Professor Obama got his ass kicked and seems okay with it

President Obama held a press conference yesterday. He was his usual reasonable and conciliatory self. This on the day after he and his Party got an historic ass kicking by the Tea Party and Republicans.

He sounded like a Harvard law professor.

This Professor Obama stuff really needs to stop if he wants to avoid having a failed presidency. The American people, most anyway, don't like reasonable people. The reason they don't like reasonable people is that in order to deal with a reasonable person you must be reasonable in return and also you are required to think.

Americans, for the most part, are not reasonable. And more importantly most Americans do not like to think. Americans like to be told what to think. Why do you think Fox (cough) News, Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck are so popular. It's because they tell their followers what to think. They never leave it up to their followers to figure stuff out on their own.

Do you remember all of those Tea Party town hall meetings where Tea Party followers believed that the President's Health-Care Reform was going to include death panels? There were no death panels but those people believed that there were death panels because that's what the Republicans told them to believe.


Did you know that 58% of people who voted yesterday want the Health-Care Reform Bill to be repealed? It's true. Can you imagine people wanting the same old health-care system that we've had in this country? Sounds crazy but the Republicans told them what to think.

So now the President needs to tell Americans what to think. He needs to tell them the truth about Health-Care reform. He needs to tell them to support Health-Care reform. And that if they are against it they are against their own best interests.

He needs to tell them that Bush and the Republicans are responsible for the economic meltdown. If he continues to act like he was at the helm for the last 10 years then he's done.

He also needs to tell Americans that now that the Republicans run the House that absolutely nothing is going to get done in the next two years. And he needs to tell Americans that it will not be the fault of Democrats.

The President has two years to change his image. If he doesn't then yesterday's election results will be repeated in 2012. Obama has to stand up and fight. He has to let his opponents know that he is the President and he will lead this country.

A power vacuum exists in Washington and that's why the Tea Party/ Republicans were able to take control of the House. And that vacuum exists because the President is afraid to anger anyone. Yet all he's done is anger everyone. No one respects a wimp, no one. Not even other wimps. If the President wants to be successful then he needs to stand-up.

Dumbass Democrats, lying-ass Republicans

Well the Republicans are about to take over Congress after being out of power for just two years and after having been in power for eight of the last ten years. The economic disaster that this country is experiencing is without a doubt due to their economic policies.

Bush and the Republicans grew the government and increased government spending like never before and yet somehow the Republicans have apparently convinced a huge number of Americans that the economic meltdown is the fault of the Democrats.

That is partly due to most Americans being unable to think logically and partly due to the Democrats being brain dead.

If most Americans could think logically they'd be laughing like crazy at the lies Republicans are telling while voting the Republicans that are already in office out on the street. I mean how unbelievable is it that the Republicans are talking about the government being too big when they grew the government? And yet there are millions of Americans who are buying that nonsense hook, line and sinker.

And yes, the Democrats are brain dead. If they collectively had any sort of normal brain activity they would have been blaming the Republicans for the economy for the last two years. Every time a Democrat spoke they should have mentioned George Bush and his deficit.

But they didn't do that. They just sat around patting themselves on the back because they won control of Congress and the Senate.

Wall Street is going to throw a party on Wednesday

The Republicans are going to be a disaster once they take over. They are going to reward the rich for being rich with tax breaks and all sorts of goodies. Meanwhile they will cut all sorts of programs that help middle-class and poor Americans.

So, buckle-up folks we're about to fly through some serious turbulence. Unless of course you happen to be rich.

Barack are you listening?

"Despite Fenty's defiance, his advisers were concerned about the anger toward the mayor that simmered in black neighborhoods." Washington Post


Washington D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty lost the Mayoral Democratic primary recently. His loss can be attributed to a lot of things but one that caught my eye was Fenty's disconnect from his African American constituents. Many African Americans, who supported the soon to be former mayor in the past, voted against him.

According to many Fenty seemed tone-deaf when it came to hearing the concerns of African American constituents. This seems, in my opinion, to mirror President Barack Obama's own tone-deafness to the voices of African Americans.

Could Fenty's loss be an omen of things to come in 2012 for Obama?

Obama says to Black voters: Do not ask what I can do for you, ask what you can do for me!

President Obama has been ignoring African American voters since the day he took office but no more. Now he's remembered that we exist. Why? Because it's time to get us out there to vote in the mid-term elections, that's why.

