it will never happen

the democrats have an opportunity, but no leader with the balls to strike. no one smart and gutsy enough to turn the tables on the republicans.

the republican leadership has shown itself happy to expand government and make itself more intrusive into private lives. it has a total disregard for constitutional freedoms and protections, and an eagerness to tell people what to do and how to do it. this is anit-libertarian, and one of the accusations conservatives have made against the democrats in previous years. now is the time to turn it around, remind the public the republicans are doing this, and contrive to attach the same, or greater, level of opprobium to the label 'conservative' as the republicans connected with 'liberal' 20 years ago. 'liberal' should stand for freedom, liberty, less government, and a shift away from corruption and influence peddlers into something that protects the individual, the little guy (while also pursuing liberal economics, which includes fair trade). 'conservative' stands for bossiness, government intrusion, and repression. it always has, but now we have to show the american public that this is a bad thing, something to oppose, fight, and tear down. we have to marginalize the religious right while pulling the libertarian and centrist conservative into the fold.

the problem is, our political system of gerrymandering and corporate political contributions means people, the mainstream especially, have no say in how the party is run, the direction it takes, or who its leaders are. bill clinton had the right idea, but his faction's been pushed out in favor of radical leftists and grassroots fanatics. the appeal to the fanatics gives you vocal support, but hurts your respect with the majority of voters. somehow the republicans managed to pull in that majority, while also feeding their lunatic fringe. i don't think the democrats can do that. i think their radicals are too far for most americans--they scare us. if the democrats don't centralize and appeal to a broader range of people, they're still going to lose the mid-term elections, and the nest presidiential election. someone has to step up and take charge. someone has to lead.

and they need good advisors, with proven track records, not those losers who keep losing.

judicial insanity

Fourth Circuit OKs Retaliation on Whistleblower

While a group of workers watched a breaking news story on the office TV, one employee known for making similar comments blurted out, "They should put those two black monkeys in a cage with a bunch of black apes and let the apes f**k them." Last Friday, May 12, a divided Fourth Circuit panel concluded that there's nothing illegal about firing an employee for reporting such racially inflammatory remarks to supervisors.

Republican appointees Paul Niemeyer
(Bush I) and H. Emory Widener (Nixon) joined in the majority over a sharp dissent by Clinton appointee Robert King, who simply could not fathom a ruling so manifestly contrary to federal anti-discrimination law and the public policy goals underlying it.

Title VII of the Civil Rights
Act of 1964 outlaws retaliation against employees who report workplace discrimination, including racially hostile work settings. By dismissing Jordan's case at the earliest possible stage of litigation, Judges Niemeyer and Widener ruled that IBM did not violate Title VII even if it did retaliate against Jordan for his report. Their reasoning? Jordan was not blowing the whistle on what a reasonable person would perceive as unlawful; rather, they said, he was reporting nothing more than a "unique and never-to-be-repeated" incident that did not reflect a fully-ripened or "planned" racially hostile work environment. Such a report, they concluded, was insufficient to trigger Title VII's protections against retaliation.
(Click here for more (http://e2ma.net/go/270183166/213696/6176958/goto:http://www.afj.org/fullcourtpress.html))


Jordan v. Alternative Resources Corp., No. 05-1485 (4th Cir. May 12, 2006)

senate responsibility (and the republicans' efforts to destroy it)

Dear Mr. starzero:

Thank you for contacting me about President Bush's judicial nominees. I appreciate hearing from you.

As a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I carefully review the merits of each nominee. During this process, I evaluate the nominee's past record, professional competence, integrity, temperament, and judicial philosophy; his or her commitment to upholding the rights and protections established by the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and subsequent laws; and the background information and testimony collected in the course of the candidate's confirmation hearings.

It is important to ensure that fair and independent judges are appointed to the federal bench. The federal judiciary must reflect the diverse values, ideals, and views of all Americans. The nomination of mainstream, qualified judicial candidates with bipartisan support will increase the public's confidence that our courts are a forum that fairly considers claims affecting the lives and security of all Americans.

