'm interested in making nice; I'm interested in accomplishing our goals. How does stooping to the same level of deception, rudeness, and unethical standards as the right, move forward a progressive agenda?
The one thing upon which liberals appear to agree is that the left is more intellectually astute than the right. Frankly, I don't believe that this is an absolute, but liberals pride themselves on being thinkers. Exactly to whom does a policy that adapts the approach of the right appeal? It doesn't appear likely that the intelligent minded folks on the left will be influenced by negative strategies; besides, they are already on our side. So who are we trying to influence?
As for the Tea Party, it is a lost cause and there is nothing that the left can say that will sway them to change their position. Calling the right on the lies that it perpetrates may provide some personal satisfaction but it will not change their minds. You can't show them that they are wrong. It's a waste of effort. Their beliefs aren't based on logic; no matter how many facts you present to the Tea Party faithful they will continue to believe what they want to believe. For heaven's sakes, these people believe that Obama is a Muslim, a socialist, and a supporter of the terrorists in spite of there being nothing to support these allegations and everything to contradict them!
The progresive left needs to focus on the independents and young people who played a key role in winning the presidential election in 2008. Is the dumbed down, angry attack mode of the right really going to be an effective tool in persuading the disenchangted progresives who were so enthused in 2008 to rally? Is engaging in a shouting match with the right to assign blame really an effective strategy for influencing these intelligent, undecided people?
We don't need the Tea Party in order to win in November but we do need those disillusioned independents and young people who put Obama over the finish line in 2008. Those are the people who are threatening not to vote; those are the people who feel betrayed. They are disillusioned and tired.
Long time liberals will snarl and complain but we will still vote, but without these disillusioned folks, our votes won't be enough and the TP will triumph. So how do we rev up the independents, the "this is the first time I've ever voted in 30 years crowd," the idealistic young, how do we get them to replicate the dedication that they displayed in 2008? Somehow, I don't think that a lot of whining and complaining because unrealistic expectations have not been met will get them to come back to the fold.
All of this leftist carping isn't a minor thing. We have to get these people back. We can't afford for them to sit out the upcoming elections. We have to help them see a reason to have hope. 2008 was alll about hope; now progressives have turned into a whining, bitter bunch out for blood. I don't object to this solely because I personally find such behavior childish but because it is not only useless, it's counterproductive. It only confirms for the disillusioned that there's nothing worth fighting for because hope is a myth and change is impossible. If I believed that, I'd stay home on election day too.
We cannot afford to suck the life out of the progressive movement with sour attitudes and a sullen sense of defeat before the battle is even fought. The next time that someone challenges Obama's effectiveness in his less than two years as president, give them this link to 244 things that Obama has accomplished thus far. Then direct them over to his recent interview in Rolling Stone Magazine. If you need a fact sheet explaining why the repeal of DADT is not within the president's power, let me know. I've generated one and will be happy to send it to you. Don't waste your efforts on TP members but do remind those who voted for Obama in 2008 that change has always been incremental and that the president is moving us in the right direction. Most of all, pick yourself up, stop whining, and remember that at the bottom of Pandora's box, when all the evils of the world had been released was a bright and shining creature called "Hope."
Among the 100 people arrested outside the White House last Monday was climate scientist James Hansen, who issued a statement saying mountaintop removal "destroys historic mountain ranges, poisons water supplies and pollutes the air with coal and rock dust." The devastation it causes to the environment, the towns and the people is immeasurable and cannot be repaired. It is nothing short of earth rape and domestic terrorism. It is man made. You know, the coal mining corporations that are people.
Hansen joined environmentalists, miners and Appalachian activists to call attention to mountaintop coal mining, which literally means blowing mountains to smithereens to reach coal reserves. The rally, called "Appalachia Rising," was organized by protesters from West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia and Tennessee.
In an article first published in Orion Magazine and found on grist (HERE), Erik Reece writes, "Central Appalachia provides much of the country's coal, second only to Wyoming's Powder River Basin. In the United States, 100 tons of coal are extracted every two seconds."
