i cancelled my sunday only subscription as soon as i heard (i had only re-instated it 6 months ago when a high school student showed up saying they had decided to give the routes back to local kids). it seems they had staff on hand with a special script to respond to calls- wonder how many subscriptions they will lose…

If you still subscribe to the Chicago LA Times, it’s high time you canceled. Tell them why.

Ah, c’mon! The readers of Costa Mesa must be served!

Heyyyy! Wait a minute!

Anaheim, Irvine (master planning on an epic scale), Laguna Niguel, Newport Beach and Corona Del Mar are your more likely right-wing paradises.

Costa Mesa was pretty much a funky little burg, at least when I lived there (mid-80s), because it was close to the ocean, but a hell of a lot cheaper than most other places that close. Lots of surfers holed up in lots of little bungalows and 6-10 unit apartment houses.

But maybe it’s changed.

Ah, back from the dog park, that was fun, but now I’m tired.

Thanks, Valley Girl, for the reminder — it wasn’t thoughtful of me to just type the PDA website url, when it’s just as easy to make a handy link for everyone.

DFA is very good news, too, and effective. What’s nice is that they and PDA are trying to coordinate, so that nobody ends up duplicating efforts and resources, or re-inventing the wheel when it’s not necessary.

Another thought: I used to regularly check out the local info for the (now pretty much defunct) Meetup website. There were always quite a few local meetings listed, especially shortly after “Black Tuesday” Nov. 2 2004, there were lots of impromptu meetings of all sorts of folks in our city, looking for solace and support to regroup for the long fight.

While I know that the Meetup organizing tool/website is pretty much kaputt — it seems to me I read about a new, similar organizing tool/website to serve the same purpose: to facilitate putting community meetings together.

Problem is, my tuckered out brain can’t remember the name of the successor outfit…anyone else know?

Wow, I went over to the DFA site and found there is an active chapter in my area. Sounds like a good thing for me to get involved in. Wish I had found it sooner, we will be leaving for the winter soon. But I bookmarked it and will visit again… maybe post some.

Regarding Democratic and/or Progressive activity at the state and local level, I think there are grassroots organizations popping up all over the place, in large part because the old Democratic organizations are creaky old fossils that don’t want new blood and can’t seem to change.

I would defintely take a look at DFA (Democracy For America) which is what Dean’s grassroots organization has spun off into. There are numerous DFA groups in Connecticut – and I know that they are active all over the country. Dean was quite focused on getting progressives elected at the local level – in many cases Republicans run unopposed for the school board and other local positions.

http://www.democracyforamerica.com/

What is Democracy for America?

Inspired by the presidential campaign of Howard Dean, Democracy for America (DFA) is a political action committee dedicated to supporting fiscally responsible, socially progressive candidates at all levels of government—from school board to the presidency. DFA fights against the influence of the far right-wing and their radical, divisive policies and the selfish special interests that for too long have dominated our politics.

DFA has a long-term goal to rebuild the Democratic Party from the bottom up—it will take time, but we must start building a base now for the future.
View the candidates that Democracy for America has endorsed in 2005
Read the Democracy for America weblog (updated daily)
Learn the history of Democracy for America
Read press releases from Democracy for America
Subscribe to our RSS feed:

On the DFA home page is a grassroots event finder search engine you can plug your zip code into.
_________________

Also, Moveon.org political action has been focused on building grassroots in every state. You might want to take a look there as well.

http://www.moveon.org/

Robert Scheer is getting a bit long in the tooth, but what an extraordinary career and mind! He simply cannot be replaced. M

new thread

If you don’t like Libermanns politics, help
him get defeated by a more progressive
Democrat.
lgf | 11.12.05 – 5:45 pm | #
___________________-

Couldn’t agree with you more, lgf.

Pairing those two words together is appalling and extremely counter productive. What’s with the insistence on repeating them over and over? I thought we had put this to rest on the last thread.

I live in Connecticut. I want Lieberman out of office – as do many other folks. Calling him names like that isn’t going to help us accomplish our goal.

Ah, c’mon! The readers of Costa Mesa must be served!

