IS BASEBALL REALLY DYING A SLOW DEATH, OR ARE THE DODGERS ONTO SOMETHING BY RESTRICTING TELEVISION VIERWSHIP TO ABOUT 30,000 IN A CITY OF MILLIONS?

New radio

    The lack of televised Dodger games has forced me to listen to them on the radio.  And on AM.  It has been a long, long time since I had no other media with which to watch the team.

    The standoff between Time Warner Cable and every other television program provider only just hit me this year, when I moved into a house that has Direct TV.  My last 20 years of residency was within a two mile radius, of which, Time Warner (and its earlier iterations) was the primary cable provider.  As such, when SportsNet LA became a channel, I paid little attention to the fact that it was “exclusive.”  It was just a different channel on which I watched the Dodger games the past 20 years.

    At first, I panicked!  How was I going to survive my nightly ritual!  How was I going to handle not seeing Puig, or Gonzales for that matter, hit them out of the park?  What about guessing who is sitting in the first row?  Ok, that’s a throw away! 

    I thought that if I purchased the MLB package, I could at least see the Dodgers, but at a hefty price.  I figured I could watch them on my tablet, or better yet, on the TV.  But, that option was not available I soon found out.  Direct TV had a free preview of MLB games on opening day, and the week thereafter.  However, the Dodger game was blacked out.  Serious frustration began to set in.  (I have already read about people who have bypassed the MLB restrictions, but I have not made up my mind if I will utilize this approach).

    I tried to see if I could stream the AM radio station, but again, the dreaded black out notice.  I had to finally dig up this tiny Sony portable AM/FM radio, circa the 1980's, plug my Bluetooth speaker in (obviously, no WiFi connect!) and locate the damn signal.  Once I was able to put that all together, I started listening to the games every day the team played.  Then the radio broke, and I had to wait a week before my new one came in the mail.

    What a difference listening to the game on the radio is. I love it.  I know enough about baseball that between Vin Scully and Rick Monday, their calling of the game is easy listening.  I find myself sitting out on the front porch with the bug candles lit (!!) and my radio on the window sill, spending the early evening with the game pictured in my mind. 

    I listened to the Dodger games when I was a youngster, teenager and young adult, on the radio.  I had my trusty transistor radio back then. Took it to the beach when I was laying out for a tan.  I lived two blocks away from the beach, so this was a regular past time for me.  I was listening to the game on the radio in 1968 when Drysdale pitched his 58 perfect innings.  Ironically, I was listening to the game on the radio in 1988 when Hershiser broke that record with 59!

Old school transister

    I really don’t understand the Dodgers' apparent unconcern about the lack of television exposure that is going on its second year, in the Los Angeles community, as expressed by Magic Johnson recently. Baseball is, in many ways, a dying game. It has been pointed out many times that the mean age of the baseball fan is now in the 50's. The game is slow and methodical; it is not fast paced like hockey or basketball. Having a 55,000 per game attendance is certainly sustainable for a while, but bringing in the younger new fans will be a stretch without television.

The Union Made Me Do It - The Story Of Hostess (NOT)

The "unions" were responsible!

That is the story the Republicans are telling, and they are sticking with it, the truth be damned.

And if you get your daily news updates from the "fair and balanced" Fox News, you will not know the truth of why Hostess is firing the 18,000+ workforce and closing shop.

This is the second time Hostess has looked to bankruptcy protection from creditors.  The first time around, the workers (unionized) agreed to concessions by a reduction in pay, as well as a reduction in the work force.  But, the problem really lay in the fact that "hedge fund managers" had gotten involved with the company, and Hostess was basically "Bained" by vulture capitalists. 

What prompted the unionized employees to tell Hostess to go fuck themselves this time around was that while the company was trying to gut pensions and pay for the workers, the top four Hostess executives had given themselves pay raises of up to 80%!

So, for now, it will be the vulture capitalists (like a Bain Capital, and let us remember how much we learned during the presidential race, about how they work) who will be the only beneficiaries of a sell off of the assets of the company, as they fire the 18,000+ workforce.

Think about that the next time you watch Fox News and listen to them prattle on about how the employees of Hostess were "hosed" by the union, and realize why Fox News watchers are more stupid than the average person who does not watch news at all.