In the name of corporate expedience, coal companies have turned from excavation to simply blasting away the tops of the mountains. To achieve this, they use the same mixture of ammonium nitrate and diesel fuel that Timothy McVeigh employed to level the Murrow Building in Oklahoma City -- except each detonation is 10 times as powerful, and thousands of blasts go off each day across central Appalachia. Hundreds of feet of forest, topsoil, and sandstone -- the coal industry calls all of this "overburden" -- are unearthed so bulldozers and front-end loaders can more easily extract the thin seams of rich, bituminous coal that stretch in horizontal layers throughout these mountains.
While topless mountains serve as shocking visual evidence of environmental devastation in Appalachia, it's the waste issue that creates real problems for communities in the region. After the tops of the mountains are blown off, the waste debris dumped in nearby valleys often blocks waterways and causes flooding. The debris includes a number of toxic heavy metals that end up in the water, causing a litany of health problems. Areas close to the blast sites have lower birth weights and higher rates of mortality, lung cancer, and chronic heart, lung, and kidney disease. A study released earlier this year found an average of 11,000 more premature deaths per 100,000 residents in the counties with the heaviest mining.
Not only does mountaintop mining destroy the earth for all eternity, it's devastating impact on humans is even more ominous, says Reece.
. . . an Eastern Kentucky University study found that children in Letcher County, Ky., suffer from an alarmingly high rate of nausea, diarrhea, vomiting, and shortness of breath -- symptoms of something called blue baby syndrome -- that can all be traced back to sedimentation and dissolved minerals that have drained from mine sites into nearby streams. Long-term effects may include liver, kidney, and spleen failure, bone damage, and cancers of the digestive tract.
There's suicide:
Consider the story of Debra and Granville Burke. First the blasting above their house wrecked its foundation. Then the floods came. Four times, they wiped out the Burkes' garden, which the family depended on to get through the winter. Finally, on Christmas morning 2002, Debra Burke took her life. In a letter published in a local paper, her husband wrote: "She left eight letters describing how she loved us all but that our burdens were just getting too much to bear. She had begged for TECO to at least replace our garden, but they just turned their back on her. I look back now and think of all the things I wish I had done differently so that she might still be with us, but mostly I wish that TECO had never started mining above our home."
And murder:
The specific injustice that had drawn together a group of activists calling themselves the Mountain Justice Summer movement was the violent death of 3-year-old Jeremy Davidson. At 2:30 in the morning on Aug. 30, 2004, a bulldozer, operating without a permit above the Davidsons' home, dislodged a thousand-pound boulder from a mountaintop-removal site in the town of Appalachia, Va. The boulder rolled 200 feet down the mountain before it crushed to death the sleeping child.
But Davidson's death is hardly an isolated incident. In West Virginia, 14 people drowned in the last three years because of floods and mudslides caused by mountaintop removal, and in Kentucky, 50 people have been killed and over 500 injured in the last five years by coal trucks, almost all of which were illegally overloaded.
And activists:
Larry Gibson has lived on Kayford Mountain in W. Va. for over 200 years.
Forty seams of coal lie beneath his 50 acres. Gibson could be a millionaire many times over, but because he refuses to sell, he has been shot at and run off his own road. One of his dogs was shot and another hanged. A month after my visit, someone sabotaged his solar panels. In 2000, Gibson walked out onto his porch one day to find two men dressed in camouflage, approaching with gas cans. They backed away and drove off, but not before they set fire to an empty cabin that belongs to one of Gibson's cousins. This much at least can be said for the West Virginia coal industry: it has perfected the art of intimidation.
Gibson knows he isn't safe. "This land is worth $450 million," he told me, "so what kind of chances do I have?" But he hasn't backed down. He travels the country telling his story and has been arrested repeatedly for various acts of civil disobedience. When Gibson talks to student groups, he asks them, "What do you hold so dear that you don't have a price on it? And when somebody comes to take it, what will you do? For me, it's this mountain and the memories I had here as a kid. It was a hard life, but here I was equal to everybody. I didn't know I was poor until I went to the city and people told me I was. Here I was rich."