Thanks for the link Mrs. K8. This is about the 3rd site of Dem organizations I’ve been back to lately and it blows me away again our capitol of Lansing doesn’t have a Chapter listed, I live 20 minutes away. Our Governor is Dem, our state is a blue state, I’ve visited Mich blogs, and I’m still having trouble finding any local chapters that I can join or attend a meeting. I’m currently unemployed so I can’t afford to start one. (The city I live in is all Repubs though). Finding this rather frustrating that our own capitol doesn’t have a well known Progressive place to contact, nothing is ever listed in the paper either. Perhaps I haven’t searched hard enough?

At least on the PDA site they do include a couple of state coordinators contact email addresses, I will start there. Hopefully they will have some info that something is being formed in Lansing soon.

Need… new… FDL… post…

Must… drink… from… favorite… blog…

:passes out:

Troop casualties in Iraq continue to run at a 3 per day clip. No good news over there. Even goopers seem to have given up on putting lipstick on that pig.

President Clusterfuck continues to use the “gotta support the troops” argument.

So much bullshit!

Support the Troops- bring em the hell home!

Mrs. K– I went to the website and the progressives appear to be much better organized. I’ll check them out.

Frankly I just want a dem in this congressional district- don’t much care which flavor.

Did learn today that the political affiliation within the district is not QUITE as gooper as I had thought- there are a lot of independents and “other” (probably libertarians)..It might be worth working on.

Hi all. Reading, but not much to weigh in about Jonah Goldberg. I’ll keep poking around.

BTW, it is quite easy to add clickable links to your posts. For example, if you have the web page open for PDA (from Mrs. K8) just copy the address and then paste it into the comment box:

http://www.pdamerica.org/
-

rw — PDA believes the party currently is somewhat DYSfunctional, with poor communications between various levels, and is looking to change that.

Do you have a full-time progressive radio station in your area? Where we are (in AZ) we have a station that has a good bit of local programming. They feature programs with interviews of local PDA and DFA activists and their plans for better party organization, quite often. Really gets the energetic juices flowing. There’s quite the blossoming of Dem party reform here in AZ right now.

Check out your local PDA chapter through their website — hit the “Grassroots” button at the top, and click on “Chapters.” Then get on their mailing list. You’ll soon find out what’s what in your area.

We can’t wait for the stodgy oldsters to straighten out their poor intra-party communications problems. We’ve got to roll up our sleeves and FORCE them (nicely, of course) to GET CRACKING. I see energy being channeled quite nicely. And our local progressive radio station is functioning as a great megaphone to draw in new blood, too!

Well, we’re off to take pupster to the dog park. See you guys shortly.

Henry Holland -

“superb writer and a marvelous conservative thinker” … Maybe the letter writer intended irony, but troweled it on a bit thick. If meant seriously, it approaches Harriet Miers level brown-nosing.

Thanks for the reminder that we’ll be seeing the back of David Gelerntner, too. Now if only they’d Boot Max.

Those fuckers.

counterproductive to label Jews who become
backers of Bush and the neo-cons Jewish Nazi’s. Their politics may be reprehensible
yet it’s all in the framing of language that’s
important. Appeal to their social conscience
Get Biblical with them as lots of them are
orthodox and backers of Likud in Israel. Talk
about the Jewish Prophets who spoke truth
to power etc….
The defense mechaninisms of Jews who
are attacked become impenetrable and the
phrases anti-semite becomes loudly proclaimed.
If you don’t like Libermanns politics, help
him get defeated by a more progressive
Democrat.

Thanks Mrs K

I’ll check it out. At the moment- I just want to get my bearings in how the whole organization functions and how it can be improved.

On the Nickname thingy. My favorite Nickname for Dubya is “Goober Chickenshorts.” So I guess now Mr. Chickenhack and Mr. Chickenshorts can engage in a ,”Coop dee Grass!” If we’re lucky, maybe they’ll peck each other to death!!!

Hey, rwcole!

