my bulletin from days ago- because I seriously have no time
Things are looking up, Tony has some deals in the works. I am fine, except that I burnt my arm wicked bad on the iron over at Miss Lisa's. Tommorow I have bookclub and Hillary is gonna be at Central High, so that has gotta be a good day .
Can you believe that McCain guy? Seems pretty wimpy for a POW if ya ask me. And Wamu?? What a handbasket......
just a quick check in (because of my severe myspace slackening)..
*First-I'm sorry I never read/respond to any frickin emails..I know that my inbox is full, and that I am a complete douche.
*Tony has no job, we are now waiting for our government bailout please? Hey-If AIG-Bear Stearns...etc... can get billions, could you please just pay off my mortgage? On that particular note please boycott that bastard of corporate America, Applebee's, they just suck...and I hear they put unspeakable things in their food....just sayin..
*The kids are good and happy and healthy.They seem to be doing okay this year at school so far. PTA season begins on Thursday and I think I might even be excited. I am so lame.
* I LOVE WORKING. It is strange that fetching things for people could be so satisfying. It seems like I used to bitch about waiting tables, but it really seems fun as long as its busy, and the cats the work there are very nice.
*I went to my first Obama meeting, and actually was supposed to walk, last Sat, but it rained, and honestly- I woulda went out in the rain if it were Hillary, but I figured some of those younger, more 'hope'ful activists could handle it ;P.I think you should all also know there is an Obama 08 sign on my lawn, and I was polled the other day(Not in that way! Dirty Dirty!) I need to blog about politics again soon because there are some really important discussions that need to be had. Why the HELL are the polls SO close?? Why is America full of such Sheep? Oh ...and let me count the ways I detest Sarah Palin(Oh - You- best - not use Hillary , you blatant misogynist!).
*So Another private blog... IM SORRY, I was writing that, BEFORE checking my emails last time I signed in, when Tony called and told me about the "no more livelihood" issue. I couldn't finish it and have been just trying to stay busy. I feel like if I clean the floor well enough, that my life will truly be secure. I haven't really been depressed, but I have been avoiding everything, trying to escape discussing these small stresses with friends. I have been losing myself in books and movies. I dont mean to be anti-social , I just think Im in some weird survival mode. The strange thing is that I am very happy still, maybe a touch too thoughtful for my own good. In short, I am fine I just hope no one has been offended at my absence.
*I have been reading simultaneously, "The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty" and "The Feminine Mystique". As paradoxical as it my seem, I highly recommend both . ;)
Electric. When Barack Obama receives the Democratic presidential nomination before 75,000 people in Denver's Mile High Stadium on the forty-fifth anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech, new possibilities will be born. A historic candidacy, a new generation in motion, a nation yearning for change. Even the cynics running the McCain campaign might be touched, if they weren't so busy savaging Obama as a vain celebrity not up to the task of leading a nation.
No one should be blinded by the lights. It will take hard work to turn the nomination into victory in a campaign that has already turned ugly. Moreover, even if victorious, Obama will inherit the calamitous conditions wrought by conservative failures--a sinking economy, unsustainable occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan, accelerating climate change, Gilded Age inequality, a broken healthcare system and much more.
Obama will also be limited by the constricted consensus of an establishment not yet able to contemplate the changes needed to set this country right again. To be successful, his presidency will have to be bolder and more radical than now imagined.
A historic candidate, the forbidding conditions and the constricted consensus make it vital that progressives think clearly and act independently in forging a strategy over the next months. The following is a contribution to a rich and ongoing discussion. We invite others to join it at thenation.com in the weeks to come.
A Sea-Change Election
The Obama nomination sets the stage for a sea-change election, one that could not only elect a Democratic President and increased reform majorities in both houses of Congress but also mark a clear turn from the conservative ideas that have dominated our politics for three decades.
In recent weeks, the media--primed by a Republican strategy contrasting Obama's purported doublespeak with McCain's alleged Straight Talk--have focused on Obama's compromises and backsliding. Much of the alleged retrenchment has been exaggerated. Some of it--like his fold on the FISA wiretap bill, mixed signals on trade, the compromise on offshore drilling--has been clear and deplorable. Many on the left were dismayed as the Obama campaign trotted out advisers from a Democratic bench that had championed the toxic Rubinomics brew of corporate trade and financial deregulation.
These concerns should not distract us from the central reality: this election features a stark ideological contrast. Although marketed as a trustworthy maverick, McCain accurately describes himself as a "foot soldier in the Reagan revolution" and attests that "on the transcendent issues, the most important issues of our day, I've been totally in agreement and support of President Bush." He is committed to the full Bush catastrophe: continued war in Iraq, more tax cuts for the wealthiest, more corporate trade deals, more deregulation, more hostility toward labor, more conservative social policies and reactionary judges. Indeed, he's Bush on steroids. McCain seeks not only to privatize Social Security but also to unravel employer-based healthcare, leaving people to negotiate alone with insurance companies liberated from regulation. His bellicose posturing on Iran and Iraq is as disastrous as his pledge of impossibly deep cuts in domestic programs. He embraces the corporate economic and trade agenda that has so devastated the American middle class. If he is defeated, it will mark the end of the Reagan era.