And Granny:
At a 2006 rally against Massey Energy which was organized by Mountain Justice, gray-haired Julia Bonds told the crowd:
"I'm honored to be here with you. We're an endangered species, we hillbillies. Massey Energy is terrorizing us in Appalachia. Little old ladies in their 70s can't even sit on their porches. They have to cut their grass wearing respirators. That's how these people have to live. The coal companies are the real terrorists in America. And we're going to expose them for the murdering, lying thieves that they are."
And children:
In 2005, Mountain Justice volunteers went door-to-door in Rock Creek, W. Va. in an "effort to identify citizens' concerns and possibly locate cancer clusters."
The school, a small brick building, sits almost directly beneath a Massey Energy subsidiary's processing plant where coal is washed and stored. Coal dust settles like pollen over the playground. Nearly 3 billion gallons of coal slurry, which contains extremely high levels of mercury, cadmium, and nickel, are stored behind a 385-foot-high earthen dam right above the school.
In 1972, a similar coal impoundment damn collapsed in W. Va., killing 125 people, writes Reece."
And history:
The history of resource exploitation in Appalachia, like the history of racial oppression in the South, follows a sinister logic -- keep people poor and scared so that they remain powerless. In the 19th century, mountain families were actually doing fairly well farming rich bottomlands. But populations grew, farms were subdivided, and then northern coal and steel companies started buying up much of the land, hungry for the resources that lay below. By the time the railroads reached headwater hollows like McRoberts, Ky., men had little choice but to sell their labor cheaply, live in company towns, and shop in overpriced company stores. "Though he might revert on occasion to his ancestral agriculture," wrote coal field historian Harry Caudill, "he would never again free himself from dependence upon his new overlords." In nearly every county across central Appalachia, King Coal had gained control of the economy, the local government, and the land.
Death and destruction are not factored into the price of coal.
Last year (2005), American power plants burned over a billion tons of coal, accounting for over 50 percent of this country's electricity use. In Kentucky, 80 percent of the harvested coal is sold and shipped to 22 other states. Yet it is the people of Appalachia who pay the highest price for the rest of the country's cheap energy -- through contaminated water, flooding, cracked foundations and wells, bronchial problems related to breathing coal dust, and roads that have been torn up and turned deadly by speeding coal trucks. Why should large cities like Phoenix and Detroit get the coal but be held accountable for none of the environmental consequences of its extraction? And why is a Tampa-based energy company -- or Peabody Coal in St. Louis, or Massey Energy in Richmond, Va. -- allowed to destroy communities throughout Appalachia? As my friend and teacher the late Guy Davenport once wrote, "Distance negates responsibility."
Natural Resources Defence Counsel (NRDC) has campaigned vigorously against mountaintop mining. This link is to their list of articles on the travesty I've only touched on. HERE
WHAT WE CAN DO:
WE can write letters to the editors of our local papers.
WE can bring attention to it on our blogs.
WE can sign petitions sponsored by NRDC and other organizations.
WE can donate to NRDC and AppalachiaRising.
WE can write and email our congressional representatives on a regular basis.
So you're religious? That's a shame because I like to talk about the subject I've been interested in and have studied for at least 50 years -- but not with people of "faith." Scholars, linguists, archaeologists with and without faith are another matter entirely, but mentioning even the most elementary things about the Bible that one would learn on the first day of your first college class usually produces a reaction similar to Bela Lugosi encountering a cross, or a resounding and peremptory NO!
I've given up mentioning obvious facts like the separate and interleaved Genesis stories; one talking about Yahweh and the other, in a different voice, talking about the Elohim. The details differ remarkably. Ask your Sunday School teacher about the 100 days and nights of rain and Noah loading animals 6 by 6 and watch the reaction.