I answered your question above! Read my post above about this coalition within the party, to take back the soul of the party. They already have some decent successes to their name, after being in existence only one year. I think they’re in all 50 states now.

Progressive Democrats of America

http://www.pdamerica.org

I am writing a book inspired by Goldberg’s new book “Liberal Fascists”. My new book is called: “Jewish Nazis”.

-GSD

Would love to be connected with the party at the state level. They obviously could be doing so much more to make use of these “clubs”. Most of the people are retired and are willing to pitch in if someone asked- but no one asks. What’s up with that? Seems that theyare used as casual labor come election time and that’s about it.

Goopers did a good job of laying the foundation for their current success by winning state legislatures. Not glamorous work- but it pays of at re-apportionment time.

Dems need to be working along the same lines for 2010. Whoever holds the state assembly that year will win some congressional seats automatically.

Don’t really know who DOES that in the dem party. Anyone know?

Getting rid of the elephantine Michael Ramirez, on the other hand, is a true occasion for joy. Unlike bad columns, his heavy-handed cartoons couldn’t be ignored; they blare out from the page like Fox “News” turned up too high. It’s like being made to read Max Boot at gunpoint.

Yep, that nails it. I suspect that the Ramirez boot was purely financial–they can get stuff from Toles, Herblock etc. much cheaper. I’ve been told that the top brass loved Ramirez because he generated controversy and they could use him to counter “liberal bias” charges. His stuff really was vile a lot of the time–think of LGF and Lucienne.com in op-ed cartoon form, lots of race baiting.

So, on balance, all to the good: Scheer a small loss, Goldberg a small waste – but knowing I won’t have to see Ramirez will brighten my whole morning.

You forgot to mention David “Dumber than fucking Douglas Feith” Gelerntner got the axe as well. Add in the departure of Michael Kinsley, and I’d say the op-ed page is on it’s way to recovering from it’s slide over the past year or so.

I love Scheer’s stuff, though I agree with you as well, he was basically an Atrios/Kos/FDL board denizen that had an op-ed page. What bums me out about his leaving is that he won’t be there to torment that fool Kevin Drum any more.

BTW, two full page columns worth of letters about the changes today, running roughly 80% against getting rid of Scheer and getting the Doughy Pantload. The best one was from some asshat named Jeffrey Smith from Westminster who called Goldberg a “superb writer and a marvelous conservative thinker”.

Jeffrey Smith doesn’t get out much, does he?

Oops. Forgot to give you the website:

http://www.pdamerica.org

Aquaria–I’m new to this party stuff and can’t figure out how it works.

The democrat clubs that I have visited seem totally disconnected from the party at a national or state level.. No one seems to be communicating anything to them- and there seems to be little communication upward either. Do you know how the party is organized?

Did get one bit of hot news. Word is that Randy Duke Cunningham will be indicted in a couple of weeks and may be forced to resign- which could result in a special election early.

The L.A. Times has an ongoing identity crisis. It can’t really figure out what it wants to be. The good news is they also got rid of Ramirez’ cartoon, which was hard to avoid on the editorial page. It won’t be hard at all to avoid JG.

My only local alternative is the Orange County Register. Saints preserve me.

I don’t bother going to the local official Dem Party HQ much any more.

Instead I got involved with PDA:

Progressive Democrats of America. They’re a coalition within the party, looking to take back the soul of the party. They recruit progressive candidates to run at the local level, as well as state level. At this point, I believe they have chapters in all 50 states. And they work together with DFA (Democracy for America — Dean’s activist/grassroots organizing group).

They already have some successes. Just one example: Tucson city council gained two new progressive Democrats last Tuesday, recruited through PDA/DFA. This has tilted the balance of city council decidedly.

These two coalitions which are now working hand in hand have plenty of energy and drive. They are determined to take the party (and the country) back county by county, precinct by precinct.

Where I live, they’ve been having an influence on state party direction, as well. They tipped the scale in getting the state party to vote for Dean as chairman.

Why not work *within the party* to take back the party? It’s what the DLC pulled off way back when. We can kick the DLC out. We’ve got the energy and the passion.

