You wonder whether the next act in all this will be a massive march on DC to try to intimidate the Congress.

If you are so afraid of your constituents you cannot find the courage to tell them they are wrong, aren’t you in the wrong party?

It’s happening by design and ignoring it will not make it go away.

by proposing things similar to medicare is going to cause citizens to start a revolution, in the same that

Is the word state missing in the second line of the quote?

Silence is an endorsement.

Yay, Sunny! Ya beat me to it.

Thanks for this, Attaturk.
Good morning, Pups!

FunnyWheelieDiva

What’s The Matter With Iowa?

Yeah, thanks for catching that.

Meanwhile, on Glenn Beck’s self-proclaimed, “Most Important Show EVAH!” he manages to make his big point.

Obama is an “OLIGARH”.

Yes, he had all day, all week, his whole life to make this show the most important show ever, and he only proves that not only is he nuts, he cannot spell either.

He’s the King of the Morans.

And we we “cowards and traitors” when, after serving in their fucking war, we came home and tried to stop it by telling the truth.

If we hadn’t been gifted with the word moran, we’d a had to invent it :-)

Good morning, pups. It’s Bobo and Krugman today. Bobo, in “The Great Gradualist,” says Ted Kennedy’s ability to forge compromises and champion incremental change created the legacy everybody is celebrating today. Prof. Krugman, in “Till Debt Does Its Part,” says the budget projections showing a deficit of $9 trillion over the next decade are worrying, but the real concern is how the nation’s politicians deal with the debt.

Here they are.

The coffee and tea are ready, the cool drinks are in the fridge, and I’ve got waffles with fresh berries. Other than noting that it’s Friday, which is a good thing, I’ve got nothing. Have a great day.

Wondering how military expenses are projected for the budget.

There is also a piece on Rusty Calley there today

Mr. Calley endures as a classic scapegoat. He was sentenced to life in prison. But as the nation polarized and he was lionized in a jingoistic pop song, he was ordered transferred by President Richard Nixon to house arrest at a comfortable apartment. His sentence was eventually reduced, and he served three years. “I am very sorry,” Mr. Calley told the Kiwanis, stirring the ghosts of a horrific episode the nation dare not forget.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08…..ef=opinion

Good morning Attaturk and pups. Thanks for the post ‘turk.

Apparently we have the worst President ever! He rode a bicycle WITHOUT A HELMET. The HORROR. This from the hysterical, frothing at the mouth freedom crowd. Un-fucking-believable.

You know, I think the old people disappoint me the most. Just like the freak in this video, that generation had so many more advantages than any other group did — esp. the 20-somethings of today. I am disgusted with the mindset of those like Tom Brokaw with his rag “The Greatest Generation.” Was that a good generation? In some ways, yes. BUT if anyone under 60 (today) were transported back to 1950, they would be shocked. Yes, all we hear about is how they didn’t have teevees or PCs, or Ipods, etc. Hey folks! That is just popularities and technology. You don’t miss what you never dreamed of! Believe it or not, when you are 60 years old, your grandkids will marvel at how it was like in 2009 and think. “How did they LIVE without (fill in the blank)?”

But those who came out of WWII got practically free college degrees. I know, because I saw them. And even my in-laws, who were in WWII and never went to college, got a good wage. In fact, I think they never finished high school. Yet, they raised 4 children and owned a car and house, and didn’t have wealthy parents. Compare that to today — how many 20-somethings can have 4 children, a stay-at-home wife, and buy a house and car? Oh yeah, and take vacations, too?

But look at this freak (in the video)! He will go to DC with his gun if someone will go with him? “Waaaaaa! I am tough, but someone hold my hand!” Sissy! And he shows no shame in speaking his cowardice in public — and people clap for him!

I’ll be 60 in November.

All we have to do is tie the tin an of razy to these lowns.

I am 56. I was born in 1953 and don’t remember life without teevee. But I DO remember life without tons of things!

The way they GG set up their own entitlements and then spent the rest of their lives bitching and moaning about other people’s has always pissed me off.

I just turned 65, lived without airconditioning and tv and turned the crank to wring out clothes over the washer.

But I do not think medicare is socialist, I think the humane won the election and as usual the wingnuts are mad. In fact, they’ve always been mad.

Your examples are on the money. We had no AC for years, but it wasn’t out of the ordinary. Neither was having a wringer washing machine with no clothes dryer. It is all put in context — it’s not as if you have such a washer and no drier TODAY. Back then, it was no big deal.

Like I tell my kids: By the time YOUR kids are grown, they will be marveling that when you were young, people actually died of cancer — all cancer wasn’t eliminated with a vaccination, much the same as polio was when I was a kid.

The people who live in a culture of distrust of government and a pride in independence are voting against their own interests. Who do they think is going to rescue them from unemployment and a disappearing economy? Who do they think has the power to create jobs for everyone to restore a sense of dignity to them which has been stripped away by a predatory economy? Their churches down on the corners of their streets cannot do this.They cannot all join the army to get a job. How do they propose we give everyone health care when many, many people are losing their jobs, homes, and even their families? We can’t all fit into tents in the Walmart parking lots!