To read all there is to know on this, CNNMoney has a rather lengthy screed, well worth a read, especially if you traditionally get your scoops from Fox News.

UPDATE:  11/17/12 Courtesy Sacramento Bee

In a desperate attempt to break the solidarity and resolve of striking BCTGM members across the country, Hostess Brands is falsely claiming that its decision to close three of its bakeries -- St. Louis, Cincinnati and Seattle -- is the result of the nationwide strike against the company by BCTGM members.

[snip]

Over the past eight years since the first Hostess bankruptcy, BCTGM members have watched as money from previous concessions that was supposed to go towards capital investment, product development, plant improvement and new equipment, was squandered in executive bonuses, payouts to Wall Street investors and payments to high-priced attorneys and consultants.

BCTGM members are well aware that as the company was preparing to file for bankruptcy earlier this year, the then CEO of Hostess was awarded a 300 percent raise (from approximately $750,000 to $2,550,000) and at least nine other top executives of the company received massive pay raises. One such executive received a pay increase from $500,000 to $900,000 and another received one taking his salary from $375,000 to $656,256.

Over the past 15 months, Hostess workers have seen the company unilaterally end contractually-obligated payments to their pension plan.  Despite saving more than $160 million with this action, the company continues to fall deeper and deeper into debt.  A mountain of debt and gross mismanagement by a string of failed CEO's with no true experience in the wholesale baking business have left this company unable to compete or survive.

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/11/13/4983174/hostess-continues-pattern-of-misinformation.html#storylink=cpy#storylink=cpy

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/11/13/4983174/hostess-continues-pattern-of-misinformation.html#storylink=cpy#storylink=cpy

Good-bye America

I am ambivalent about politics of late. Somewhere between 2005, when I had started up my blog, and was very passionate about the slow take-over of our democracy by the “right wingers,” and today, where seven years of outright lying, a lackadaisical news media, and a misdirected and ill-informed public, I’ve given up. Literally. With the promises made by a presidential candidate in 2008, who won (in my mind) with overwhelming support, and the follow-up of consistent failure to keep those campaign promises, coupled with a very real embrace by said president of certain ideologies that are antiethcal to the very nature of our democracy (i.e., renditions, killing American citizens abroad without warrants, trials, and the like, deporting more people out of this country than Bush ever did, failure to properly and timely embrace the GLBT issues that he ran on, etc., and not to mention the very same reliance on the banking industry that his opponents also embrace) have molded me into a non-believer in today’s version of our democracy.

This is a fully corrupt nation, with zero regard for the 99% of those that make up this country, work hard, and have tried to believe in the greatness of America. Instead, we have countries disparaging America based on the hypocrisy of its ideology vs. the practice. We prop up dictators, deal with our enemies, and wage wars on innocent people and nations. We are trillions in debt and yet not a single legislator on any level of government is taking up the mantle and running with the torch for the American people.

I had a guy tell me yesterday at my local watering hole that it is the corporations like GE, the oil companies, and others, that “pay the majority of taxes” in this country. I literally almost fell off my bar stool. I told him he really must stop watching Fox news, stop reading the Wall Street Journal, and for goodness sake, turn off talk radio. You will not get the truth from such areas, and that is why you, my friend, are ill informed.