"Head to your beauty shops and your barber shops, and spread the word", the President told a group of African American voters in Philadelphia recently.

And we all know that the only places that African Americans hangout are beauty shops and barber shops, right.

Isn't it amazing that when Obama speaks in front of groups other than African Americans he tells them what he will do for them but every single time Obama speaks in front of an African American audience he is always asking us for something or worse, telling us to do something.

I learned long ago that people who are always asking for something from you but don't ever seem to be able to return the favor are just dead weight in your life. Barack Obama has become dead weight in the lives of African Americans.

During non-election times Obama is adept at ignoring or belittling the needs of African American voters. The President talks about unemployment to White voters but refuses to acknowledge the higher than the general population unemployment rates among some groups of African Americans.


Obama never seems to have anything for African American voters and yet he breaks his neck trying to assure White voters that he's keyed into their needs. The President never misses an opportunity to make promises to groups of White voters and never misses an opportunity to ignore African American voters concerns.

African Americans and in particular African American women have suffered disproportionately in the mortgage meltdown and yet it's Whites who have lost their homes that the President seems to focus on.

Remember Mrs. Velma Hart?

The President made sure that White farmers in Missouri got over a billion dollars in aid this past summer while Black farmers who are owed billions by the government didn't get a cent. In 2009 Obama took funding away from Historically Black Colleges and Universities and in 2010 gave it back. And I suppose we were supposed to ignore the fact that HBCU's gained nothing in all of that and are in fact still underfunded?

And when it comes to education policy for public schools Obama hired Arne Duncan who ran one of the worst public schools systems in America in Chicago and since Obama has done nothing but talk about firing teachers. And the teachers who he is ready to fire are mostly African American women who teach in failing inner city school systems.

And do I have to remind you of the list of Black people Obama has fired from his administration?

But forget all of that, it's election time and Obama needs us to get out to vote for those wonderful Democrats. According to polls quite a few incumbent Democrats will have a fight on their hands in November. And trust me if they didn't have a hard way to go to re-election Obama would not even be speaking to African American audiences. He's desperate and that's why he's coming calling.


Well many of us are desperate too. The unemployment rate in many Black communities is double the White unemployment rate. Many of our schools are failing. Many of our communities are ridden with crime and despair. Many of us are lacking basic health-care despite the Presidents fancy new health-care bill.

So it seems to me that when President Obama comes knocking on our collective door that we should treat him like the friend that is always asking for something but is never there when we need something.

Don't answer the door.

Jesse Jackson, Jr's Tiger Woods/ Harold Ford, Jr. moment

Jesse Jackson, Jr. and wife Sandi, who is on the Chicago City Council

Apparently a scandal has broken out in Chicago politics. Not the first time to be sure. This time the scandal involves one of the best known names in the Civil Rights movement, Jackson. Reverend Jesse Jackson's first born son Jesse Jackson, Jr.

Giovanna Huidobro

It seems that Jesse Jr. has had an extramarital affair. And what makes it worse to some people of Chicago is that said affair was Tiger Woods style with a blond waitress/ model named Giovanna Huidobro.

Harold Ford, Jr. and wife

In 2010 so-called interracial relationships are no big deal in general but in politics it's still the 1960's as far as how many view such relationships. Just ask another Junior, Harold Ford, Jr. His quest for the Senate in Tennessee was ruined, many say, by political ads which spoke of his penchant for blond White women. A lot of people thought those ads were just political dirty tricks southern style until Mr. Ford actually married a blond White woman. And that marriage seemingly ended Harold Ford, Jr's political career in Tennessee. He has now moved to New York and was considering making a run for office there.

Prior to this revelation of Mr. Jackson's affair he was pondering a run for Chicago mayor. He was also fending off allegations that he conspired to try to buy a seat in the Senate from the former Governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich.

So this affair, which Jesse Jackson, Jr. has admitted to is just another brick in the wall of problems facing him at the moment which threaten to derail his political career permanently.

But the underlying and more interesting question seems to be would this affair have rocked his political career had the woman been Black or at least of color? I think we all know that America is no where near post-racial. In fact in some ways it seems that we are regressing as a nation when it comes to matters of so-called race. So it's not really a surprise that the racial aspect of Jesse Jackson, Jr.'s affair is being talked about in Chicago.

Somebody is lying and that's the truth

"This summer the Obama White House promised Arkansas Democratic Sen. Blanche L. Lincoln that farmers in her state would receive $1.5 billion, ostensibly for disaster-relief aid. Cynics, however, say the money is a payoff to the farmers along with their relatives, friends and other Arkansans to get them to vote for Lincoln in November."

