Good day, friends. It’s taken quite a bit of effort to move all of the archives, er, furniture here to the new Blend Coffeehouse, but we’re open for business. Our reporting and commentary is here as it always has been for you all to debate and discuss, and you’ll occasionally encounter personal essays by the PHB team of baristas bringing you fresh Blend each day. There has always been a mix of the personal and political, and that will remain part of the banter here in the coffeehouse.

It is with great excitement that I welcome you to The Dissenter, a Firedoglake blog that will cover civil liberties and digital freedom issues. It will feature regular coverage of the torture scandal that continues to wear on and the ongoing US government war on WikiLeaks, along with coverage of the Orwellian expansion of the surveillance state, Internet privacy rights, the mass incarceration of people of color in this country and the current and historic repression of dissent.

FDL’s first “webinar” took place on Monday, April 26, at 8-9 pm EDT.

Marcy Wheeler moderated a panel that included Army Ret. Col Ann Wright and David House, friend of Bradley Manning.

Welcome to the Grand Deck Porch overlooking the Christy Hardin Smith Memorial Cove here at the Lake. Pull up a chair and settle in for some imaginative fun. May I offer you a brisk cup of Wicked Wolf Coffee? Perhaps a nice English Breakfast Tea? Of course there is Coke or Pepsi for the cola-holics (I myself am in recovery).

The Human Revolution — The Tree of Life.

John was also one of the world’s few living experts on 5th century B.C. Babylonian Astronomy. He held a Ph.D from Yale from the Philosophy of Science department, and he used to joke that he could just be making it all up and there was nobody alive who would know the difference.

The folks at Firedoglake asked me to send out a huge collective hug and THANK YOU to all of you who have contributed to FDL’s fundraiser. They met their original goal of $50,000 by June 30, and extended the fundraiser a couple more days to allow FDL’s supporters to contribute through this weekend.

You can still contribute to FDL and help us get to $60,000 this weekend by contributing here.

Those extra dollars will help FDL continue operating for a while and postpone the need for another fundraiser too soon. Because you know from other member-supported organizations (e.g., like your PBS stations), that they have to continue the torture until morale improves.

Earlier this year, Diesel, the clothing line, rolled out the most ridiculous ad campaign I’ve seen in a while: “Be Stupid.”  As if this country needed the reminder? Ever since proud “C” student George Bush was appointed President, the United States has been on an inexorable slide downward into imbecility, thanks in no small part [...]

We all know the ways in which individuals and groups are de-humanized by languages and name-calling and we are guilty of doing the same towards people and groups with whom we disagree. We de-humanize in order to marginalize yet the reality is that even for the folks with whom we disagree, we still have far more in common as humans than we do the differences, even though we concentrate on the differences.

Happy Holidays to all.

I want to thank you for your lively discussions and comments on our Book Salons. You are what makes the FDL Book Salon a must for many of authors now. And most of the authors comment on how much they enjoyed the quality of the discussions.