Obama clearly offers a change of course. His victory in itself will require overcoming the racial fears that have so long divided this country. He carries a reform agenda--largely driven by progressives--into the election: an end to the occupation of Iraq, using the money squandered there to rebuild America; affordable healthcare for all, paid for by raising taxes on the wealthy; a concerted drive for energy independence, generating jobs while investing in renewable energy and conservation. He is committed to empowering labor, to holding corporations and banks more accountable and to challenging our trade policies. A social liberal, his judicial appointees will keep the right from consolidating its hold on the federal judiciary. Obama may not be a "movement" progressive in the way that Reagan was a "movement" conservative, and he may have disappointed activists with his recent compromises, but make no mistake: his election will open a new era of reform, the scope of which will depend--as Obama often says--on independent progressive mobilization to keep the pressure on and overcome entrenched interests.
As this is written, an election Obama should win handily is locked in a virtual tie. Both the Obama and McCain campaigns treat the race as a referendum on Obama, with the former focused on getting Americans comfortable with trusting a young African-American with an unusual name, and the Rove minions in the McCain campaign intent on stoking the fears that enabled them to assemble a white majority party in the past.
Obama's campaign will not succeed without the independent efforts of progressive activists. One central task is winning support among wary white blue-collar workers, the core target of the Rovian poison. This will require persuasion as well as mobilization; the work of the AFL-CIO, Change to Win, Working America, religious groups and others with a base in these communities in swing states will be of critical importance.
Progressives generally--and independent media and the blogosphere specifically--can contribute by reminding voters there's a clear choice in this election, with McCain representing the same old, same old. While exposing McCain's doubletalk, his Bush-redux agenda and the money and interests behind the scurrilous right-wing independent expenditure campaigns, progressives can also help build support for reform. The new Health Care for America Now coalition, for example, has the resources to expose McCain's healthcare folly, thereby building a mandate for universal coverage. The antiwar movement should be challenging McCain's saber-rattling on Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan, helping to strengthen US support for a change in course. With gas prices at the center of American concerns, the environmental alliance around jobs and energy can consolidate support for a concerted drive toward energy independence, while challenging absurd claims that we can drill our way out of the crisis.
Driving Reform
While focusing on what is certain to be a difficult campaign, progressives should start thinking now about strategy for an Obama presidency. Clearly his election and inauguration would mark an exciting moment. At home, a new sense of energy and idealism will be unleashed. Across the world, his election will begin the process of restoring America's ravaged reputation. Not only will Obama usher a new generation into politics, but for the first time a President with experience as a community organizer will have the ability to mobilize directly a dedicated following larger than any other in politics [see our roundtable forum of community organizers].
In the first months of an Obama administration, progressives should be pursuing an inside-outside strategy in relation to the administration. For example, in the transition, we should push to place allies in strategic positions, particularly in the areas of economic policy and national security. The AFL-CIO and other groups are preparing lists of potential candidates. These inside efforts should be complemented by watchdog monitoring and reporting on potential nominees. No free pass should be given to those who drove the financial and trade policies that led to the current economic debacles or supported the invasion of Iraq, the worst foreign policy fiasco in recent history.
For Obama to achieve his core promises, he will have to push significant reforms early. As Dan Lazare has argued, our entire political system is designed to block reform, not facilitate it. Periods of significant change in American politics are rare, but they feature spasms of furious activity: Roosevelt's first 100 days, Johnson's push in 1964-65, Reagan's reaction in 1981-82. Inevitably, these spasms don't last long before reaction sets in. So it is vital to move rapidly and boldly and across many areas to have any chance at success.
Obama's first decision--to be made, no doubt, during the transition--will be the most telling. He has pledged that he will instruct the Joint Chiefs of Staff to prepare a sensible plan for ending the Iraq occupation. Already, Democratic security advisers who initially supported the war are calling for "conditional engagement," arguing that the United States can't afford simply to set a timetable to get out. Thus it is vital that the peace movement organize aggressively during the campaign, and mobilize independently and visibly immediately after the election. The Obama White House must have no doubt about the firestorm in Congress, in the streets and within the Democratic Party that would be caused by a retreat from this pledge.
If the Iraq promise is kept, progressives will sensibly work to help define Obama's agenda from the inside and support key parts from the outside. He will lay out a major initiative on jobs and energy. He has said that he'll try to push through healthcare reform quickly--although that is likely to trigger trench warfare in Congress (and progressives will have to overcome deep internal divisions to ensure that fundamental reform succeeds). Obama will reverse many of the reactionary Bush executive orders, from the global gag rule to secrecy excesses stemming from the "war on terror." His first budget decisions most likely will have to deal directly with a broader stimulus plan to get the economy going. He has pledged to support passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, enabling workers to organize unions without employer harassment.