Attempts to eliminate Senators' ability to use a filibuster when they deem it necessary undermine a fundamental principle upon which our country was founded - the system of checks and balances. This mechanism was created to limit the power of the President and the majority party in Congress. It was designed to protect the rights of the minority and promote compromise among the branches of government. It guarantees that we meet our obligation to conduct the kind of debate necessary to ensure that candidates for the judiciary have broad support.

President Bush must respect the Senate's constitutional role in the judicial nomination process and seek our advice, not just our consent. The Constitution does not make the Senate a rubber stamp for the President's nominees. By working together, the President and the Senate can make progress on nominations as well as other important matters.

Thank you again for contacting me. Please feel free to stay in touch.

Sincerely,

Richard J. Durbin

republican corruption will never stop

Alphonso Jackson, the Republican Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, told a story recently during a talk he gave in Dallas. Here's what he said, according to the Dallas Business Journal:

Jackson closed with a cautionary tale, relaying a conversation he had with a prospective advertising contractor.

"He had made every effort to get a contract with HUD for 10 years," Jackson said of the prospective contractor. "He made a heck of a proposal and was on the (General Services Administration) list, so we selected him. He came to see me and thank me for selecting him. Then he said something ... he said, 'I have a problem with your president.'

"I said, 'What do you mean?' He said, 'I don't like President Bush.' I thought to myself, 'Brother, you have a disconnect -- the president is elected, I was selected. You wouldn't be getting the contract unless I was sitting here. If you have a problem with the president, don't tell the secretary.'

"He didn't get the contract," Jackson continued. "Why should I reward someone who doesn't like the president, so they can use funds to try to campaign against the president? Logic says they don't get the contract. That's the way I believe."

You're probably not too surprised to hear that. Frankly, neither am I. And that's the problem.

The Republican culture of corruption has so infected our government that we aren't even surprised to hear a cabinet secretary talk about the "logic" of potentially illegally awarding federal contracts based on political affiliation. That's right -- if this story is true, it is probably illegal. Our taxpayer dollars are required by law to be spent based on merit.

Public pressure for Jackson to resign is already building, and Democrats in Congress are calling for an investigation. You can be a part of the groundswell of support for clean government by demanding Jackson's resignation.

We're shooting for 100,000 Americans sending a clear message to Secretary Jackson that he is not fit to serve. We will deliver your message to him when you sign this petition demanding his resignation:

http://www.democrats.org/hudscandal

Jackson summed up what's left of the Republican philosophy of government when he said, "That's the way I believe." The journalist Josh Marshall put it well when he wrote yesterday:

"Just as interesting was Jackson's follow-on statement in which shows his understanding of how government contracting works: political supporters get contracts so they can pump a percentage of the profits back into the political party. Standard machine politics, at best. Organized bribery, at worst. And whatever you want to call it, the guiding principle of all contracting and government spending in the second Bush administration."

That's exactly right. And Jackson isn't the only example of this entrenched Republican corruption. Bush's Republican procurement chief -- the man in charge of spending huge sums of taxpayer dollars -- was arrested and charged with conspiracy in the evolving scandals associated with Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

This kind of mentality must be rooted out. But you don't have to wait until November to send your message that you want change. Sign this petition now and demand the resignation of Secretary Jackson:

http://www.democrats.org/hudscandal

Just like many Americans, the media has come to expect this kind of corruption from the Republicans. But it's up to those of us who want change to build public pressure and ensure that our friends and neighbors know that corruption is a day-to-day reality in Republican Washington.

Sign this petition and send your message to Secretary Jackson -- and then pass this message along to your friends:

http://www.democrats.org/hudscandal

Enough is enough -- and we're not going to stop until we achieve real change.

your wealth makes you complacent

our country is still sinking into corruption and disgrace. we have a government intent on wrecking its human rights record, violating every freedom and right known to man, and pretty much establishing itself as a dictatorship. when the tanks roll in 2008 to enforce marshal law and keep bush in power, don't be surprised. the blame for all of this falls on the apathetic voters who simply don't care that their politicians have created a separate world for themselves and are out of touch with most of the country. in the name of retaining power they have reworked constituencies so that incumbents remain in power and challengers rarely make headway against vested interests. this allows, even forces, our so-called representatives to pander to the fringe groups of their support base, because those are the ones who care enough to vote. the more they do this, the less the mainstream voters feel connected to their politicans, and thus the less they vote, reinforcing the cycle. we live in a declining america rife with corruption and political malfeasance. we are still capable of changing this, but no one seems to care enough to try. democratic representation is dying in america, because no one is left to fight for it.