But "Obama says the black farmer settlement is a high priority for his administration."

So Black farmers who won a 1.25 billion dollar settlement against the USDA years ago can't get a freakin' dime but a bunch of White farmers in Arkansas get 1.5 billion without even asking for it?!

This summer the U.S. Senate twice blocked payment of the settlement to Black farmers. But in total the Senate has blocked payment to Black farmers seven times. But Obama says that paying Black farmers what they are owed is a high priority. Yeah right.

Somebody is lying.

Boycott Target, unless you want your money going to ultra-right-wing Republicans

This past July mega-retailer Target, based in Minnesota, donated $150,000 to a anti-gay, anti-worker Republican candidate for Minnesota governor Tom Emmer. So far at least 250,000 people have publicly joined a boycott of Target because of this political donation. As well there is a Facebook campaign to boycott Target.

Here are some of the positions Tom Emmer takes:

Authored a bill saying Minnesotans "had no constitutional right to abortion.

Defines marriage as "the union between one man and one woman

Would not require pharmacists to fill prescriptions for contraceptives

Wants to declare Minnesotans "sovereign individuals" and require a two-thirds majority in the state legislature to put federal laws into effect. (Last time someone tried something like this, we had a war.)

This past January the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against limiting political donations by corporations. So this Target donation is just the beginning. It's bad enough that we already live in a country where politicians are swayed more by corporate America than actual American citizens and now that Supreme Court ruling is just adding fuel to the fire.

Unless Americans push back against corporations making political donations then we are sealing our own political fate. A strong message must be sent and a good start is to boycott Target stores.

Baby Boomer paranoia and an Islamic Cultural center

Unless you have been camping in the Amazon for the last several weeks you've heard about the controversy surrounding a proposed cultural center and mosque near the site of what's called ground zero in New York City's lower Manhattan.

According to a poll I saw yesterday 63% of Americans think it's a bad idea to build an Islamic cultural center and mosque near ground zero. The news media is loving the controversy, they can't stop talking about it. And President Obama was so over come by the pandering instinct last Friday night that while speaking in front of a group of Muslims honoring Ramadan he said he supported building the cultural center. Of course the next day he denied supporting it.

So since so many people are in such an uproar over this I have to ask myself why this proposed Islamic center doesn't bother me in the least.

I'm an American. I was raised in the U.S. So shouldn't I be as closed minded as everyone else? Shouldn't I both hate and be frightened of anyone who is different from me? Shouldn't I feel insulted by this cultural centers close proximity to the place that 3,000 Americans were killed on September 11, 2001?

Maybe you as well are confused by your lack of righteous indignation about this. Maybe you too feel it's really no big deal.

So what makes some Americans so closed minded, hateful and fearful when others aren't? Does it have to do with age? Seems most of the people going nuts about this are so-called baby boomers. And baby boomers are notorious chickens. They are afraid of everything. Maybe it's because they grew up just after World War 2 and during the Cold War? Maybe it has to do with them thinking America as they knew it was coming to an end during the 60's?


What ever it is I'm really getting sick of baby boomers and their nonsense. It seems all they do is protest anything or anyone different from them. The Tea Party couldn't exist without baby boomers. Fox News would be out of business with out its baby boomer viewers. The Arizona anti-immigrant laws would never have been passed without baby boomers.

Note below the crazed baby boomer hyperbole from possible 2012 Republican Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich:

"And I think we ought to be honest about the fact that we have a right – and this happens all the time in America. You know, Nazis don't have the right to put up a sign next to the Holocaust Museum in Washington. We would never accept the Japanese putting up a site next to Pearl Harbor. There's no reason for us to accept a mosque next to the World Trade Center."

Now I understand that not every baby boomer is a crazed hater of everything. Some are totally rational people. But it's painfully obvious that baby boomers have more than their share of wackos that hate everything and everyone.


Which brings me back to the Islamic cultural center.

After writing this I realize that nothing is wrong with me. I just don't belong to a generation that is afraid of its own shadow. After all it's fear that is driving these protests against the cultural center. Fear masquerading as outrage.

Baby boomers are afraid of Muslims because they're different. And many of them are brown. And some of them have foreign accents when they speak. And because of that baby boomers see them as 'other'. And because they are other, they can be villains in this never ending melodrama performed by baby boomers over and over again. A melodrama of anger and fear.