But Obama will encounter formidable obstacles. He'll face a business lobby girded for battle. Corporations have already begun moving more of their money to Democratic incumbents and are snapping up former Democratic legislators and staffers for their lobbies [see "Dollars for Donkeys" on page 28]. They will do everything they can to stall healthcare and drug-pricing reform, empowerment of workers and re-regulation of Wall Street. Moreover, while Democrats are likely to enjoy larger majorities in both houses, their caucuses are likely to be less progressive as they pick up seats in very conservative, formerly Republican districts.
Progressives will enjoy their greatest strength mobilizing independently to support Obama's promises. We can organize constituent pressure on politicians who are blocking the way, something even a President with Obama's activist network would be loath to do. We can expose the lobbies and interests and backstage maneuvers designed to limit reforms. Now that newspapers increasingly lack the resources for investigation, progressive media, online and off, and the independent progressive media infrastructure--from The Nation to Media Matters to Brave New Films to The Huffington Post--must assume a greater role in monitoring the opposition, even as we mobilize activists in targeted districts across the country.
In doing this, we can help give backbone to the Obama agenda, even as we supply muscle and energy to help pass it. The best way to achieve this is to generate large-scale independent-issue campaigns. A clear example is the Healthcare for Americans Now Coalition, which is ready to take on the insurance companies and support the White House's commitment to universal care. The new Half in Ten Campaign, spearheaded by ACORN and the Center for American Progress Action Fund, will help ensure that poverty does not disappear from the agenda. Progressives generally should join the AFL-CIO and Change to Win in their drive to pass the Employee Free Choice Act. The Apollo Alliance and a range of environmental efforts will support the initiative on jobs and energy.
Acting in support of Obama will require challenging legislators in both parties who stand in the way, a task progressives should undertake aggressively. The Service Employees International Union has already taken the lead in announcing a $10 million "accountability program," designed to force politicians to heed the will of their voters, with a new plan--Justice for All--as the core vehicle. This should be complemented by other independent efforts, despite likely objections from the Democratic Congressional leadership and possibly the White House. Democrats should be on notice from their own constituents that they will be expected to help move reform, not stand in its way.
The Constricted Consensus
The great challenge for progressives is whether the energy and idealism unleashed by the Obama candidacy--and the collapse of conservatism--can expand the limits of the current debate. McCain promises merely more of the same bankrupt policies, but Obama's reform agenda is itself limited by a very constricted establishment consensus that is an obstacle to real change.
On national security, both candidates have pledged to increase the size of the military, adding billions to a bloated budget that already represents nearly half the world's military spending. Both assume America's role as globocop; neither suggests unraveling the US empire of military bases. Both seem intent on deepening the occupation of Afghanistan. Neither has dared to embrace the conservative RAND Corporation's conclusion that the very notion of a "war on terror" is counterproductive, and that aggressive intelligence and police cooperation should be the centerpiece of our strategy.
Obama has called for a second stimulus plan focused on new energy and rebuilding America, but he hasn't suggested anything like the major public initiatives--the combination of public investment, revised global economic strategy, industrial policy and financial regulation--that would be essential to get the real economy moving again while responding to the threat of catastrophic climate change.
Obama has made affordable healthcare for all a centerpiece of his agenda, but he has not addressed the unraveling of the private social contract once delivered through corporations and unions. It will take independent efforts to drive an economic bill of rights, from healthcare to pensions to Social Security to guaranteed paid vacation, in addition to paid sick days and family leave.
Obama laid out promising principles for financial reform in his Cooper Union speech in March, but he hasn't challenged the Wall Street bailout, nor has he mobilized support for policing the shadow banking system that has proved so destructive in its greed.
Obama defends liberal social reforms, but a serious war on poverty--or an initiative to transform our brutal criminal system of injustice that is devastating the lives of young minority men--is not yet on the agenda.
And while Obama is a former professor of constitutional law, he hasn't called for dismantling the imperial presidency. It will take independent efforts to reclaim for the Congress and the people the powers Bush has arrogated to the presidency.
This corrosive consensus reflects the entrenched power of the established order. It is enforced by aggressive lobbies--the military-industrial complex, Wall Street, corporate interests--and rationalized by well-upholstered house scholars. The establishment's strength is its ability to simply exclude alternatives from serious consideration.
After the first flurry of activity, an Obama administration may well realize that the dire condition of the country demands a far bolder agenda than what is now on the table. Progressives should recognize that an Obama administration would have no alternative but to be one of constant experimentation. We should embrace the best of the public-policy proposals that scholars are developing in our universities and think tanks. These ideas challenge limited assumptions about government and call for everything from dismantling our empire of military bases to curbing the imperial presidency, from passing progressive tax reforms to strengthening the public commons. Again, independent campaigning--particularly regarding concerns not high on the national agenda--will help lift issues into the mainstream.
