Killing the California Dream Sounds A Lot Like Killing the American Dream

If you want your tax dollars to be spent on education, health, transit, infrastructure, and re-building our crumbling edifices – instead of the banksters, corporations, and endless wars – then you should read Michael O'Hare's "A letter to my students":

Now, your infrastructure is falling to pieces under your feet, and as citizens you are responsible for crudities like closing parks, and inhumanities like closing battered women’s shelters. It’s outrageous, inexcusable, that you can’t get into the courses you need, but much worse that Oakland police have stopped taking 911 calls for burglaries and runaway children. If you read what your elected officials say about the state today, you’ll see things like “California can’t afford” this or that basic government function, and that “we need to make hard choices” to shut down one or another public service, or starve it even more (like your university). Can’t afford? The budget deficit that’s paralyzing Sacramento is about $500 per person; add another $500 to get back to a public sector we don’t have to be ashamed of, and our average income is almost forty times that. Of course we can afford a government that actually works: the fact is that your parents have simply chosen not to have it.

Read the whole thing, and then think about your state's budget woes and ballooning deficits. You know where all those crippling debts, with ever-increasing interest come from? They come from elected officials who won't fund our public services, but won't admit to it. So they take out loans they know are bad (and in many cases, it seems better than just shutting down all services -- until you can't borrow anymore), often with the very goal of saddling the people, and the state, with so much debt that we can't get out of it and then must admit that Government Is the Problem. At that point we don't have to wonder what it would be like to live in a Glibertarian paradise where roads, schools, and healthcare only exist for the independently wealthy -- because we've allowed them to create that very heaven on earth for themselves.

This is so applicable to NY, but definitely to NJ as well, and probably most states in the Union. There's this insistence that any other viewpoint beyond "we must cut and destroy all services to save ourselves" is un-serious and wishful thinking, but that's total bullshit. I have to wonder: for electeds looking to stay in office, wouldn't "take back the american dream," or similar make a better platform than, "legislating huge corporate giveaways was better than doing nothing"?

May the People save America, because God isn't coming.

Sucky Liberalism Kinda Kills It

As Atrios wrote quite recently, when liberalism doesn't work, it discredits liberalism.

So there I was last night watching the aforementioned comics at Comix, and one of the best set-ups and lines of the night was when this one comic starts talking about having his appendix burst on him recently:

"I cost me $40,000! Aaaaand I didn't have health insurance because I thought Obama took care of that. There I am under the knife and they stop to ask me 'what kind of insurance do you have?' Obamaaaaaaaa..."

It was actually a really funny moment, it wasn't the usual right-wing Obamacare fear-mongering, but a more apt and specific criticism: The Administration Fucked Up Universal Healthcare, and Everyone Knows It.

It's going to make "fixing" it damn near impossible. But, y'know, had to take the best we could get and all, last chance to ever do anything ever or else ben nelson will take his steak and go home.

Comedy

We went to Comix last night to see Judah Friedlander (headliner) and a bunch of other yahoos yuck it up. They were all very good, and I'm still trying to find the list of the other comics who performed, as they had some dang zingers. I mean, it was really good, especially Judah.

I groaned when I first heard we were going because even though I'm a fan of Judah, I've always kind of hated the experience you typically get at comedy clubs. Dangerfield's is probably the worst example so I'll start there. You get "discount" tickets from somebody for $15, and that's your admission, provided you buy two drinks. Once inside, you find out drinks are $25 minimum. And the comics are terrible and there's no one there.

That's Dangerfield's though. At other places, it's more like Comix. Nice place, but the rules are the rules, dude, and if you don't like it, you can leave, and they'll penalize you for bringing around anyone who's not on board. Our friends who brought us to the show told us that on a previous trip came in with a friend who refused to buy two drinks, so he left early in the show. The club insisted on charging our friends for his two drinks. [ who goes back to that place after that? well, ... the comics were very good... ]

How do you even justify that? I mean, that's going out of your way to be vindictive. I'm sure that there are a lot of cheapskates out there, the club needs to stay in business, and the comics themselves need to get paid (do they actually get paid by the club?), but it's that kind of shit that usually keeps me out of comedy clubs.

Would be cool if comedy was treated a little more like theater by everyone involved.

Pet Peeve: Brutal Stasi Police

Digby on another murder-by-taser of unaccountable people:

"If a citizen doesn't know that he is likely to be killed in the police station by asphyxiation and electrocution for failing to immediately follow a police officers order, then he deserves to die. This is America. "

Indeed.

One thing about the right-wing that I'll never understand is that while they scream and freak out and buy up all the local ammunition at the news of every bizarre and imagined threat to their "liberties" (few of which they could actually enumerate), they never, ever fucking speak out against this.

This kind of shit should be their bread and butter, as conservatives, or believers in limited government (living on welfare).