The proposed Islamic Cultural center in lower Manhattan doesn't scare me. In fact after its built I'd like to visit it. I'm just not afraid of the stuff that a certain generation is afraid of.

I don't think baby boomers are going to change. I think they'll be riding off into the sunsets of their lives yelling and screaming and pointing fingers. So it's up to the rest of us to not let them destroy what America is supposed to be about. And that thing is hope. A hope that we Americans can turn corners when needed and do better. That we can overcome differences by realizing how much we all have in common.

America can survive an Islamic cultural center in Lower Manhattan just a few blocks from ground zero but I'm not sure we can survive the baby boomer generation.

Barack and Hillary's shotgun wedding in 2012?

Unless the economy turns around in a big way I think Barack Obama is going to have a very tough time being re-elected in 2012.

Even with all of the capitulating the President has done to try to win favor with White Americans in the middle of the country he's still not too popular with them. And all that capitulating has angered the most liberal groups in the Democratic party. And on top of that Obama has turned off at least a few percentage points of African American voters with his fear of racial issues or mishandling of them.

So how will Obama right his political ship in 2012?

Well there are more than a few people who are calling on him to or predicting that he will drop Vice-President what's-his-name and replace him with Hillary "I was shot at by snipers" Clinton as his running mate.

And those people do have a point that Clinton more than likely will bring with her lots of votes that Obama may have trouble getting without her. White women come to mind. And remember that Hillary won Texas and Ohio in the Democratic Primary. Both Texas and Ohio are going to be a battlefield in the general election in 2012 so having some help there wouldn't hurt Obama.

But would Hillary Clinton as a VP running mate hurt Obama as well? We all know that the Republicans love to hate Hilary. So they would have a field day. But, if their attention is on Hillary that might give Obama a break from all of the attacks. Plus since we all know that Obama will not defend himself on anything remotely racial it might help to have an attack dog like Hillary in the fold.

On the other hand more than a few African American voters were turned off by the Clintons during the last primary season. There was a lot of racial baiting coming from the Clintons. And I don't know if enough time has passed for those wounds to have healed.

I don't think anyone believes that Vice-President Biden has a chance in heck of winning the Presidency in 2016. So he'll be a liability to the Party if he remains on the ticket. Clinton would actually have a chance at winning the Presidency in 2016 so that is another plus in her column.

Oh and one more thing; Bill Clinton. He's kind of a wild card in this. He is a great fund-raiser and campaigner. But he can get out-of-pocket pretty quick. So he might be a problem in a long campaign season, as the 2012 campaign is likely to be.

And there may be another wild card in the 2012 Presidential election, that's New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. His candidacy might really hurt Obama. I know that I would consider voting for Bloomberg. I don't think he'd be afraid to address issues important to African Americans.

But Obama with Clinton might help him overcome a Bloomberg threat.

So, Obama/ Clinton in 2012? What do you think?

Something, something just ain't right

Maxine Waters

Maxine Waters and Charles Rangel have quite a bit in common these days. Both are members of the United States House of Representatives and have been for a long time. Rangel has been a member since 1971 and Waters since 1991. Both are Democrats and both are African American. Oh and one more thing, they are both under investigation for ethics violations.

Rangel who represents New York's 15th congressional district is under investigation for alleged improper fund raising and failing to report $600,000 in income, amongst other charges. Thirteen in total.

Charles Rangel

"The allegations include failure to report rental income from vacation property in the Dominican Republic and hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional income and assets on his financial disclosure statements.

Other charges focused on Rangel's use of congressional staff and stationery to raise money for a college center in New York named after him; accepting favors and benefits from the donors that may have influenced his congressional actions; use of a subsidized New York apartment as a campaign office instead of a residence; and misuse of the congressional free mail privilege." Yahoo News

Waters who represents California's 35th congressional district allegedly helped a friend of her husband get Federal bank bail-out money.

"Congressional sources confirmed late Friday that later this year Rep. Maxine Waters (D- Los Angeles) will face an ethics proceeding likely related to allegations that she sought to help a bank with ties to her husband receive federal bailout funds."- LA Times

First, I have no idea whether Waters or Rangel are guilty of these charges. Nor am I saying that they shouldn't be investigated. But it strikes me as odd that two African American members of the house are under investigation at the same time.