Ah, the curse of the off-year dem party: puttering along, no direction in sight.

I used to do the “let’s energize the party” stuff. Nobody wanted to hear it. Well, my uncle, chairman of his county’s Dem party, just loved it when I’d live close enough to him to volunteer some time for him. Other places? Eh.

Outside of election time, the Dem party (at least here in TX) is the province of what I liked to call the “blue-haired ladies.”

They’re sweet dears, they keep everything in the party together until it’s election time again. But they’re not interested in doing any of the forward-thinking campaign strategies like scoping out what a change in demographics means for individual precincts, etc. It seems more like an excuse for them to get together to gossip and talk politics. But no do. Lots of no do. Months of it.

It’s really frustrating. So I quit going.

marky,
I’ve always thought of Ramirez as a good sketch artist but not much of a cartoonist, drawing heavily as he does from Paul Conrad in style, if not in substance, and illustrating as he does, the latest wingnut talking points put forth by the likes of Goldberg.

Alright, just once, while John Kerry was campaign stumping, I would have liked to hear him say, “George Bush? Listen, while that little fucker was doing his little candy-ass handstands and cartwheels at the Yale football game, I was leading a platoon of men in the fucking hell-hole of Viet Nam! This is resolute? This is brave? This is a fucking leader of men? Swift Boat Fucking Veterans For Truth, my ass!!!”

Ok, so he never said it. But one can dream, can’t one?

And you *know* Kerry thought it.

.

Newsweek: “President George W. Bush is sinking deeper and deeper into political trouble, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. Only 36 percent of Americans approve of the job he is doing as president…”

Me: “This is like watching a limbo dancer. How low can you go?”

Well… Nixon got down to 24% approval before finally resigning.

I figure Geroge can get down to 17% before bowing out. He’s not real quick on the uptake.

Plus, George has got that nasty competitive streak from his uh… cheerleading days.

Don’t laugh.

Just because other men were fighting, suffering, and dying in Viet Nam while George was cheerleading the football team doesn’t make him any less macho.

Back in the day, George could do a mean-ass cartwheel. And if you think doing a full down-to-the-ground horizontal leg split isn’t manly, well, then you just don’t know the meaning of a torn groin ligament.

That’s the kind of pain, the suffering for the cause, that prepares one for the trials and tribulations of being Commandee-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the USA.

.

Went to the local dem club meeting today. They are definately not in election mode yet. Ex dem congressman speaker was entertaining enough-but nothing that was forward looking.

Did ask a question about 06- speaker said that chances for the house were better than for the senate- but the redistricting had limited the number of competitive races- that’s about the opinion that I went in with.

Dems need a net gain of 16 seats to take over the house- tough if there are only 35 competive races- they’d need to win 26 of the 35 and hold everything else- that’s a tall order.

Of course recent developments may bring more districts into play. If there are 60 of em- dems would only need to win 38 out of 60.

Anyone seen anyone take on this question seriously yet? We need for Clusterfuck to stay way down in the polls and for the “culture of corruption” to continue to sap strength from goopers nationwide.

Then we need an A team of challengers for the contested races where goopers are exposed.

Hope someone’s doing something nationally.

Me: I like that Newsweek quote except for this bit:

the 43rd president of the United States, a leader who rode comfortably to reelection just a year ago.

There are still quite a few of us who don’t believe he was “reelected” at all. First of all, he wasn’t elected the first time. Secondly, I don’t believe he was elected the second time. Something not very kosher happened at 12:38 AM EST, when the numbers suddenly flipped.

I remember seeing polls, just a month out from Black Tuesday November 2, that already showed the truth. Pundits proclaimed surprise that the “honeymoon was already over.” More like a shotgun wedding. There was no honeymoon to begin with.

“President Bush was furious with the staff preparation for last week’s inter-American summit in Argentina where his trade proposals ran into unexpected opposition.

Probably because he only brought one ton of aides with him.

His party of 2,000 were unprepared. Who knew the levees wouldn’t hold?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10…../newsweek/
The latest NEWSWEEK poll shows serious political trouble for President Bush.