Here it will be vital to sustain a reform infrastructure independent of the administration or the Democratic leadership in Congress. Progressives in the Senate and House, many grouped around the Progressive Caucus, can provide both leadership and a public forum for new ideas. Independent research institutes--like the Institute for America's Future, the Institute for Policy Studies, the Economic Policy Institute and others--can help think outside the establishment box. Progressive bloggers can track the limits of the debate and give new ideas greater visibility. Reform leaders at the state and local levels, coordinated by centers like the Progressive States Network, can champion legislation--like paid sick days, mandated vacation minimums, early childhood education, tighter regulation of insurance companies, creative financing for energy conservation projects--that will be a model for the national agenda. Grassroots organizing--neighbor to neighbor, supported by the energy of the young, linked to national concerns--will be essential if Obama's election is to generate thoroughgoing reform.
When John F. Kennedy was elected President, he too summoned a new generation into politics. While Kennedy's agenda was limited, the energy he unleashed helped build the civilizing movements of the following decades--the antiwar, civil rights, women's, environmental and gay rights movements.
America now is very different from the America of the 1960s. Those movements, nurtured in the cradle of postwar prosperity, assumed the country could afford to be more just. This generation has grown up with much greater economic insecurity, is laden with debt and is struggling to find decent jobs. It faces an economy that cannot be sustained--and must be transformed.
But once more a young and exciting candidate, seeking the presidency after a long and failed conservative era, can spark the hope and sense of possibility that carry far beyond his campaign platform. Progressives should be focusing less on the limits of the Obama agenda and more on the possibilities that a successful candidacy opens up.
As a former community organizer, Obama has taught that "real change comes from the bottom up." It comes about by "imagining and then fighting for and then working for--struggling for--what did not seem possible before." As President, he will face conflicting pressures, and undoubtedly he will carefully pick his fights. The movement that he has called into being will have little choice but to embrace his charge and mobilize across the country to achieve what "did not seem possible before."
I try to get excited abut Obama...I really do.....
Current mood: argumentative
Category: News and Politics
But I just cant.
If someone gives me a button Ill wear it, and I never have turned down a free t-shirt, but when the DNC called asking me for money I told them I just didnt have the heart to give them the small amout of expendable income that I posess at the moment.
I am too depressed about Hillary. What could be worse than another dumb Republican in the White House? NOTHING, I say! Many Obama folks think that it would be impossible to lose with how Bush&Co has messed up so utterly, so completely.....alas I am afraid too many of these supporters were not around Four years ago when I was thinking the very same thing.
Now Obama is saying he will consider off-shore drilling and staying in Iraq? I really could be more impressed. The base of Obama's supporters (18-29)are notorious for not getting to the polls. Old white women.....we vote(LOL). I believe Obama needs to reach out to Hillary supporters, because if they are feeling as distraught as I am then 4 more years of hell is looking like it may not be avoidable...
Oh yah- this lil article is what just got me jumpin this am:
Hillary and Bill Clinton are privately fuming about the second-class treatment they have received from Democratic presumptive nominee Barack Obama.
When Obama and Hillary "kissed" and made up during their unity rally in June, both made a private pledge to each other to help raise $500,000 from their donors for the other's campaign.
Though deep in debt, Hillary quickly fulfilled her promise. But cash-rich Obama has yet to cough up the dough from his backers.
"Hillary has done her part in that regard," a Hillary adviser told Time. "Obama has not."
Then there was the warm and fuzzy call between Bill Clinton and Obama. Obama told Clinton he wanted to sit down with the popular former president, the most successful Democratic president since FDR. But Clinton aides say Obama has never folowed up on the verbal invitation.
These and other details on the deteriorating Clinton-Obama relationship are laid out in a Time magazine report.
Bill Clinton's comments to
ABC News are symptomatic of his and Hillary's icy relationship with Obama. Asked during his trip to Africa if Obama was qualified to be president, Clinton stubbornly refused to answer affirmatively.
A Hillary adviser told TIme, "It's not a great relationship, and it's probably not going to become one."
Reportedly, Hillary seriously doubts that Obama can beat McCain come November. And she is thinking of keeping her name in nomination and demand a vote at the party's Denver Convention.
Hillary wants to remind voters and the media that she was the alternative to Obama, a important point that could be brought home on Election Day.
Love to everyone and enjoy your last days O'summer...
If You live in town, you should come to my Block Party :)
Last night we went to Pontiac to see Wolf Parade. We got a flat tire about 40 miles from our destination and that frankly sucked, especially the part where I stood on the side of I-69 for twenty minutes in a strapless dress holding a piece of paper with "Jack?" scrawled on it. I felt strangley like a misplaced concierge that stumbled away from the airport terminal in search of my clientele.....Anyway, 75 dollars and a new tire later we made it to the show and the opening band was still playing. All thanks to the fellas who stopped to help us and the guy at Belle tire who hooked us up even though they had closed a half-hour earlier-Yay for good Samaritans!