Now maybe at another time in our history these investigations wouldn't even be on my radar. But we all know that the Tea Party/ Republicans have been on a witch hunt since President Obama has been in the White House.

And it seems that all of the Tea Party/ Republican targets have been, you guessed it, African Americans. First there was Van Jones. Then ACORN. Then Desirée Rogers. Then Shirley Sherrod. And in all of those cases both the Obama administration and the Democrats ran like hell from the fight and threw them all to the wolves.

So in this political climate I'm wondering if the Tea Party/ Republicans have realized that if they attack African Americans that no one, not the Democrats nor the White House, will defend them. And if that is the case them maybe, just maybe, Waters and Rangel are just the African Americans who are next in-line.

As I said earlier, Waters and Rangel may indeed be guilty of these charges. But I think it's worth it to stop and think for a moment about the implications of two African American members of the house coming under investigation considering the current racial climate in American politics these days.

And it's also worth it to stop and wonder who is going to be the next Tea Party/ Republican target.

Or maybe I'm just being paranoid?

President Obama's Negrophobia

[Disclaimer: I am not a Barack Obama hater nor an Obama stan. I'm just calling it as I see it. Also I am not a Republican, which should be obvious from my commentary. Just wanted to fend off Obama stans who take offense at any criticism of the President, especially from an African American]


It's one thing when African Americans call Barack Obama out for his avoidance of everything Black, it's another when a White New York Times columnist calls him out.

"His closest advisers — some of the same ones who urged him not to make the race speech after the Rev. Jeremiah Wright issue exploded — are so terrified that Fox and the Tea Party will paint Obama as doing more for blacks that they tiptoe around and do less. “Who knew that the first black president would make it even harder on black people?” asked a top black Democratic official." - Maureen Dowd/ NY Times

The word is out and even the mainstream media knows that Barack Obama is loath to tackle any issue that involves African Americans and or race.

Obama does indeed fear what Tea Party folks and Fox News will think should he actually act as President for African Americans as well as everyone else. Obama and his people have made the political calculation that African Americans will continue to support him no matter what. And while many African Americans will undoubtedly support him even as he ignores and mistreats us, some of us are contemplating walking away. Or have already walked away.

For a long time many African Americans have known that the Democrats take the Black vote for granted. And we've been onto the good cop/ bad cop game that the Democrats and Republicans have been playing with us. But with the Republicans never fielding a Presidential candidate that most African Americans can feel comfortable voting for, we remain in a political quandary.

And now that we have a Black President in the White House one would have thought that we could finally reap some of the political benefits that supporters normally do when their candidate wins. No such luck. African Americans are persona non grata with the Obama Administration.



Whether it's the Congressional Black Caucus asking Obama to consider policies which might help African Americans who are suffering higher than average unemployment during this recession, to which Obama told of his belief in Trickle Down Economics, for African Americans. "A rising tide floats all boats", the President was quoted as saying. Or the Obama Admin not giving Shirley Sherrod an opportunity to explain her speech to them before summarily firing her. Many African Americans are feeling little love from the Obama Admin.

So even with a Black, Democratic President African Americans remain at the bottom of the political hierarchy. That is a shame. And worse we will have to suffer two more years of Obama's fear of addressing issues specific to African Americans.

Barack Obama ought to keep in mind an old Texas saying, "Dance with the one that brung you". No matter how much he genuflects before the Tea Party and Fox News, neither will work to get him re-elected.

Another African American woman run over by the Obama bus

Shirley Sherrod

Well, President Barack "I love firing Black people" Obama has done it again. This time he fired Shirley Sherrod, formally the United States Department of Agriculture's Georgia director of Rural Development. Apparently the right wing crazies played half a video of Ms. Sherrod speaking before the NAACP in which she was telling a story of racial tolerance and Obama, rushing to shine right wing shoes as always, fired Ms. Sherrod.

In the first part of said video Ms. Sherrod was telling of her initial reluctance to help a White farmer. This happened decades ago. Anyway, Ms. Sherrod in the unseen part of the video went on to recount how she not only helped the farmer but helped him save his farm. By the way, the farmer and his wife have come out in support of Ms. Sherrod.

The point of her story was that she realized that he was a poor farmer and that was what she should focus on, not that he was White.

But of course in Obama's zeal to fire another Black person he apparently only watched the video on Fox News. So he only saw the first half and fired Ms. Sherrod post-haste. And on top of that Obama is too much of a wimp to admit that he ordered the firing and the USDA Director is taking the fall.