Morning all, This week we lost the Lion of the senate and got left with Charles Grassley, the Worm of the senate.

Ah, the problem with your questions is they start with: “Who do they THINK?” That’s the problem. They don’t THINK. Even an inch deep. I wonder what is in their minds. How can they raise a family? Drive a car? Hold a job? Even cross the street? They obviously never use their brains.

These are the same arguments put forth by the American Liberty League who opposed FDR’s policies, which addressed the needs of the nation’s governed. FDR was accused of fascism because the policies represented a perceived threat, to their way of doing business, until Pearl Harbor, where billions where made on a war time economy. Today the for profit insurers and tax exempt public charity insurers perceive a threat to their way of doing business, which is to practice a form of legalized discrimination, to deny individuals treatments, drop coverage to protect profit.

Economic servitude to corporations leveraged by the color of law is the enemy from within. It is the same enemy the colonist fought, in the form of a corrupt King and his corporate cohorts in colonial crime who raped the colonist for the profit of a King, now replaced by corporate monopolies who will do everything to protect their status quo interests and profit.

Gutless loser cowards do not think. Brown-shirts where gutless loser cowards who drank the brain numbing Kool-Aid offered by a true dysfunctional fascist psychopath and terrorist. That is what these people remind me of, brownshirts who have been brainwashed and manipulated to think in a manner which is not in their self-interest, instead blaming scapegoats……………

And Joe Lieberman, the prion of the Democratic Party.

Crowding 64 here. No air conditioning when I grew up, and mother wouldn’t have a TV in the house. Somehow I managed to survive.

OT. I guess Ralph Nader was sorta right.
He was just eight years too early:

The Obama administration will largely preserve Bush-era procedures allowing the government to search — without suspicion of wrongdoing — the contents of a traveler’s laptop computer, cellphone or other electronic device, although officials said new policies would expand oversight of such inspections.

the prion of the Democratic Party

Snerk! Love it!

Worms serve an extremely useful purpose. Grassley’s the slime mold of the Senate.

Yes, but my point was: would you survive TODAY if your home had no TV (and you had children)? Or lived in a hot area and had no AC?

Me? When I was very young, in the 1950s, we had no AC, no washing machine, no PCs, no cable, not even any microwave. We were so deprived, we didn’t even eat TV dinners. Weren’t we primitive?

No kidding. Is there a person in the world that complains and whines more than a Repub or “conservative?” As is one of their most favorite tactics, they project that claim onto Liberals though.

Hypocrisy is so ingrained in their psyches. It’s just who they are now.

I really didn’t feel deprived playing sports or reading.

In a word, yes. The garden always needs weeding, and there are a few books that I still haven’t read. It would be a bit of a nuisance to take the laundry to the laudromat, but seeing as I’ve only had my own washer and drier for about 4 years I can slip right back into that habit.

How about water from a nearby stream, no toilet just a hole dug in the ground for the next person after doing your business, no electricity, cooking on an open fire and transportation was one foot in front of the other. And that was how I spent the first 8 years of my life in rural Ireland.

I laugh at people complaining at a lack of modern goodies.

And Joe Lieberman, the prion of the Democratic Party.

Sweet. He sure is twisted and refuses to return to the fold.

I’m 66 and I remember no TV, no air conditioning, a wringer washer, etc. And Fibber McGee & Molly, and The Great Gildersleeve on the radio!

I also chuckle when I remember that my son, now 43, discovered that vegetables “come fresh.” When we got a microwave, during his middle school years, I cooked a lot more fresh veggies in it instead of buying frozen. So suddenly vegetables didn’t come in boxes and cans anymore.

“the Worm of the senate”
You are too kind !
maggot or cockroach me thinks

Cherchez l’argent
The United States spends 6% more of it’s GNP on health care than Canada.
That is a hell of a lot of money.

The recipients of that 6% will spend as much as it takes to preserve their interests.
http://www.thestar.com/comment…..cle/683089
And the expenses is growing
http://www.nchc.org/facts/cost.shtml

America today is the result of a trajectory began about 100 years ago when business discovered that they could manufacture consent and mold public opinion and behavior essentially in the interest of “profit”. To capture the minds of Americans they had to essentially get Ameicans to abandon facts and critical thinking skills and replace them with desires with aligned with the leaders of society.

They drove consumerism, and ideas like patriotism use fear and enabling the rise of the national security state. They were so successful and dumbing down America they realized that they had to control the message so completely that they needed to own all the channels of information and purchased the media, and suppressed any movement which struggled against the oppression that consumerism and wage slavery represented.

Religion was exploited to use its power of unquestioning by the parishioners of their pastors to poison the minds of Americans further and insinuate this as a force in democracy and government.

Most Americans are now clueless about history, science, government, and civics and have their heads filled with garbage. The leaders of industry have controlled the message so completely that they were able to take over the government, having their sheep vote against their own interests without even knowing it. Those who weren’t dumbed down were bought out using the belief that wealth and money is power and that’s good. We know have legalized bribery which is called lobbying.

Black is white, up is down.