But they don't mind government having authoritarian, brutal power, as long as it's a Good White Christian at the wheel. Or behind the taser, I suppose.

The Story Remains the Same

Krugthulu, as Atrios calls him, on why the government isn't, you know, doing anything about 9.5% unemployment:

"[T]hough the story shifts, the moral is always the same: the little people have to suffer."

Co-Existing with Allen West

One the GOP's most exciting (and African-American!) candidates:

I saw that bumper sticker that absolutely incenses me. It’s not the Obama bumper sticker. But it’s the bumper sticker that says, ‘Co-exist.’ And it has all the little religious symbols on it. And the reason why I get upset, and every time I see one of those bumper stickers, I look at the person inside that is driving. Because that person represents something that would give away our country. Would give away who we are, our rights and freedoms and liberties because they are afraid to stand up and confront that which is the antithesis, anathema of who we are. The liberties that we want to enjoy.

Speaking of liberties:

West began his political career after resigning from the military following an investigation into his interrogation tactics. In 2003, West was interrogating an Iraqi policeman who was not being cooperative. According to his own testimony during a military hearing, West watched four of his men beat the suspect, and West said he personally threatened to kill the man. According to military prosecutors, West followed up on his threat by taking the man outside and firing a 9mm pistol near his head, in order to make the man believe he would be shot.

When Allen West is leader of the free world, I wonder which liberties I will get to enjoy?

Setting Good Examples Around the World

Iran's first unmanned bomber drone.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said the plane could serve as a "messenger of death", but that its key message was one of friendship.

Iranian state TV later showed the "Karrar" aircraft in flight.

It said it had a range of 1,000km (620 miles) and could carry two 250-pound (115kg) bombs, or a precision bomb of 500 pounds.

My Favorite...

is when conservatives, who are always leading the way down the road to Censorship in the name of Decency (forcing their moral values on the rest of the population), complain that their first amendment rights are somehow being abridged when people respond in kind to the shit that comes out of their mouths:

KING: Why is your freedom of speech denied on radio?

(CROSSTALK)

KING: Because people can criticize what you say.

SCHLESSINGER: You know, when I started in radio, if you said something somebody didn't agree with and they didn't like, they argued with you. Now, they try to silence you. They try to wipe out your ability to earn a living and to have your job. They go after affiliates. They send threats to sponsors.

KING: That's their right, too.

SCHLESSINGER: Yes, but I don't hatch the right to say what I need to say. My First Amendment rights have been usurped by angry, hateful groups who don't want to debate. They want to eliminate.

Who's playbook does that sound like to you?

Stunning

There's a bunch of perspective posts on nytimes.com about the mosque that isn't a mosque and isn't at the world trade center (stop calling it "ground zero" you fucking retards), and I'm stunned by the vile bigotry of Kathryn Jean Lopez (editor of the vile National Review Online), and the Times' willingness to even print it on their website. You can see where this is going immediately:

On Aug. 13, President Obama held a Ramadan dinner at the White House and announced that “this is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakeable.” This is a statement I absolutely agree with, and I wish that Western countries would be inspired by the hat tip to our founding principles.

When you’ve taken as many positions on as many issues as Obama has, you start to lose your credibility.
The president went on to say, “I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as anyone else in this country. That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in Lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances.”

I agree with that, too. I’m a Catholic who sees threats to religious liberty increasing here at home -- largely by legislative fiat -- and I'm earnest about ensuring its protection for us all.

But I also think that to build an Islamic center near ground zero is an imprudent move.

Because I association Islamic community centers with terrorism, which makes me a hideous bigot.

If Islam had a pope, he might advise the Cordoba House developers as much...

But they don't because Muslims are savages.

Kathryn Jean Lopez, may Google cache this for all time, it is your shame and if you had even a shred of dignity, you'd recant.

Marcy & Metro

Dear NYCDOT, if I am killed one of these mornings on my walk to work, it will almost assuredly be here, where it happens almost every day.

The traffic you see turning in the photo is high speed traffic, people literally racing against on-coming traffic and pedestrians to get onto the BQE down Marcy St. They never get a red-light, and ignore the crossing symbol, the cross walk, the people in it... I mean, seriously, I've been very nearly run-down with the right of way I don't know how many times. Often the cars seem to speed up to chase you out of the road.

One of these days I need to write the DOT a letter, they do take comments and complaints. But what the fuck, who thought this was a good idea?

Conservatives Never Miss A Chance to Ruin a Good Thing for Profit

David Waldman:

I guess I just thought that conservatives would be generally resistant to change and would prefer keeping the Internet the way it is now that they've learned to use it to trade theories about black helicopters.

Hahahaha. Do go on:

After all, the most basic way of describing the fight is pretty clear. If you like the Internet the way it is, then you're for net neutrality. If you'd rather pay more money for less service, and have a giant company tell you what you are and aren't allowed to see, then you're against net neutrality.

That's it.

Indeed.