Desirée Rogers

As you can tell I'm pretty angry with Obama but I'm not at all surprised. This isn't the first time Obama has tap danced for right wing crazies and fired a Black person. There was Van Jones, then Desirée Rogers and now Shirley Sherrod.

Van Jones

Maybe Michelle Obama should start packing. One day the right wingers are going to work Barack into such a tizzy that he's going to fire her.

Val's week in review

The British Parliament selected a Black woman, Rev Rose Hudson-Wilkin, as the new speaker's chaplain in the House of Commons, becoming the first black woman to hold the position. The House of Commons is Parliaments equivalent of Congress here in the U.S. Read more here



Kim Kardashian has apparently moved on from her brake-up with New Orleans Saints player Reggie Bush. She's now dating the Dallas Cowboy's Miles Austin. That's Miles above hiding behind Kim's big booty. I wonder if White guys resent Kim for only dating Black guys?

Gone fishing.

Today about 1.5 million unemployed Americans will have their unemployment benefits end. Congress passed a bill to extend the benefits yesterday but the Senate did not. So what do you think the Senate is doing starting today? They are going on vacation of course. They'll be back in a two weeks.


Ashton Purvis, 18, this week won the Gatorade girls national track and field athlete of the year. The award honors athletic and academic excellence. Ashton this year had the best time in the nation among high school girls in the 200 meters, 22.90 seconds. She also won the 100 meters at the California scholastic federation state championships.

Ashton attended St. Elizabeth High School in Oakland, Ca. She beat out more than 457,000 high school girls track and field athletes nationwide for Wednesday’s award. Ashton who will attend the University of Miami is now a finalist for the Gatorade Female High School Athlete of the Year award, to be presented at a pre-ESPY Awards ceremony in Hollywood in two weeks.

Congratulations to Ashton. She should be very proud of herself. I have a feeling we will be hearing more about Ashton as the 2012 Summer Olympics in London approach.

400 meter World Champion Sanya Richards-Ross was out last week with an Achilles injury but says she may run in Eugene Saturday.

And speaking of track and field; if you are a track fan don't miss the PreClassic meet from Eugene, Oregon tomorrow, July 3, on NBC. Air time is 4:30 pm eastern/ 1:30 pm pacific.

Big Brother is you and me

In George Orwell's fictional book 1984 he tells a story about government watching the people. He uses the term, "Big Brother", which is a euphemism for government. In 1984 Big Brother, the government, is always watching. But it seems that Big Brother in modern times isn't government but the people who are watching each other.

We see dozens of news reports each month about crimes and other events being caught on cell phone cameras. And no one hesitates to turn the photos or video over to the government.

Isn't it amazing that government now has us working for it catching each other doing all sorts of things. We have been trained well haven't we.

G20 for regular folks?

President Obama and his British counterpart Prime Minister David Cameron toast the rich at G20

The G20 (Group of Twenty) or as I refer to it Gang of Twenty, summit going on in Toronto is basically a meeting where nations and huge financial institutions get together and try to figure how to make the rich richer and the poor poorer. Okay, that's not the official agenda but that's what really goes on.

Anyway, it seems to me that maybe the poor and working class people of the world need to organize a summit to counteract the G20 summit. Poor and working class people need to band together and form strategies to fend off the constant barrage of attacks from governments and private financial institutions.


Maybe if the poor and working class had such strategies we wouldn't have gotten caught up in the derivative/ mortgage crisis that sunk millions of poor and working class people around the world. We, the average people, can no longer afford to sit around naïvely thinking that our governments are actually going to look out for us. That fantasy ought to have been crushed when governments around the world bailed out bank after bank and yet sat and watched as average folk struggled and drowned in the economic whirlpool that was born on the Wall Streets of the world.

Hopefully by the next G20 summit working people will understand that rather than watching worthless anarchist protests at these summits that we need to band together and have our own summit.

McChrystal's job is safe

When a couple of goofballs invaded the White House last fall the President didn't have any problem deciding to make former White House social secretary Desirée Rogers the scapegoat. Even though Desirée wasn't responsible for White House security. That would be the Secret Service. And Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan still has his job.

Desirée Rogers

Now General Stanley A. McChrystal and his team have made some very critical statements in Rolling Stone Magazine about not only Vice President Biden and Senators Kerry and McCain but also a member of McChrystal's team said McChrystal thought President Obama was unprepared and intimidated by him during their first meeting together. Pretty bad stuff for a sitting General to say, right.

