This excerpt from Max Blumenthal's new book Republican Gomorrah has gone damn-near viral on the web : At the Charter School for Excellence, a school in South Florida inspired by Gothard's draconian principles that receives $800,000 in state funds each year, children are indoctrinated into a culture of absolute submission to authority almost as soon as they learn to speak. A song that the school's first-graders are required to recite goes as follows: Obedience is listening attentively, Obedience will take instructions joyfully, Obedience heeds wishes of authorities, Obedience will follow orders instantly. For when I am busy at my work or play, And someone calls my name, I'll answer right away! I'll be ready with a smile to go the extra mile As soon as I can say "Yes, sir!" "Yes ma am!" Hup, two, three! The larger excerpt is actually about the impact of Christian right self-help guru Bill Gothard, and don't get me wrong, Gothard and his devote...

It's not just President Obama, but he does tend to fall into the trap too often. I don't really know anybody who has taken seriously those supposedly inspiring Presidential anecdotes that crop up in speeches all the time. Carter, Reagan, Clinton, the Bushes--they all embellished the stories that their speech-writers fed them. But it can really bite you on the ass in a speech that is at least partly about other people distorting the truth : Last week, when the President addressed the Joint Session of Congress in a speech on health reform, he referred to some of the untruths – okay, lies – that have been spread about the plan and sent a clear message to those who seek to undermine his agenda and his presidency with these tactics: "We will call you out." Unfortunately, as Lynn Sweet at Politics Daily points out , that speech came with an anecdote that ... wasn't true: When Obama spoke to Congress about health care reform on Sept. 9, he attempted to put a human face...

...although he does it on the comments page , rather than have the fortitude to do so in a post: Actually Stefan, IMHO, being Anti-Iraq War, is not just "extremely Leftwing," but v ery close to Nazi or Stalinist Authoritarian . If you oppose the War in Iraq, you are essentially saying "I support Saddam Hussein, and wish he was still President of Iraq." Recall Hussein was a Hitler worshipper, even knelt down 4 times a day in his Uncle's hut, to a large portrait of the Nazi leader, with candles around him. So, being Anti-War in Iraq, is not so much "extremist," more Hitler-like. I mention this because Eric likes to drop by here and call people names when they don't agree with him, like when he's running outrageous, manufactured stories about WMDs found in Iraq (the Tuwaitha yellowcake that Dubya himself handed back to the Iraqi security forces as no threat [we'd known about it since 1991]), support for the racist Sonny Landham as the Libert...

Yes, once upon a time Alan Greenspan was a Libertarian, a devotee of Ayn Rand and gold-based currency--back when Senator Robert Byrd was still wearing a hood and Ronald Reagan was a Democrat. Nonetheless, says Slate's Jacob Weisberg in Newsweek , Greenspan (along with Phil Gramm and Chris Cox) is decisive proof that Libertarian ideas brought down the financial markets: We have narrowly avoided a global depression and are mercifully pointed toward merely the worst recession in a long while. This is thanks to an economic meltdown made possible by libertarian ideas. I don't have much patience with the notion that trying to figure out how we got into this mess is somehow pointless—Sarah Palin's view of global warming. As with any failure, inquest is central to improvement. And any competent forensic work has to put the libertarian theory of self-regulating financial markets at the scene of the crime.... Neglecting to prevent the Crash of '08 was a sin of omission—less the...

The NY Times reports yet another reason why having Democrats in control of Congress is no better than big government Republicans running the show, you just get a lot more whine with your cheese. These people are just gutless, spineless liars. At least the Bushie Republicans are straight-up fascists. The Democrats bitch and pretend otherwise, and then show their true colors with their actions. Pelosi and Hoyer are disgraces. Both are what is wrong with Washington. Entrenched lifer insiders cutting deals to protect corporate and statist interests, civil liberties and the public interest be damned. Ex post facto immunity for major telecoms' trampling the Constitution as useful tools for a rogue imperial now-lame duck president, on his way out the door. Of course, they have let Bush and his henchman get away with murder, too craven to impeach the son-of-a-bitch...why not help their telecom lobbyist pals out of a jam, too? The money line : "I think the White House got a better...

Bill Conroy was normal journalist doing his duty when one day two agents of the Department of Homeland Security came to his house and all of that changed . And his life changed forever..... You can read his story here. You know that when our academics and journalists are intimidated and coerced, the end is nigh.