When I went to pick up the chilluns today, my sister finally talked us into taking one of her kittens. Tony isn't too thrilled, seeing how we already have 3 cats and 3 dogs, but the kids think she is a freakin riot. Perhaps Lizzie revealing her plans to get both a pot-bellied pig and a pygmy goat in the near future made him realize another kitty wasnt so bad! So, I think Ill call her Bhutto(After Benazir), my sweet and courageous girl-cat. She is a cute little gray and white fluffy with a black spot right on her nose. The other cats hate her, but the dogs like her well enough. She should be happy here.
The garden, the kids, the weather. Always something doing and always my guilt growing because I know there are important aspects of my life being neglected. The truth is I am always seeking balance, but when the sun is up and the days are long the scale swings more toward actual 'living' than introspection or reflection or even creativity. ,,but it is good. It is food for the future. Play now, and youll have things to discuss later....And OH, the things.......
Currently
listening
:
At Mount Zoomer
By
Wolf Parade
Release date: 2008-06-17
Alright.....which one of you fuckers stole my yard sign?
Category: News and Politics
I've listened to your gloating, your "impossible maths" and "Hillary Huckabees".Yes, I can imagine your exasperation with this nomination contest as well as I can picture that smug grin spread across your face as you watch every political pundit and his cousin say the race is long over. As if it were not enough to be exposed endlessly to Obama supporters disrespectfully struggle to bully my candidate out of the race, it appears that my support is being bullied too.
This beautiful Michigan morning opened the first of my poppies, A lovey orange shade the color of my old totaled Dodge Neon, I went out to have a look. After inspection of said flower I turn to see if I need to mow the lawn today(I did) and guess what? Yup, some fucker stole my Hillary sign! I'd like to think that it was another Hillary supporter, so enraptured by the stomping in Puerto Rico that they were determined to get a yard sign of their very own, driving in a frenzied state till they found the only one in the city(I haven't seen another). Ahh...but something tells me that is not the likely scenario.
Luckily I bought my mother one at the same time and I'm pretty sure she will surrender hers if I pout enough. I actually had to temper my feelings a bit when I remembered that I once stole a yard sign with friend(I wont say names, Tara). I must have just turned 18, and we decided it would be a great idea to steal a couple of Dole signs. Using electrical tape the color of the signs we altered the E to an L and in Kemp's name we fashioned the K into an H and then put them back up at busy intersections. Seeing how our plot was not only for comedic purposes, but also a political statement I still consider it justified and not subject to divine retribution. This is all besides the point, I swear I have an objective here...
Here it is.
You can steal my sign all you want, you can disrespect my candidate, you can take away half my vote(And give-GIVE all of Edwards-Kuchinich-and undecided Michigan votes to Obama), you can say she doesn't have the delegates and there is no possible way for her to win but you are forgetting one little thing. You need me. In order for Barack to win in November he MUST court Hillary supporters.
My sincere opinion is that in order for the Democrats to secure the presidency, both names must grace the ticket. He must at least offer Hillary the position before anyone else or I will not be happy. I will vote for Obama but I will not have the heart to campaign unless she is at least publicly offered the Veep chair. Over 17 million Americans have voted for Hillary Clinton. Seventeen Million Democrats in crucial counties. I'm looking forward to sticking a new sign in my manicured lawn and it had better have Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's name on it somewhere.
"Women Are Never Frontrunners" by Gloria Steinem
Current mood: angsty
Category: News and Politics
Women Are Never Front-Runners
By GLORIA STEINEM
Published: January 8, 2008
Correction Appended
THE woman in question became a lawyer after some years as a community organizer, married a corporate lawyer and is the mother of two little girls, ages 9 and 6. Herself the daughter of a white American mother and a black African father — in this race-conscious country, she is considered black — she served as a state legislator for eight years, and became an inspirational voice for national unity.
Be honest: Do you think this is the biography of someone who could be elected to the United States Senate? After less than one term there, do you believe she could be a viable candidate to head the most powerful nation on earth?
If you answered no to either question, you're not alone. Gender is probably the most restricting force in American life, whether the question is who must be in the kitchen or who could be in the White House. This country is way down the list of countries electing women and, according to one study, it polarizes gender roles more than the average democracy.
That's why the Iowa primary was following our historical pattern of making change. Black men were given the vote a half-century before women of any race were allowed to mark a ballot, and generally have ascended to positions of power, from the military to the boardroom, before any women (with the possible exception of obedient family members in the latter).
If the lawyer described above had been just as charismatic but named, say, Achola Obama instead of Barack Obama, her goose would have been cooked long ago. Indeed, neither she nor Hillary Clinton could have used Mr. Obama's public style — or Bill Clinton's either — without being considered too emotional by Washington pundits.