So if anyone on McChrystal's team is a Black woman she'd better watch out because we all know the President isn't going to fire McChrystal.

Update: It appears that I was wrong. Obama, according to news reports has fired McChrystal. The reports also say that General David Petraeus is going to take his place. Good for President Obama.

H/T to ?

And this is dedicated to everyone at the Environmental Protection Agency

After 9/11 the EPA told emergency workers and others at the World Trade Center that the air quality was good. The EPA said their was nothing to worry about for emergency services personal and others working at the site.

Fast forward to a few years after 9/11 and dozens of people who spent time at the World Trade Center site began to become ill with all sorts of respiratory illnesses. Oops, the EPA lied. But no biggie for EPA because the individuals who worked for EPA during that time are either long gone or insulated as they work for a government agency. The poor folks who believed EPA are left to die or be sick and have had to go to court to try to gain compensation. And we all know how that goes.

So now we have the disaster in the Gulf and the EPA is at it again. This time they're lying saying that the air quality in and around the oil spill in the Gulf is safe. This despite the fact that a few dozen people have already fallen ill while working in the area. Some have even had to be hospitalized.

But, the EPA says the air quality is safe. They say that there are no unhealthy levels of benzene, which comes from the oil, or Corexit, a oil dispersant, in or around the Gulf.

And when people around the Gulf begin to suffer the long term effects of exposure to benzene, which is a known carcinogen, or Corexit, BP will be long gone. The only recourse anyone will have will be to sue British Petroleum. Oh, did I mention that Alaskans who sued Exxon back in 1989 after the Valdez spill are still in court.

Lisa Jackson

Shame on you EPA head Lisa Jackson, I really expected better from you. These lies are going to be your legacy. Just as the lies told by the former EPA head Christie Todd Whitman after 9/11 are her legacy.

The Gulf Coast spill isn't BP's first major U.S. oil spill so why is the media not mentioning their previous spill?

The Prudhoe Bay oil field spill on Alaska's North Slope is seen on Monday, March 13, 2006. Cleaning up the spill estimated at up to 267,000 gallons in the Prudhoe Bay oil field has been slow going because workers are having to take frequent breaks to protect themselves against extreme conditions. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)


From CommonDreams.org Origionally Published on Tuesday, March 21, 2006 by the Independent / UK

Across the frozen North Slope of Alaska, the region's largest oil accident on record has been sending hundreds of thousands of litres of crude pouring into the Arctic Ocean during the past week after a badly corroded BPO pipeline ruptured.

The publicity caused by the leak in the the 30-year-old pipeline could seriously damage BP's image, which has been carefully crafted to show it as a company concerned about the environment.


I think it's really strange that no major news organization has mentioned the 2006 British Petroleum oil spill in Alaska. The mainstream media is falling all over themselves covering the current spill off the gulf coast but ignoring that this spill is history repeating itself. The spill in Alaska occurred because of poor maintenance on the pipeline. The spill in the gulf seems to have occurred because the best available technology to prevent blowouts of drilling wells was not used. So it seems that BP has a history of being lax on preventing oil spills.

Even at the congessional hearing in Washington yesterday to determine who is most responsible for the spill no one mentioned the previous spill.

So what's really going on?

I hate to say I told you so but...

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post about my being absolutely sure that President Obama was not going to nominate an African American woman to the Supreme Court. And I was right. Yesterday Obama nominated former Harvard Law School dean and current Solicitor General of the United States Elena Kagan. Anyway, I'm not disappointed as I don't expect Obama to show any love to his most loyal constituents. And if another Supreme Court Justice steps down I'm pretty sure Obama would nominate a judge from the planet Mars before he'd nominate a Black woman. I'm just calling it as I see it.

Can America be saved from Plutocracy?

"Plutocracy is rule by the wealthy, or power provided by wealth. The combination of both plutocracy and oligarchy is called plutarchy.

In a plutocracy, the degree of economic inequality is high while the level of social mobility is low. This can apply to a multitude of government systems, as the key elements of plutocracy transcend and often occur concurrently with the features of those systems." - Wikipedia

What amazes me is that so many middle-class Americans have been duped into supporting American plutocracy. Namely the Tea Party folks, who have become the 'peasants for plutocracy'. But with the Tea Partiers I think their rabid racism is blinding them to what they are really supporting. The illustration above is a perfect picture of how idiotic the Tea Party movement really is.