It is hard to stand for truth and justice when there are so many politicians that have jumped on the bandwagon of corrupt methods of gaining and maintaining their free ride in government. “Can I please have some more” is the cry of the populace with the answer from the politicians being “hell fucking no” even as they cash their social security checks, get their federally funded (or state mandated) insurance coverage that is denied to anyone not in politics, and tell the average worker to go fuck themselves. Hell, the thought that the 1% think it’s okay (for example, Scranton, PA) to cut police and firefighter’s pay to minimum wage ($7.25), even after a court ordered the mayor NOT to do that, is just to mind boggling for me. The 1% are clearly not aware that to live in today’s America, minimum wage just does not cut it. And to believe that the majority of Americans want to suck off the teat of the government (the only people the suck off the teat of government ARE the politicians) is preposterous. A decent wage, the ability to put a roof over you and your family’s head, and raise your children with a decent education, has now gone the way of a “dream” and is actually, according to many politicians, no longer a “right” for Americans. The only “rights” that these politicians believe in is their right to pillage and destroy the America I grew up in, and turn our government into a corporate owned subsidiary. One person, one vote? Got rid of that. Power to the people? Got rid of that. A decent working wage? Got rid of that. Home ownership for the average American? Got rid of that. Where a corporate executive can work one day, retire, and take home $44 million in severance, bonuses, etc. (think Duke Energy’s CEO Bill Johnson), while there are millions and millions of people (including many Iraq war veterans) who are literally homeless, on the streets, with no real income in sight, as well as the rampant starvation of our children, I get sick to my stomach. And to top it off, a great deal of this rhetoric is pumped up by the false assertion that these politicians and their supporters are merely following Christian (read “bible”) themes, which totally distort the reality of what “Jesus” actually preached (according to some relevant history that seems to be methodically erased from the propaganda of what current Christianity means to this country).

Many of our elected officials are boneheads and seriously stupid. Deranged and empowered by corporate fueled laws and rights that come hand-in-hand with corporate money, it is time for me to check out. The power of the people, or the lack of it at this point, will be demonstrable in the 2012 elections, when it becomes obvious that millions of people will be disenfranchised as voters, where gerrymandering has resulted in lopsided and illegal power grabs, and where many more millions like me will simply fail to show up to cast our worthless vote.

Good-bye America. I will dream of your resurgence in the future. I only hope I live long enough to see the second Revolution and the fight to regain the rights that constitutionally belong to the American people.

Just Who Owns The Media

A pretty interesting article with graphics about the clear consolidation of media of the world into the hands of some six major players. Think about that for a while. I grew up when breaking up monopolies was the thing to do (remember the "baby Bells" as the telephone industry monopoly was broken up in the 1970's?) It's obvious why this country remains stupid -- big media wants it that way.

I'll have another cup of reality tv, thank you. H/T to The Frugal Dad.

Source: Frugal dad

Interview By Sam Seder Of Professor Richard Wolf

This is only about half an hour, but it is absolutely worth listening to. H/T to AMERICAblog's Gaius Publius for providing the link.

The above podcast is from an interview by Sam Seder of Prof. Richard Wolf which basically walks the average person through the financial crisis in Europe, the austerity programs such as what is going on in Greece, why they don't and won't work, and comparisons with the United States and its proposed austerity solutions to the economic crisis here.

Basically, the point being made is that the problem in Europe and America lie within the rich that have the money, and the manner in which they have "lent" their money to the not rich, and how when the not rich find themselves in the position of not being able to pay back the rich, concoct methods and ways to continue to "loan" or "bail out" countries (or individuals here in the United States, such as the loan modification programs, which by the way, don't work either). Austerity will not work because it takes the responsibility for the mess and for the resolution of the mess, off of the very people that created the mess, the banks, corporations and rich people, and try to put the resolving of the miss onto the backs of the very people who cannot afford to help solve the mess, because of the very fact they are the poor as a result of the mess!

Some interesting comments also were made about Roosevelt and how he handled the situation in the 1930's and 1940's, and a comparison was made of him to those today like the Warren Buffets of the "rich." A trickle down society will not solve the problem, it has to be a trickle up situation that will stimulate growth and a way to get back to the middle class that we pretend still exists but in reality, we only have the very uber rich, and then those that fall close to or below the poverty line. The so called pretend middle class has been fooling itself for way too long now that they belong with the rich, or can achieve what the rich have in some fashion, and many are also trying to cling to what little they have, not realizing that in comparison to the rich, what the "middle class" have that they are holding onto is a pipe dream, and not based in financial reality.

Until the rich start paying their fair share, and that includes banks, corporations, governments and people, this financial meltdown will continue, and the riots in Greece and elsewhere in Europe over austerity programs will follow to here in the United States when we make the least capable and most vulnerable class of people have to shoulder the debt and financial crisis while at the same time the rich do nothing but continue to get richer!

Seriously, listen to the whole interview - you will come away so much more informed about the financial problems we are facing, not just as a country, but as a world.