So why is the sex barrier not taken as seriously as the racial one? The reasons are as pervasive as the air we breathe: because sexism is still confused with nature as racism once was; because anything that affects males is seen as more serious than anything that affects "only" the female half of the human race; because children are still raised mostly by women (to put it mildly) so men especially tend to feel they are regressing to childhood when dealing with a powerful woman; because racism stereotyped black men as more "masculine" for so long that some white men find their presence to be masculinity-affirming (as long as there aren't too many of them); and because there is still no "right" way to be a woman in public power without being considered a you-know-what.
I'm not advocating a competition for who has it toughest. The caste systems of sex and race are interdependent and can only be uprooted together. That's why Senators Clinton and Obama have to be careful not to let a healthy debate turn into the kind of hostility that the news media love. Both will need a coalition of outsiders to win a general election. The abolition and suffrage movements progressed when united and were damaged by division; we should remember that.
I'm supporting Senator Clinton because like Senator Obama she has community organizing experience, but she also has more years in the Senate, an unprecedented eight years of on-the-job training in the White House, no masculinity to prove, the potential to tap a huge reservoir of this country's talent by her example, and now even the courage to break the no-tears rule. I'm not opposing Mr. Obama; if he's the nominee, I'll volunteer. Indeed, if you look at votes during their two-year overlap in the Senate, they were the same more than 90 percent of the time. Besides, to clean up the mess left by President Bush, we may need two terms of President Clinton and two of President Obama.
But what worries me is that he is seen as unifying by his race while she is seen as divisive by her sex.
What worries me is that she is accused of "playing the gender card" when citing the old boys' club, while he is seen as unifying by citing civil rights confrontations.
What worries me is that male Iowa voters were seen as gender-free when supporting their own, while female voters were seen as biased if they did and disloyal if they didn't.
What worries me is that reporters ignore Mr. Obama's dependence on the old — for instance, the frequent campaign comparisons to John F. Kennedy — while not challenging the slander that her progressive policies are part of the Washington status quo.
What worries me is that some women, perhaps especially younger ones, hope to deny or escape the sexual caste system; thus Iowa women over 50 and 60, who disproportionately supported Senator Clinton, proved once again that women are the one group that grows more radical with age.
This country can no longer afford to choose our leaders from a talent pool limited by sex, race, money, powerful fathers and paper degrees. It's time to take equal pride in breaking all the barriers. We have to be able to say: "I'm supporting her because she'll be a great president and because she's a woman."
I was tired of being a woman, tired of the spoons and the post, tired of my mouth and my breasts, tired of the cosmetics and the silks. There were still men who sat at my table, circled around the bowl I offered up. The bowl was filled with purple grapes and the flies hovered in for the scent and even my father came with his white bone. But I was tired of the gender things.
Last night I had a dream and I said to it... "You are the answer. You will outlive my husband and my father." In that dream there was a city made of chains where Joan was put to death in man’s clothes and the nature of the angels went unexplained, no two made in the same species, one with a nose, one with an ear in its hand, one chewing a star and recording its orbit, each one like a poem obeying itself, performing God’s functions, a people apart.
"You are the answer," I said, and entered, lying down on the gates of the city. Then the chains were fastened around me and I lost my common gender and my final aspect. Adam was on the left of me and Eve was on the right of me, both thoroughly inconsistent with the world of reason. We wove our arms together and rode under the sun. I was not a woman anymore, not one thing or the other.
O daughters of Jerusalem, the king has brought me into his chamber. I am black and I am beautiful. I’ve been opened and undressed. I have no arms or legs. I’m all one skin like a fish. I’m no more a woman than Christ was a man.
The Blues in Michigan and Floridia- Is there no Democracy in the DNC?
Category: News and Politics
Dear Howard Dean,
My name is Amanda Brown, and I am a due-paying member of the DNC, I am also a Michigan citizen and voter. This election year, as you obviously know, my state party leaders decided to move up the primary election in effort to push a change in what they consider to be an unfair election process. There was no vote from constituents. Mark Brewer and Gov. Granholm didn’t tell us that there were possible repercussions for holding such a contest, and they certainly didn’t ask permission from the people. To not count my vote is unfair and not Democratic in any way. Both Michigan and Florida are historically very important blue states in the general election, and now we are being treated as if we are not even American citizens? How is this possible?
Michigan does not want a re-vote, that is not necessary. We held a contest and it should stand. Michigan citizens knew they could vote un-committed if they were supporters of Edwards or Obama and if seated the delegates would be represented by those camps. True, our state broke the rules- but that rule was broken by a few people and the voters should not suffer. It is completely un-American and certainly not what I expected from my party. I do not see how anyone can say this is fair to Michigan and Florida voters. How can we not be heard? Michigan is the worst state in the country for unemployment, the big 3 auto makers are crumbling, and now as we head(or are already immersed in) a nation-wide recession we are being outcast? Please do not disenfranchise Michigan Democrats any further because you will need us come November.
Thank You everyone for the emails. BCBS has agreed to extend her in-patient for at least 2 more weeks. Here is the update I recieved from Maia’s Daddy. Hugs to everyone that helped us to put the pressure on.