This is like watching a limbo dancer. How low can you go? I was correct that a Bush attack strategy would cost him in the polls… And the speech was just yesterday.

President George W. Bush is sinking deeper and deeper into political trouble, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. Only 36 percent of Americans approve of the job he is doing as president, and an astounding 68 percent of Americans are dissatisfied with the direction of the country—the highest in Bush’s presidency. But that’s not the worst of it for the 43rd president of the United States, a leader who rode comfortably to reelection just a year ago. Half of all Americans now believe he’s not “honest and ethical.”

The battleship BushCo settles deeper into the water and begins to list heavily. The capitan orders the engines at full speed ahead despite the 5 torp holes arrayed along the keel line…

Wilson46201: “If you dont want to support the lifestyle which Jonah will be getting accustomed to…”

What life is that, Dos Equis and Kettle Chips every night? It looks like he’s already accustomed to that life.

.

That business of peering out of the dark inside of a parked vehicle does fairly scream “pervert,” doesn’t it?

I mean, really, it’s the kind of thing that makes you want to get down on your knees and thank the holy blessed Lord that you’re a Democrat — even if you don’t believe in God.

.

You know, I keep looking at that photograph, and all I can think is:

“Just remember, George, this man is on *your* side.”

And the LA Times will remain a highly absorbent cat box liner.

somehow, with the doughy pantload in there, I think you should carefully check your shoes very carefully before donning them

Arianna: “The presentation ended with Ajami praising Chalabi again and comparing him to Scheherazade…”

And then Chalsbi did The Dance of the Seven Veils. And my eyeballs melted. The horror! It was unspeakable…

.

What is that picture about? Is that what happens when you let these basement dwellers out in sunlight?

I bet Lucianne still nurses him at her shrivelled breast every night before she tucks him in.

Hmmmm…

Maybe the insurgency recruits in ads with the motto:

“An Insurgency of One!”

JohnGabriel –

I just read your Chalabi quote to Mr. K8. His response was to the point:

“Then, gee, I wonder why they call it an ‘insurgency’”?

Ugh!

We are shortly to have dinner, and I jump online to gaze at the bitch-whipped, pimply afterbirth of Lucianne?

How revolting!

Think pretty thoughts. . . think pretty thoughts. . .

Pretty thought: we are not opera buffs at all, but today we saw the Kennedy Center’s production of Porgy and Bess.

Beautiful. Made me cry. There, I said it.

Now, on to the really good news of the day: thank God Wolcott posted again. Where the hell has he been lately? Times like these require his verbal scalpel with every day that passes.

Chalabi (via Arianna): “There is no communal strife in Iraq. Only individual acts of violence.”

(Stunned pause.)

Ok, I give up. There’s just nothing snarky I can do with this one. The inherent contradictions are just too mind boggling — like the title of that film, “Final Destination 2″.

.

To be contrarian, if I hadn’t read that they were canning Scheer, I’d hardly have noticed that he was gone. Somewhere along the line he reached the point where he was merely mad about the same stuff I’m mad about, but without giving me any positive reason to read him, so I fell out of the habit.

Killing trees to print Jonah Goldberg is a sin, of course, but he’ll be even easier to ignore than Scheer had become.

Getting rid of the elephantine Michael Ramirez, on the other hand, is a true occasion for joy. Unlike bad columns, his heavy-handed cartoons couldn’t be ignored; they blare out from the page like Fox “News” turned up too high. It’s like being made to read Max Boot at gunpoint.

So, on balance, all to the good: Scheer a small loss, Goldberg a small waste – but knowing I won’t have to see Ramirez will brighten my whole morning.

Novakula: “President Bush was furious with the staff preparation for last week’s inter-American summit in Argentina where his trade proposals ran into unexpected opposition. The president was reported as particularly unhappy with the work by his National Security Council staff…”

Welcome to the club, Georgie. We’re particularly unhappy with your NSC staff, too.

.

JohnGabriel –

That’s what makes Jonah *so special* –
you get a two-fer: dumb as a rock, and low as a worm.