I'm talking about minutia, of course and I'm staying away from the conclusions to be made from them, but the level of ignorance amongst the most faithful is as astounding as the refusal to actually read the approved source documents much less the banned and earlier documents archaeology has provided us. It requires more than most can or will apply to the task -- and takes all the fun out of it, of course. The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life took a poll earlier this year and the results didn't surprise me at all. It appears that Americans are a pretty ignorant lot in terms of how much they know about the Bible, the other religions of the world and things related to the status of religious life in the US, the urge to make public displays notwithstanding. Atheists and agnostics seem to know a good deal more than the general run of the faithful, although you're welcome to ignore the question of whether it's knowledge itself that produces doubt in the places certainty likes to dwell. It does seem that the more educated are -- well, more educated about these things.
Jews seem to do best of all in terms of broad spectrum religious knowledge, but that's not too surprising as religious education in that group is a much different sort of thing and educators may be less shy of difficult questions. They're less likely to get their theology solely from the polyester preachers on TV whose continued existence defies claims of divine forces at work in the world.
The most important lack, in my opinion, is that shown by American Protestants and Catholics who know very little about other religions compared Jews and Mormons and Atheists and that's something I can't explain easily. Less than half of us know that the Dalai Lama is a Buddhist or that most people in Indonesia are Muslim. A tiny 8% 0f us know that Moses ben Maimon (Maimonides) was Jewish and I'm sure most of those were Jewish as well.
Apparently the one fact we're most likely to know, is that teachers in public schools may not lead students in prayer and one of the things we're least likely to know is that it is indeed constitutionally permissible to study the Bible and other texts in a comparative religion course. The answer to that opens a whole new perspective in strategic public anger management, but I won't go there either.
Of course all of us seem to know that Islam is inherently and unavoidably evil and some can supply all sorts of reasons to substantiate it and even more reasons to be angry with you if you don't quite agree with it all, but ask what Ramadan is about and only half can tell you it's an Islamic holiday.
So what does all of this mean? Beats me. I do know that too much speculation about these things is likely to get my neighbors and associates to beat me too. After all, as a people we're quite possessive of what we don't know and have good reasons for not knowing it: and of course we are, as always, number one.
Recently, AlterNet writer oleoleolson uncovered a right wing scheme to game a popular social media site and suppress content submitted by liberal contributors, story here. Digg is not the only target of the so-called culture warriors. There is a pervasive and pernicious pattern of harassment and censorship in other corners of cyberspace. In case you have not followed events in our 'extended' communities, our own Shaw Kenawe, from Progressive Eruptions, and Pamela Hart, a conservative blogger from The Oracular Opinion, have joined forces to expose a number of cyber scams and shams. You can read Pamela’s post here and Shaw’s post here.
For years, I have tried to encourage a cooperative and mutually respectful bipartisanship, and I am gratified that Pamela and Shaw have joined forces in this venture. However, I am also appalled at what our investigators have uncovered: Fraud, Identity Theft, Plagiarism, MALware attached to hotlinks, and other acts of cyber-mischief bordering on criminal behavior.
Within days after Pamela and Shaw exposed these scams, twenty-seven (27) of the most virulent right wing sites ceased operations or went underground. Within days, a mysterious avatar called Fearthedragon appeared on the followers lists of everyone in our community. Warning: Fearthedragon contains Malware links. Do not open! If you find a mysterious and unwelcome avatar on your followers list, go to your Google Reader and block using the trashcan icon. For more tips on how to protect your weblogs, please read the comment threads under Pamela’s and Shaw’s posts.
From the beginning, the blogosphere has been a free and open medium ripe for abuse. Sooner or later, malicious persons would inevitably hide behind cloaks of anonymity and violate community standards with impunity. Most of this activity is the work of partisan extremists, either self-appointed freelancers or organized Psy-Ops cells. Their mission and purpose is to harass and demoralize liberal bloggers, sabotage discussion forums, and interrupt the free and democratic exchange of ideas and viewpoints.
Surveillance seems to be another motive. Yesterday, one of my blogging colleagues, a prominent and highly visible progressive voice in cyberspace, reported a breach of privacy. A right wing troll entered his business email account and website. Why? Perhaps to find dirt, to discredit him; or perhaps a far more sinister motive.