stop killing yourself

crossing the line from activism to terrorism.

or maybe we should just stop making new medicines. no more pain relievers. no new anti-depressants. no new diabetes medication.

should we stop using medicines developed using animal testing? ok, what's left?

the goal is to stop hurting animals, right? well, building houses hurts animals, all that wood taking down their homes. driving cars and all that pollution hurts animals. eating meat. all our electricity and books and cds and guitars and appliances and pretty much everything has come through some process that has hurt animals. so we stop making more, stop using more, stop doing more?

then what? we can't eat animals, so we're left with plants. we can't yoke up an ox or horse to plough the field, because that's cruel, so we're pretty much stuck with what grows naturally.

a lot of us are going to die.

the rest of us will compete with animals for food. is that ok? or do we just roll over and die, let them take over? let them kill each other, eat each other? let some other species evolve into dominance, enslave the rest of the world. what's the ultimate end of all this?

somebody tell me because it doesn't make any fucking sense.

the right hates everyone (part 1,709

On May 5, 2006, the Eleventh Circuit issued a split, 2-1 decision denying asylum to a Colombian woman who, because of her political work, had been on the receiving end of menacing phone calls, a death threat note and gunfire.
Previously filibustered, formerly recess-appointed, highly controversial Bush II pick Bill Pryor authored the majority opinion over a stinging dissent by Bush I appointee Ed Carnes. Despite the growing evidence that immigration courts have been falling down on the job, the Eleventh Circuit has never - yes, never - reversed an immigration court's refusal to grant political asylum. In Luz Marina Silva's case,
Judge Carnes felt the time had come. Unfortunately for Ms. Silva, Judges Pryor and Frank Hull (a Clinton appointee who regularly joins the court's most conservative wing) thought otherwise.
(Find outmore)
(http://e2ma.net/go/265542945/210694/6098371/goto:http://www.afj.org/2006/05/eleventh-circuit-thinks-death-threats.html)

every freedom precious

Most Americans think mid-term elections are a big yawn. But you and I know differently.

This year's Congressional elections are an exciting, high-stakes opportunity -- a historic chance for you and your friends to stop the radical right in its tracks.

We've seen what 6 years under President Bush and an anti-choice Congress means for women. We have less access to both birth control and honest information about preventing unintended pregnancy. At the same time, Bush and his allies are doing everything in their power to make it more difficult and dangerous to access abortion care.

Now is the time to get started. We have exactly 6 months to let our friends, neighbors, and colleagues know why they have to act -- and vote -- on their pro-choice values this election cycle. This is our opportunity to turn the anti-choice tide.

You can help take our grassroots message to Chicago, IL and wake up other pro-choice Americans this election season. Download our "5 Reasons Why I'm Voting Pro-Choice in November 2006" flyer and put it up in your workplace and pass it around to your friends. Click here to download the flyer: http://prochoiceaction.org/ct/z7LRNvK1oXpL/

Go ahead. Wake them up and say you're voting to elect a pro-choice Congress because:

:: We must block potential anti-choice Supreme Court nominees now that Roe v. Wade hangs by just one vote.

:: For more than three years, Bush's FDA has refused to allow the "morning-after" pill - a safe and effective way to prevent unintended pregnancy - to be sold over-the-counter.

:: More than half a billion taxpayer dollars have been spent on ineffective abstinence-only programs since Bush took office.

:: We need the votes to pass the Freedom of Choice Act so that we never have to fight for the right to choose again.

:: With only two years left in his term, Bush will use his anti-choice Congress to pass as many anti-choice bills as he can. This is our chance to stop him (and them)!

With your help, our pro-choice message will be taken to individuals and communities across the country. We'll stir them up, we'll get them talking, and we'll vote pro-choice and win this November!

Thank you for all you do to protect a woman's right to choose.