The "Fleecing" Of Minnesota Citizens By NFL

The rich never, ever, run out of ideas to screw the non-rich. I am copying the post from Think Progress verbatim, as cutting it up will now give the full impact of the deviousness nor the duplicity of the NFL (the "rich") stealing money from the non-rich, in this instance, the citizens of Minnesota. Guess there's a reason I don't root for the Vikings, and now I have another reason not to root for them.

In an egregious example of how professional sports can be little more than a “glorified real estate scam,” the owners of the National Football League’s Minnesota Vikings are about to fleece an unwilling Minnesota public for hundreds of millions of dollars, as they push to secure public subsidization of a new stadium. A deal is reportedly “imminent.”

Real estate developer Zygi Wilf and five partners bought the team in 2005 for a reported $600 million. (The franchise is now valued at $796 million.) From the get-go, Wilf and his partners wanted what every owner in the NFL wants: a new stadium.

The Metrodome opened in 1982 and is certainly not the newest and most lavish in the league, but there are eight stadiums that are older. And Minnesota voters clearly do not want to pay for a new stadium using public funds. A February 3 poll sponsored by KSTP-TV in Minneapolis found that a whopping 68 percent of Minnesota voters think the new stadium should be built “entirely with private financing.” Only 22 percent believed that any tax dollars should be used at all.

Even more astounding, these results came after a six-figure ad campaign paid for by the Vikings to try to drum up support for financing the stadium.

So leave it to Minnesota’s politicians to find a way around the public will. Gov. Mark Dayton (D) has been out front on the stadium issue and is doing everything he can to get a new stadium built. “We’re at the five yard line and its first and goal, and I think we’ve got a great opportunity,” Dayton recently said.

But in 1997, Minneapolis voters overwhelmingly passed a referendum stating that voters must approve any plan to spend more than $10 million on a sports facility. Given that a referendum today would obviously fail, how is the governor going to get a stadium built in downtown Minneapolis? By exploiting a loophole, of course.

In the latest stadium proposal, at least $300 million in Minneapolis taxes already devoted to paying off the city’s convention center would be diverted to pay the city’s share of the new stadium. And to circumvent the requirement that voters approve funding for the stadium, Dayton’s top stadium negotiator, Ted Mondale, explained that a newly created “stadium authority” would spend the city’s money, rather than the city itself.

So despite the fact that the Minneapolis public voted to require a public referendum before financing any new stadium, and has made it clear that it doesn’t want a new stadium in this case, Minnesota’s governor and state legislature appear poised to spend $300 million in taxes on one anyway by creating a new entity out of thin air that is not subject to the referendum law.

The NFL is making money hand over fist, but the public is expected to pay the costs of providing a (lavish new) place for NFL teams to play, socializing the costs of the sport while privatizing the profits.

Large Corporate Taxes Paid Vs. Lobby Expenses!

Interesting post over at Think Progress regarding the top corporations taxes paid compared to what they paid for lobbying of Congress.

(shaking head) And you have to constantly ask me the stupid question of why the Occupy movement exists?

Top 30 Corporations That Paid Zero Income Taxes

H/T to Think Progress.

Still Think Obama's Administration Is On The Regular Person's Side?

Two senior Treasury officials said Friday that they had never seen a loan restructuring similar to an Energy Department loan to a failed solar panel maker.

The half-billion dollar loan to Solyndra Inc. was restructured earlier this year so that private investors moved ahead of taxpayers for repayment on part of the loan in case of a default.

You read that right. The loan was restructured so that private investors will get their money before the TAXPAYERS!

And you wonder why OWS exists???????

Anyone Contact You Lately To Discuss Your Prescription Buying Habits?

I once got a telephone call from a "survey" company that concerned my "prescription" drug purchases. Now, I really only have two prescriptions, one for my blood pressure, and one for relief of stress. But, I was rather surprised that this company knew my information, what drugs I took and where I purchased them from. I was aghast that my personal medical history was out there for others to pick at.

Seems I am not alone (subscription required for full reading):

The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down a Vermont law that barred the sale of doctors' prescription data to drug companies, ruling the law interfered with the pharmaceutical industry's First Amendment right to market its products.