Let's see: we have a revenue shortfall. Let's ask the editorial board at the Snooze Journal. Not in more than three decades has the General Assembly taken money from the fairest and most equitable source: everyone. Delaware's income tax went from one of the highest rates in the country at 20 percent for the wealthiest, to among the lowest at 5.9 percent for those earning over $60,000. There's been no measurable change in the personal income tax formula for more than a decade. Instead, surtaxes have been levied on special groups whenever revenue was needed. But during that same period of flat income tax , which began in the middle of Gov. Tom Carper's administration, the number of employees on the state payroll has doubled. The state population has increased about 18 percent.... A minimal quarter-percent increase in the personal income tax for 12 months would make up that difference. For most families, that would mean only a few dollars out of their paychecks. Yeah,...

This sounds damning, doesn't it? WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Heavy marijuana use can boost blood levels of a particular protein, perhaps raising a person’s risk of a heart attack or stroke, U.S. government researchers said on Tuesday. Levels of a protein called apolipoprotein C-III were found to be 30 percent higher in the marijuana users compared to the others. This protein is involved in the body’s metabolism of triglycerides — a type of fat found in the blood — and higher levels cause increased levels of triglycerides. High levels of triglycerides can contribute to hardening of the arteries or thickening of the artery walls, raising the risk of stroke, heart attack and heart disease. Of course there are two aspects of this US government study you might want to take into consideration while you are evaluating its reliability. Number one: the next sentence in the story. The study did not look at whether the heavy marijuana users actually had heart disease. In other words: we didn...

.....and as the Republic Magazine exposes, we have until May 11 to comply with it. It is was nice living under a constitutional republic while it lasted . But as we have noted before this is simply a continuation of the same technological programs that another government used that led to more than one genocide . I think we all know the famous "your papers please...." but how many of us know that Pol Pot used them too ? I have a national ID card from a citizen of a nation who knows a thing or two or three about the risks they carry......let me share it with you.....this one is from the CCCP ..... And it is being implemented in the United States now......By 2017 all of your personal information will be in a government database, one can only wonder if the site administrators will be listening to Deutschland Uber Alles at that point? It is not a comforting thought to know that your sexual orientation, race, gender, age, credit score, medical records, will all be embedded o...

Over at Delaware Politics they have made a disturbing little heartland industry of bashing Barack Obama's Reverend Jeremiah Wright whose comments sparked a national debate with "right wing liberator cum-aggressor" and militia agitator Sean Hannity. But for all the racists it seems to be OK since The Hon. James David Manning Ph.D. of Atlah Ministries gave Obama a tacit endorsement by way of breasts and trashy white women. Proving once again why we need a clear seperation of church and state- "Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a w...

I was driving down the street today when I noticed a new 360 degree optical view closed circuit camera with facial recognition the same type I noticed in the EU- what was it doing hanging over a red light? Interesting. In that vein let me present you to the Big Brother State in easy steps. Anyone can understand it- this is for your weekend viewing pleasure and for your own protection you see . You can even buy the facial recognition software for your own computer . because as of today, I see it as a new reality for Americans. It was interesting for me anyway, I was discussing this with a friend of mine who speaks Russian, he reminded me that, "Vhat you expect? Chertoff is colloquial Russian for 'son of devil'; you people stupid enough to hire him, you know dey say that you get vhat you buy, vell you got vhat you bought....ha.ha.ha.... чёрт - tshert mean devil's- like belong to him- and "off" mean "son of" ....ha.ha.ha...." for some reason I am...

...at least until this guy comes around. Ben Olken who studies graft, corruption and the politics of assassination is one of the most gifted young economists discusses why politics and graft go together like bricks and mortar for some societies. We are no exception, where throughout the 19 th century Jacksonian democracy encouraged a type of nepotistic graft, as well as a type of oligarchy. This was perfectly represented by the infamous William "Boss" Tweed . I think much of what we are seeing today is the same old oligarchy reassert itself to in their own words, "correct the excesses of democracy" which instead of translating into promoting constitutional liberty , as it should have, has translated into reasserting oligarchic control to dominate your life with restrictive orders, laws and rules. Oh joy. "I'm the law around here see...." I cannot emphasize enough how important it is for you to watch this last link.....