For years, far right wing bloggers have pushed standards of civility and decorum further into the wasteland … invoking free speech rights to mask improper conduct while hiding, assassin-like, behind anonymous monikers. Now, it seems, they have crossed another threshold. Abusive trolls and cyber-thugs have turned criminal. Let us NOT be naïve. Rabid right wingers have declared cyber-war against all opposing viewpoints … including liberals, centrists, and moderate conservatives. Bloggers beware!
I have a little notebook in which I keep information, links, ideas and names of books or articles I want to explore and, perhaps, write about. Lots of the entries in my notebook never make it onto the blog, especially these days when the big news comes in so hot and fast, even the pros can't catch it. My reflexes ain't what they used to be, anyway, and I deliberately try to avoid sipping from the fire hydrant of televised and daily paper news. Lots of things the rest of the nation knew last week are news to me right this minute. This post is a small collection of things I learned about just this week. Take pity. Pretend to be surprised.
1) We can date the demise of Wall Street as an integral part of the American economy to a 1981 decision made by one man, once known as The King Of Wall Street, John Gutfreund.
I didn't know that. I didn't realize that, according to Michael Lewis in The Big Short, on the day Gutfreund took Salomon Brothers from a private partnership to Wall Street's first publicly traded corporation, Salomon Brothers stopped serving investors and started serving themselves. Of Gutfreund and the subsequent remake of The Street, Lewis writes,
He lifted a giant middle finger in the direction of the moral disapproval of his fellow Wall Street CEO's. And he'd seized the day. He and the other partners not only made a quick killing; they transferred the ultimate financial risk from themselves to their shareholders.
...from that moment, the Wall Street firm became a black box. The shareholders who financed the risk taking had no real understanding of what the risk takers were doing, and, as the risk taking grew ever more complex, their understanding diminished....The customers became, oddly, beside the point.
The moment Salomon Brothers demonstrated the potential gains to be had from turning an investment bank into a public corporation and leveraging its balance sheet with exotic risks, the psychological foundations of Wall Street shifted, from trust to blind faith.
From there on out, it was all about the CEO's, for whom short-term gain so far outweighed the value of long-term loss that a culture of growing bonuses each year was fostered even when the customers and the stockholders lost money. Even when the government bailed them out of bankruptcy! Without that one little piece, the private-to-public piece, none of it hung together for me.
2) On October 6th, the SCOTUS is scheduled to hear the case of Snyder vs. Phelps, perhaps better known as the case of a grieving father's right to a private funeral for his military son vs. Westboro Baptist Church's right to picket that funeral with signs saying, "Thank God For Dead Soldiers."
I tackled this subject in the spring in "You! What Planet Is This?" and The Wedding Bends. The synopsis is that 20 year old Marine Matthew Snyder died in March, '06, and Fred Phelps' church group picketed his funeral. Matthew's father Albert sued Phelps and his church in '07 for willfully causing emotional distress and invading his privacy. A jury awarded Snyder approximately $11 million, but, in 2009, the US Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit in Richmond, VA, overturned the verdict and ordered Snyder to pay over $16,500 to Phelps for court costs. Snyder refused to pay.
The 1988 case of Hustler Magazine v. Jerry Falwell, " in which the U.S. Supreme Court's unanimous 8-0 decision held the First Amendment's free-speech guarantee prohibits awarding damages to public figures to compensate for emotional distress intentionally inflicted upon them," is cited as precedent. Phelps' daughter, Margie, will represent the family and the church. For Military.com, Craig Trebilcock, one of Snyder's attorneys, was interviewed by Andrew Lubin:
"People want to make this out as free speech," Trebilcock said Monday, "but actually it's about harassment and who is or is not a public figure." He continued "Lance Corporal Snyder was a 20 year-old Marine from Maryland who died in Iraq; how does a church group from Kansas declare him a ‘public figure? Because they're claiming that since the Snyder family ran an obituary in the local newspaper that makes him fair game.