Data companies such as IMS Health Inc. gather information from pharmacies about which medicines doctors are prescribing and ...

Unemployed Need Not Apply - New Business Mantra

Sadly, this is the new craze in hiring. Ain't American business just grand?

Hundreds of job opening listings posted on Monster.com and other jobs sites explicitly state that people who are unemployed would be less attractive applicants, with some telling the long-term unemployed to not even bother with applying.

I'd bang my head on the keyboard, but I gave that up a long time ago (got a strong head, and I really like my keyboard!)

Why So Many Elites Are Pushing For A Depression

A very long and intellectually difficult piece to read, but it is well worth it if you wish to try to have an inkling of understanding as to why the Republicans and the corporate, financial and some private sectors are trying to purposely lower wages and keep people in America poor. H/T to Crooks and Liars.

JAY: Okay. Now, you said because they realize the game is over. Why is the game over? And which game?

HUDSON: For the time being, the ability to pay debts. They realize that a debt that can't be paid won't be. The economy is so deeply in debt one-third of American real estate has mortgages in excess of its market price. So the Federal Reserve has come right out and said what we need is a reinflation. We need to restore the bubble economy. We need to push housing prices back up so that labor has to go into a lifetime of debt in order to afford access to housing.

Now, you say, quite correctly, "But this is going to prevent labor from buying the goods and services." That's Say's law. But Alan Greenspan explained this very clearly a decade ago. He said there's something wonderful about debt: it's cured the labor problem. The workers are now one paycheck away from homelessness. If they go on strike or if they're fired because they complain about working conditions, all of a sudden their interest rate goes up on their credit card, all of a sudden they miss their mortgage payment, they re losing their home. Alan Greenspan said debt is what has created stability of wages in this country, meaning steadily falling wages.

In America, despite the amazing rise in productivity we ve had in the last 30 years, real wages have actually gone down. All of the increase in productivity has been taken by the finance, insurance, and real estate sector, called the FIRE sector, almost all of it by the financial sector. So all of this growth has been siphoned off, not taking the form of rising living standards, but taking the form of debt service, mainly interest and fees. The fees are as large as interest for the credit card companies. So it's all siphoned off financially.

I Can't Even Say The "New" Name For The Rose Parade (Sigh), Another One For The Corporations

You know life has headed toward the really downward spiral of destruction when an old tradition succumbs ("The Tournament Of Roses Parade Sponsored By Honda"). Sure, we all are aware that the "corporations" control every thing from television (and what we see whether it be entertainment or news), government (thanks especially now to the SCOTUS decision on "Citizen's United" ruling), movies (don't get me started), sports (hell, why else did they redo just about every sports venue during the late 80's through 2000 to re-build stadiums just to have the "corporate boxes") - which is actually still undergoing a renovation given the Dallas Cowboys new stadium, and the Jets/Giants move to a brand new stadium next door to the demolished and now parking lot of the old stadium. The last bastion of private enterprise just dropped trousers to Honda. Too bad, another thing I have to add on my "I don't support corporate sponsorship" lifestyle.

I really can't imagine it's so bad one has to find a sponsor for the Rose Parade. Sheesh.

BP Still Stopping People From Digging In Beach Sand

Well, so much for that theory -- the oil is gone from Florida beaches, all is well, go for a swim, play on the beach. I seem to remember just recently a president taking his daughter into the water off the coast of Florida saying come on in, the water is fine. Well, guess you just can't build sandcastles or make mud pies, or just plain dig in the sand! What's the fun in that?

PG&E = Murderers

So, let me get this straight. PG&E asked the California Public Utilities Commission for the right to increase their rates to their consumers in 2007 to the tune of $5 million dollars in order to repair faulty pipelines such as the one that blew in San Bruno, and asked for the same amount in 2009, but they did not repair the pipelines, instead, giving the money it received from the rate increases as bonuses and other such extravagant things to the corporate bosses and CEO's. PG&E, after extracting $10 million from its users to repair pipelines, never repaired them??????!!!

And, they used that same money (and more, to the tune of $50 million dollars) from the consumers and the two tax hikes to SUPPORT Proposition 16.