March 19, 2008 at 04:33 PM EDT
GOOD NEWS - BCBS indicated to Mary Free Bed that Maia will receive an additional two weeks of in-patient care at Mary Free Bed, which is what the Mary Free Bed treatment team recommended in the first place. Once these two weeks lapse, the MFB treatment team can re-evaluate whether Maia is still appropriate for treatment. We hope that BCBS will follow those recommendations in two weeks as well.
Thanks to each of you that wrote in and made phone calls. Lorelei and I appreciate your energy, and most of all, your concern for Maia. If you notified anyone to send letters, if you could contact them to indicate emails or any other action are no longer needed, that would be most helpful.
We’re glad BCBS made the right decision to continue covering in-patient care for Maia, and we appreciate Mary Free Bed and there staff working so diligently to care for Maia.
****************************************************** You may remember my dear friends the Moore’s whose daughter Maia suffered from a ruptured aneurysm in September at the age of one and a half. It has been a long road for little Maia (if you want to know her story, you can read through her care page at www.carepages.com keyword MaiaLucia), and now the evil forces of Blue Cross Blue Shield want to terminate insurance coverage of her inpatient rehabilitation stay. I need you to blow up the email inbox of Blue Cross Blue Shield to get them to respond to little Maia.
Here is what her Daddy wrote and what he would like us to do.
A WAY TO HELP MAIA
Bad news - Blue Cross Blue Shield, against our wishes and against the advice of Mary Free Bed doctors, therapists, and nurses, have pulled the coverage on Maia’s stay at Mary Free Bed. The doctor (Dr. Porres) at Blue Cross Blue Shield indicated that Maia could make the same progress in an out-patient setting as in an in-patient setting, despite historical and current evidence to the contrary. We are puzzled and outraged that an insurance company would intervene against the general wisdom of the established medical community.
So we ask for your help. We have only a day or so to make our case. I have provided email contact information and a standard letter that you can send to voice support for Maia. You are free to use this letter or write your own. However, I do ask that you send it to the email addresses provided. The letter is addressed to Daniel Loepp, CEO of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan. Email addresses also include Sen. Debbie Stabenow’s office, Sen. Carl Levin’s office, WOOD TV 8, the Grand Rapids Press, and media relations at Blue Cross Blue Shield:
LETTER
RE: Blue Cross Blue Shield drops coverage for treatment of a 2 year old aneurysm victim against recommendations of family and families’ doctor
TO: dloepp@bcbsm.com CC: mediarelations@bcbsm.com,senator@stabenow.senate.gov, david_lyles@levin.senate.gov,woodtv@woodtv.com,jbarnes@grpress.com
Dear Mr. Loepp,
I am writing to advocate for the continued health insurance coverage for Maia Moore for her treatment at Mary Free Bed in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
On the night of September 24 of 2007, Maia, at one and a half years of age, suffered a massive aneurysm that nearly ended her life. Formerly a healthy, happy child – Maia barely survived, and is now considered multiply-impaired. She cannot walk or talk, she suffers on a daily basis from issues of tone, and part of her cranium is missing as a result of the emergency surgery to save her life.
The medical community has been heroic and supportive of Maia in her struggle. However, after being released from the DeVos Children’s Hospital in November of 2007, she made minimal progress in outpatient treatment. It was very difficult to care for Maia at home for her parents due to Maia’s agitation from going to appointments 5 days a week, her poor tone, and almost constant crying. This impeded her treatment outcomes. Consequently, in February she entered Mary Free Bed inpatient treatment in Grand Rapids to begin rehabilitation to help with feeding, communication, tone, and physical and occupational rehabilitation.
Since entering Mary Free Bed in February, Maia has made considerable gains with her feeding, speech, general lucidity, and physical tone. Maia can now eat more textured foods, she can more easily overcome the "posturing" that caused her intense suffering while at home. She doesn’t cry all the time, and she appears conscious. She has access to nurses, occupational and physical therapists, and doctors. She is only a few months removed from a severe injury, and she requires intensive help.
It was recommended by Mary Free Bed that Maia remain in in-patient treatment minimally through early April, and that her progress would continue to be evaluated justifying her stay. However, Blue Cross Blue Shield has decided to stop payment for her treatment indicating Maia could produce the same outcomes in out-patient settings. All who know Maia realize that this decision is not a sound medical decision, but a sentence for Maia to a lesser standard of living.
Insurance companies should not be deciding courses of treatment against the wishes of family and against the better judgment of the medical community. We ask that Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan immediately overturns the rejection of Maia Moore’s claim, and pays for treatment until the team at Mary Free Bed and Maia’s family decides that out-patient would be in her best interest.
In order to be a good Republican one needs to believe:
1. Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.
2. Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush’s Daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him, and a bad guy when Bush needed a "we can’t find Bin Laden" diversion.
3. Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is Communist, but trade with China and Viet Nam is vital to a spirit of international harmony.
4. The United States should get out of the United Nations, while our highest national priority is enforcing U.N. resolutions against Iraq.
5. A woman can’t be trusted with decisions about her own body, but multinational drug corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation.
6. The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches, while slashing veterans’ benefits and combat pay.
7. If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won’t have sex.
8. A good way to fight terrorism is to belittle our longtime allies, then demand their cooperation and money.
9. Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy, but p rovidin g health care to all Americans is socialism. HMO’s and insurance companies have the best interests of the public at heart.
10. Global warming and tobacco’s link to cancer are junk science, but creationism should be taught in schools.
11. A president lying about an extramarital affair is an impeachable offense, but a president lying to enlist support for a war in which thousands die is solid defense policy.
12. Government should limit itself to the powers named in the Constitution, which include banning gay marriages and censoring the Internet.
13. The public has a right to know about Hillary’s cattle trades, but George Bush’s driving record is none of our business.
14. Being a drug addict is a moral failing and a crime, unless you’re a conservative radio host. Then it’s an illness and you need our prayers for your recovery.
15. Supporting "Executive Privilege" for every Republican ever born, who will be born or who might be born (in perpetuity.)
16. What Bill Clinton did in the 1960’s is of vital national interest, but what Bush did in the 1980’s is irrelevant.
17. Support hunters who shoot their friends and blame them for wearing orange vests similar to those worn by quail.
"Remember, friends don’t let friends vote Republican."
*And if you are in/near Grand Rapids, please consider joining the anti-war protest tomorrow at Noon at Heartside Park.
kisses bitches xx
Currently
listening
:
Etiquette
By
Casiotone for the Painfully Alone
Release date: 07 March, 2006
The inevitable Obama-Hill resolution
Current mood: froggy
Category: News and Politics
Friends Friends Friends!!!!
I am so excited to tell you my new premonition.
It is my belief that the two Democratic front-runners will both be on the ticket in November. I am not sure you will be on the top of the ticket, but I feel secure in the notion that the candidates themselves and the party leaders will do what is best for our party. The clear truth is that Hillary brings in Blue-collar, Women, and older voters while Obama brings in the Men, upperclass blues, and young voters. The best way to secure the Democrats in the white house is to join these two forces and stop McCain's war-mongering ass.
Since I now am confident in my dream-team ticket, I shall take a news-blog break and save my steam to defeat the evil red repubs as long as no one in these parts trys to diss my homegirl anymore(no more whining ;). I still believe that Hillary is the better candidate, but Obama's star quality makes him a politico phenomenon and has shown he can energize people in a certain way that is remarkable. In the mean time-look for some poetry or erotica and remember that you adore me ;P
Currently
listening
:
Trouble in Dreams
By
Destroyer
Release date: 18 March, 2008
Whiny Barack Supporters- lemme tell You about SMEAR Campaigns
Current mood: fascinated
Category: News and Politics
Quicklynow, because I want to play Facebook Poker, which I am bloody addicted to!
I am so exasperated with the Obama clan that wants to say Hillary is smearing him. I want you to watch these two very very short ads, and please try to be objective as possible.
The first video is the Mondale- like phone ad that the Hillary campaign put out before this week's primary. Granted, this ad does try to invoke fear and does seem a little Guilliani 911, but it worked(mwahaha). It does not mention Sen. Obama, but certainly is meant to allude that the Illinios Senator might not have the experience we the people might like in a tough position especialy on foriegn relations(30 General and Admirals back Hiallry Clinton*cough*).. Not only do I believe this is a valid question to ask of Barack Obama, but I believe it shows that the Clinton Campaign is more ready to play hardball with the Republifucks. What bothers me most is that the Barack people would call THIS negative campaigning?? Seems like he only wants to speak of ideology and not talk about his experience......or lack there-of. Although this ad is cheesy and wouldnt personaly swat me either way, I would not consider it negative campaigning.
Now the second video is a true SMEAR ad.This ad came out a year ago.The now infamous Big Brother Hillary Ad that begain the brainwashing of our oh-so susceptable college kiddies. It was made by Phill Devellis who was working for Blue State Digital, Obama's net vendor. You can read about the connection here.
Win Ohio, Win the country. Hillary is making history.(herstory?)
Current mood: energetic
Category: News and Politics
It is true that no candidate has won the presidency without winning Ohio Primary for more than 100 years. A very important win for Sen.Clinton last night. and a very happy morning for a cocky countess. True Sen. Obama is still ahead, but I am looking forward to watching him answer the tougher questions and now he is really going to have to show his constituents some substance. Hillary has gotten terrible press coverage and it is time they stop baby-in him.
I considered doing a bunch of research with facts and links and things we all love, but since the whole "feelings" theme has been so prominent in t
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rockin
argumentative
angsty
Hugs to everyone that helped us to put the pressure on.
exotic
froggy
fascinated
energetic