If you can spare the time tonight, watch the 2nd part of Frontline series "Bush's War" tonight on PBS (9pm on Ch. 12 WHYY). Or you can watch it online : http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/bushswar/ Part One, aired last night, was a simultaneously riveting and infuriating look at the Bush administration's (e.g. Dick Cheney) and the neo-conservatives' single-minded, utterly-duplicitous, inconceivably-manipulative machinations to plunge this country into the most perilous, costly, fruitless, and entangling foreign misadventure in our history. The bureaucratic-warfare politics and Machiavellian skullduggery laid out by first-hand witnesses from both sides of the issue are a monologue of proof that raw power is far too concentrated in Washington, D.C. and the power in D.C. is far far too concentrated in a unitary chief executive. The temptations of this level of power and the designs of evil men find too easy a nexus....as they did and still continue unabated. ...

James Baker, Mayor of Wilmington, gave his budget address last night to the City Council. The big headline of his speech, triumphantly reported as such, was : "no tax increases this year" . This in spite of an incredible inflation-surpassing one year growth rate of 11% and the addition of at least 13 new city employees none of whom by the way is a police officer, given the violent crime explosion we have seen, or an otherwise essential employee. http://www.delawareonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080321/NEWS02/803210339/1006/NEWS http://www.wilm.com/cc-common/mlib/1171/03/1171_1206039408.doc In keeping with Baker's theme that it is somehow praiseworthy that the city government has managed to scrape by with such paltry means as $141,800,000 for FY 2009 * while still taking real nice care of all those much-needed layers of bureaucracy and patronage, Baker reassured that at least several of these new taxpayer-funded jobs would be justified by the new revenu...

One thing is for sure, a reformation in the Islamic world is much better than the destruction of the Islamic world. This weekend watching from Carlata Gall and the BBC is enlightening about the way that brutality and reality meet to form a new set of rules in the American war on terrorism. It follows that my prediction of a ham handed response to a human problem is the cause of new forms of extremism for the "terrorism industry." It shows less incoherence in the system then you would think at first, and it is not the work of a few bad apples, and it illustrates more systemic problems within our ability to effectively manage people we do not understand or who "some nameless 'we' do not care about" and are managed for us, to quote Adolous Huxley. The film is called the "Taxi to the Dark Side" and has won critical acclaim around the world. It is a sad contrast with my humorous posts and I am posting the whole thing here for your viewing with one quest...

OK Bloggers, The race is on. We need some research to fulfill the needs of our deviant liberal friends, which nation or group of nations, the US, South East Asia, or China has the highest documentable rate of prostitution? I will give you a clue, the US and China do not post rea l numbers or give you the actual scale of the problem. As we all know what a fat horn dog Ben Franklin was, I thought this quantification of prostitution rates might make him proud. I am not sure how proud he would be to know that there is a hooker dance party community in his native Philadelphia. At the same time, I want to make it very clear that I find this type of exploitation deplorable and want to find ways and have helped the Global Mission for Comprehensive Human Development find ways to create better paying jobs for people who were forced into this lurid business. But one thing is clear according to the interviews we have conducted, independent Hookers (without a pimp) have more fun. Those with a pimp ...

Sometimes people say the damnedest things. Here's an admission I never expected to read from "Progressive" guru George Lakoff in his Thinking Points, A Progressive's Handbook [for] Communicating Our American Values and Vision (pp. 102-103): Another multifaceted conservative strategic initiative is "tort reform," which has been made to sound like it is just about capping large damage awards and lawyers' fees. It is really a destruction of the civil justice system's capacity to deter corporations from acts that harm the public, since it is the lawyers' fees that permit the system to function. Moreover, if successful, it will also dry up one of the major sources of campaign finance for progressive candidates, which comes from trial lawyers. You can handle the implications for yourself.

One of the problems with Libertarians is that, frankly, the theoretical and strategic writing of self-styled Progressives is so difficult to read that we don't do much of it. This is something we have to get over, especially as the Progressives seemed to be in full swing of pulling off the same trick that Ronald Reagan did for conservatives in the 1980s: reframing the public political discourse in their favor. Reagan, followed by talk radio, actually managed to make the term "liberal" one that even politicians who were avowedly liberal needed to avoid if they wanted to get elected or re-elected. Liberal as a "brand" still has not been successfully rehabilitated. On the other hand, Dubya--with a lot of help from his neo-con friends and his opponents--has managed to self-destruct the brand value of "Conservatism" that Reagan created, so much so that today Rush Limbaugh announced , "I can see possibly not supporting the Republican nominee this elec...