Let's not forget the foolishness of (1) not repairing the pipelines despite two requests for rate hikes to do just that, (2) giving $50 million dollars to a campaign in California to basically give PG&E a monopoly over utility rights and (3) causing the death of at least four people and the destruction of over 40 homes. All this so that some fatcats at PG&E can screw regular people who fucking need their utilities (this is not part of an option in life, it's mandatory that you have light, heat, air, electricity, etc. in your HOME, damn it) in order to MAKE MONEY OFF OF THEM.

This is the theme over, and over, and over, and over, and over again with big business. Lies, lies, lies. Give me the money, I'll give you less services, and you all just shut the fuck up because we have the government in our pockets.

I sure hope those San Bruno victims sue the shit out of PG&E. (Call me, we do fire cases at our firm tee hee hee).

Yeah, we don't need no stinking regulations! (adjusting mi sombrero).

HT ThinkProgress.

Chrissie Hynde Laughs At Music Industry Demise

You Go Girl!

Rocker Chrissie Hynde is revelling in the "collapse" of the music industry, insisting record company bosses should not treat bands as "investments".

The rise of illegal file-sharing on the internet has led to a huge downturn in label profits, leading many business experts to warn that the industry is on the brink of disaster.

But The Pretenders frontwoman refuses to join the chorus of rockers calling for action to protect their livelihood - she's adamant she would rather be bankrupt than treat rock 'n' roll as a business.

She says, "The industry collapsed because of its own greed. That's very exciting. I like that, even if it collapses on me. I'd rather go out of here with nothing, the way I came into it, and still be having a laugh. That's not why I got in a rock band, to make wise investments."

Amen to that!

So, Who Actually Buys The Government's Statement That 75% Of The Gulf Spill Is Gone?

I'm really having a difficult time understanding the Obama administration's position with regard to the BP oil spill. At each and every step in what should have been a government controlled investigation, the Obama administration sidestepped the issue and allowed BP to call all the shots.

Now, the government is saying that "all is good," that 75% of the oil has been cleaned up, and in proving that the water is safe, Obama even orchestrated a photo op with his daughter and him in the water off the coast of Florida!

What part of all of the above reminds you of Bush, his "good work, Brownie" comment, and his planned photo op with firemen in NOLA after Katrina?

Yep, all of the above, gosh darn it! No one has been allowed to investigate, tabulate, videotape, explore, examine, view, work at, work with, work for, or even fucking view the spill site unless you either "work" for BP (wherein you signed a document that says you'll be fired if you so much as sigh in the direction of media, and probably contains a lot worse, but I can't say for sure right now, except I would not put it past BP to have a "we'll sue you" clause in it as well), or your are controlled by our corporate government, which of course, means again, you work for BP and not the American people.

Just like the Bush administration refused to let reporters into the really bad areas of NOLA, how they controlled the "reports" of the levees being fixed, and withheld pertinent information about the trailers they tried to herd NOLA residents in (especially those from the Ninth Ward), and basically ignored anyone's opinion about the conditions that didn't work for the inner circle of the Bushies. It was all about "the right party" during that era, and making sure that all the public agencies were staffed by those that bought the party agenda, and regurgitated it verbatim.

Now, with our new and viewer friendly president, whom we expected "change" in how government was going to be run, is pulling the same shit as the Bush administration did! No transparency, no cracking down on the parties responsible, no real investigation, and whooooaaaa nellie, the unbelievable cover-up of the depth of the disaster such that Obama was willing to put his own daughter at risk by actually getting into that seriously infested water. That's a mind blower to me.

Is our president really that beholding to major, non-American corporations, and to the bloody oil money, that he'd put the entire American population at risk just so that BP can "save some money?" This doesn't just impact the gulf area, we are talking about saying it is ok to fish and SELL the fucking fish and EAT the fucking fish (and shellfish) that are in these waters, when they don't even have a test to determine the toxicity of the Corexit used to disperse the oil? They are relying on SMELLING THE FISH? You have got to be kidding me.

You put tainted fish into the open markets across America, and you have no clue the level of contamination contained, and that's ok with you as POTUS? Wow ...