Trying to use logic and reason with MOST Americans is like having a conversation with a dining table.

http://video.google.com/videop…..3825999151

The GG would be any other generation if not for WW II
I wonder how many would survive in our current economy ,at least they had jobs to come back to. Not so for our present day returning vets , the GG screwed that that up for them.
They may have fought in WWII (and I thank them for that) but it is their generation that created the system we live in now

My son who is 42 today, spent a good part of his summers on the farm. Learned well where food comes from.

I’ve been having success recently using a line of argument on Repubs/Libertarians.

Every time I ask one, they agree that the 1950s and 1960s were America’s golden years economically, where America became the world’s “superpower” and when the “greatest generation” held the reins of society.

Then I inform them of a troublesome fact for their entire way of looking at the world – taxes were never higher during those years, and the top tax rate through 12 of those years was over 90%. 90%! And that meant on incomes $400,000 and above.

http://www.truthandpolitics.org/top-rates.php

That chart is interesting since it shows over the last 100 years, every single challenging economic time we’ve had is preceded by a sustained period of tax cuts. Every single gaddamned time. The biggest cut in taxes came in the 1920s, and lo and behold, that led up to the biggest collapse of the system ever.

Their argument that taxes are crippling America is simply false. It is not reality-based. And whenever I show this to them, they become babbling fools.

I’m a radical Liberal who started my own business with the plan of ending up in the top tax bracket. I want to pay the highest tax rate (90% seems too high though) and am working my tail off to get there. I realize we’re all in this boat together, and paying a little more is necessary to keep it afloat. It is the only way the system will work, otherwise we’d have to scrap the whole and start over (which is what Libertarians say, although I think they just realize they can’t win this argument and say that as a cop-out).

To try to make them feel a little better after being embarrassed, I then add, but it’s important to have “conservatives” around to push for spending controls (which is important of course)…you know, checks and balances and all that. I know I’ve made several so far question their entire political identity. One admitted to me recently he voted for Obama. I was shocked!

Gotta keep that pendulum swinging!

The freepers do not want to be left out of the corporate sponsored counter revolution. They must wave their freak racist flag high. There is a photo of the President with the caption “not too dark, bitter, not much of a head” referring to Obama. Obama is certainly neither bitter nor stupid, although the same cannot be said of these wingnuts.

They also need to threaten the liberals with a little violence.

The only time I want a Republican reaching across the aisle is to smack a liberal.

I am sooooo scared.

My family does that sometimes for a few days by choice, but to have a baby and live that way, yes, it’s hard to imagine.

Although, when we camp that way, even the little kids don’t seem to want to stop and you sort of “get in a groove,” so I can see how people can adapt to it. But yes, we do just pack up everything (including packaged food brought along), and walk a little way back to the car and drive home, so we’re not really experiencing what you describe. That’s impressive.

The GG wasn’t.

They were materialistic and primarily concerned with their own comfort.

They have been lionized for profit and the elevation of certain pundits.

They slept through critical changes.

Yet, what are we, as a generational group, we cohorts, what are we doing, now, that is different from what that particular “they” did?

We have long been accused of being self-centered.

Some of us have made a journey of discovery, but the vast majority of those of a certain age, have perpetrated the racism, know-nothing-ism and materialism which in our salad days we, some of us, protested and stood against.

And then. Our “portfolios” became us and we joined in the great snooze.

How many of us were “weekend” warriors who morphed into the very people we had once challenged?

As shell asks, how many of us could forgo the comforts to which we have been accustomed and to which we feel entitled?

How many of us shirk from confronting the ignorance we decry, preferring the safety of sitting behind our computers?

I say this once again (and many more times, I am certain) “it” is not about “them”, whoever “they” are, it is about us and what we dare and choose to DO.

DW

Isn’t that the truth? They benefited from the huge increase in the values of their homes, the capping of their taxes and all the other perks that they awarded themselves. But as you point out, they begrudge anyone else anything. They certainly are the stingiest generation.

I’ll never forget when I met a guy who was a CO during Korea, until then I had never actually realized there were people like that in other wars. From the way they came down on our generation, I thought we must have been the first with any anti-war conscience.

Well said. Mornin’, DW.

just want to say i’ll be 61 this year and appreciate all of my fellow oldsters comments…and yeah the GG sort of did luck out with WW2 (but that sounds weird)and don’t forget their perpetuation of jim crow….

When the commenters posting here get so far afield of the subject matter in the article, and then expand and embelish on the sidetracks, they sound as looney as the cranks who are decried in the article. Why is it so hard to stay attuned to the current issue(s)?

You mean this march on Washington? http://912dc.org/

Let’s all go the the Tea Party on the 12th.

“You wonder whether the next act in all this will be a massive march on DC to try to intimidate the Congress.”

September 12 would be the obvious date for one.

I agree!

Another point to be added to bonkers#41 is that the foundation that the so called greatest generation was built upon were the now despised “socialism light” programs of FDR. These programs not only saved the country from economic peril, but were an important ingredient in unifying the country into a common purpose. All the republicans that wax poetically about that era, conveniently forget that the social identity of that generation was forged with a leftist hammer.
As usual, they love to take credit for something they fought tooth and nail against, after it has become successful.