Jonah Goldberg is Lucianne Golberg’s son?

Ok, you’ve convinced me, he just might be stupider than John Tierney.

I guess it explains the weight problem too.

.

Mrs. K8: “Jonah makes it [under the Tierney limbo bar]. He crawls on his belly.”

B-b-but… That’s cheating! You *can’t* crawl under the bar in limbo.

A right winger cheating! I’m shocked, I tell you, shocked…

.

Anyone seen Jesus* General?

http://patriotboy.blogspot.com/

Scroll down to the congress critter story too.

Check out Jurassicpork (sic)

http://jurassicpork.blogspot.c…..undup.html

Jeez

Hard to tell if Ashcroft is dumb or not- the wierdness is too thick to penetrate- with Jonah on the other hand- yeah he’s dumb.

It’s useful to recall that Jonah made his TV arrival during the Starr Jihad as the son of the odious Lucianne. Without a stained blue dress, Jonah would be selling ice-cream novelties from the back of a noisy neighborhood truck…

marky: “Goldberg is quite possibly the stupidest right wing columnist…”

Novakula: “Former Attorney General John Ashcroft, a conservative Republican, has retained the prominent Washington book lawyer Robert B. Barnett, who secured multimillion-dollar advances for memoirs by Bill and Hillary Clinton. A spokeswoman for Ashcroft said Barnett was hired in connection with an undisclosed book project.”

He’s not a columnist, but it looks like we might have a new entry in the contest for stupidest right-wing writer.

.

John G,
I think googling “Jonah Goldberg AND moron” will give you a good idea what I’m talking about.

Flash- Jonah’s columns to be printed in the “Comics” section.

That’s a pretty low bar to limbo under.

Jonah makes it. He crawls on his belly.

marky: “Goldberg is quite possibly the stupidest right wing columnist…”

Again, stupider than Tierney?

That’s a pretty low bar to limbo under.

The LA Times is a good paper in my opinion- and like all newspapers is having profit problems.

They do a lot of busniness in conservative areas- like Orange County- perhaps they want to show “balance” on the editorial page.

At least they picked a total shit head gooper.

Goldberg is quite possibly the stupidest right wing columnist… well, among the men anyway.. *snicker*

If you dont want to support the lifestyle which Jonah will be getting accustomed to, you can always read the LATimes online for free at http://www.latimes.com/ They occasionally have some good articles well worth reading. I check it daily…

Hmm. I’ve never read, or even heard of, Jonah Goldberg?

But can he possibly be as bad as John Tierney? Or as full of himself as David Brooks?

.

I don’t read the LAtimes very often, but my impression was that they did a lot of good reporting on national and international affairs these days. Also, this shouldn’t be taken as a move to the right; it’s a move to the large, doughy middle—after all, they got rid of the hard right Ramirez as well.
I really hate Ramirez’s politics, but I think he’s a first-rate cartoonist.

MoDo, from an interview in Newsweek:

“You don’t get to write about sex a lot with the Bush family…”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9972517/site/newsweek/

(Apologies if someone has already pointed ot this interview.)

.

DB cancelled LA Times yesterday morning. Tried to make it clear to them that this move, although enough by itself to make me cancel, was really just the last straw.

What a bunch of bottomfeeding dolts are running that paper.

Los Angeles deserves better.

As an LA Times subscriber- I was very depressed at this announcement. Trouble is- the alternative- the San Diego Union- is worse- much worse- a gooper propoganda vehicle.

Another newspaper I won’t have to bother with….I’ll stick with FDL Daily News.

“may you have the body” of jonah.. ACK! The title combined with the picture made me retch—really.
What a nauseous quasi-human piece of intellectual roadkill.

Really unthefuckbelievable.

I guess the LATimes honchos have been jealous of all the attention their competition, the NYT’s management, had gotten for its serious genuflection to hackdom.

Since young Jonah is shirking his duty to serve in the military since he so vociferously supports his Preznit’s War on Terra, perhaps the LATimes could sorta compromise and let him write his column in the Green Zone in Baghdad? He could sorta see all the guts and glory he has been missing…