This is a verdict to watch for in October. And, if you ever doubted that it is the exception that proves the rule, here's a chance to watch the exception create the precedent for decades to come. Who ever, in their wildest and most horrible nightmares, could have dreamed up Fred Phelps? If this becomes a First Amendment ruling, then we are powerless in the face of insane and aggressive hatefulness. And there's plenty of that to go around these days. Fred Phelps is not the only demon capable of hiring or siring an attorney.
3) Something good--quick and quickly! There IS a place to listen to both sides in an entirely rational debate format.
Go to Intelligence Squared, where you can watch, download podcasts, and even buy tickets. Foremost authorities gather for classic debates of the most important issues we face. Their motto: Think Twice. This is exactly what I've been looking for.
In the most recent debate, the topic was, "Treat terrorists like enemy combatants, not criminals; for and against." The audience is polled prior to the debate and the outcome charted; after the debate, a re-polling shows the winner. I was naturally gratified to find that the audience agreed with me and with my own previously held position. (I'm so easily naturally gratified, in my opinion it just can't happen too frequently. Ahem.)
Outcome, Sept. 14, 2010
There's a Research In Depth link that provides titles, snippets, and articles used by each side in developing positions. I may disappear into this site, never to be seen again.
The right would have you believe that everything which ails this country is due to big government, taxes, and too much government spending....oh, and then you have the bunch that believes we need more religion in our lives.
The reality is that it is the lack of a PROGRESSIVE Movement that is the reason we find ourselves so overwhelmed by all that is wrong with our society.
As a society we no longer have the ideas and the people who believe in these ideas to drive us forward. We are a generation without radicals. Or as Peter Dreier states in a recent The Nation article:
The radical ideas of one generation are often the common sense of the next. When that happens, give credit to the activists and movements that fought to take those ideas from the margins to the mainstream. We all stand on the shoulders of earlier generations of radicals and reformers who challenged the status quo of their day.
Lets not forget that it was not all that long ago, when blacks were second class citizens, women were to be homemakers (YES, Sarah Palin, you can thank a PROGRESSIVE for all that you have thus achieved in your life!) and workers did not enjoy 8 hour work days or 5 day work weeks.
These were all utopian and radical ideals. The ideals that were expressed in our Declaration of Independence, our Constitution, and The Bill Of Rights were also very utopian and radical at their time too! The right does not even realize that Thomas Jefferson LOST the battle over a strong central government while Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison argued for a stronger federal government.
But, like Peter Dreier continues on to say:
Unfortunately, most Americans know little of this progressive history. It isn't taught in most high schools. You can't find it on the major television networks or even on the History Channel. Indeed, our history is under siege. In popular media, the most persistent interpreter of America's radical past is Glenn Beck, who teaches viewers a wildly inaccurate history of unions, civil rights and the American left. Beck argues, for example, that the civil rights movement "has been perverted and distorted" by people claiming that Martin Luther King Jr. supported "redistribution of wealth." In fact, King did call for a "radical redistribution of economic power." Using his famous chalkboard, Beck draws connections between various people and organizations, and defines them as radicals, Marxists, socialists, revolutionaries, leftists, progressives or social justice activists—all of which leads inexorably to Barack Obama. Drawing on writings by conspiracy theorists and white supremacists, Beck presents a misleading version of America's radical family tree.
If you believe that you, "....want your country back" or if you truly fear for the future of this country and want to leave your children and grandchildren a better country and world, then understand that what you so desire from the past, what you want to rekindle, that greatness that once was AMERICA, then you have to seek out the radicals...you have to seek out the Progressives! Then educate yourself and review the following slide shows and reflect on how each one of these Progressives changed YOUR life and allowed you to enjoy some of the most important aspects of your life that YOU now take for granted!
The future belongs to those who seek out the new and untested, it does not belong to those who keep looking back. If we are truly to overcome the problems we face as a nation today, then we must become radicals not patriots! Greatness never comes from reliving the past but from thinking outside the box.
, but that is not, to my understanding, the mindset of Barack Obama..jpg)