I realize that Obama hasn't lived up to his various promises such as comprehensive health care reform, repealing DADT, rejecting DOMA, closing Gitmo, having an open and transparent government, etc. But to literally put the entire American population at risk by falsely claiming that 75% of the oil has been cleaned up from the Gulf is not about not living up to any promise, but is a clear and deliberate act to expose the American people to real danger at the expense of allowing a corporation to skate through. That's pretty darn bad.

When it is factually provable that Alaska has not fully recovered from the Exxon Valdez oil spill many moons ago, it is not believable that a spill that was so much larger and dangerous by the tenfold than Exxon Valdez, magically in a few months, has just cleaned itself up! This is horse pucky as my grandfather would say. I am just amazed that these statements can come from the Obama administration, and that they don't feel any sense of duty to humanity to double down on the safety factor. No, it's business as usual. Drill some more, it's ok, there's no oil here ...

We should start a campaign to send Obama and his family fish caught from the Gulf waters on a daily basis and see just how much of it he eats, or he allows his family to eat. Any takers? Any guesses as to whether or not he'll actually eat anything caught in those still contaminated waters?

Uh huh. I thought so.

FDA Smell Test Ok's Gulf BP Oil Spill Contaminated Fish

Stay on track, readers. Gulf Oil Spill. Let's not get behind the corporate controlled government and their internal organizations (FDA) that have given the "go ahead, it's ok to fish in this area, there's no oil, nothing to see here, move along" ok to Louisiana fishermen. The fishermen are not totally buying it. Me? I'm not buying any fish, period, unless I either caught it myself or I bought it live in Santa Monica at a fish market. Done.

The FDA's test for dispersant contamination? SMELLING THE FUCKING FISH. Got that? Just smelling it.

I'd compare it to enacting the “5-second-rule” on food you dropped on the grounds of Chernobyl...

This smells WAY MORE than the Cordoba House non-controversy.

Hope Doesn't Live Here Anymore, Only Anger

The funny thing is, our government, in toto, is actually very much uninterested in what Americans want. It is as if politicians have allowed politics to actually be a job, a job unfortunately, one has to lobby to keep either every two years, every four years or every six years. So, the job of a politician is to lobby, and from the first day after they are elected, they lobby their entire term to stay where they are. This, sadly, has become quite known to many Americans (although that 24% of the stupid people don't even have a clue about this).

It has become maddeningly magnified by how waste, bad governing, and inattention to the constituency is just part of the daily job. And since lobbying is the job, in and of itself, any duty that, say, our congressional leaders owe to perform on the platform they ran, or govern in the manner in which they told those that elected them they would, once on the job, all that goes out the window as the politician has begun his actual job, lobbying.

Waste is an interesting topic. One of the reasons the government can never trim the waste is because those that cause the waste pay the politicians the most money to be able to continue to waste. So when The Washington Post does a three piece spread (here) concerning the "secret government" that virtually controls American lives (by "spying" illegally and legally), no politician jumped on it. The point of the piece was that this vast "secret government" which started out to be of national security importance, has turned into an unmanageable and poor functioning apparatus of the government such that hundreds of billions of dollars are being wasted.

Now, in this time of recession bordering on depression, and the mantra of the entire Republican party centering on "balance" with regards to budgetary ideology, you would think that someone would address this form of waste. Unfortunately, for Americans, our politicians figure that "waste" is helping those out of work, those unfortunate "teachers" who educate the majority of American children (because none of the politicians whose job is lobbying actually have children in public schools, so they don't care that teachers just don't make enough to live on), or in any jobs bill, or further stimulus package, or proper health care (remember, many of our elected lobbyists are actively lobbying funds to repeal the help to average Americans for affordable health care).

No, and that is because the people affected by those choices are American people, not the corporate people, a class we now have thanks to the Citizen's United decision. Even though actual American people are the only ones that can line up outside a voting booth, and put a mark down for a candidate, the corporate people have control over which politician will be elected, and what that politician's agenda will be. And so, as for the Washington Post expose, the very people involved in the "secret government," like AT&T and other surveillance giants, pay far too much money in kickbacks and in seeing that the lobby job of our politicians is carried out, such that the elected lobbyist would not actually try to cut this source off, regardless of how much American tax payer money is used to funnel the money to them. Nary a peep from our representatives in Washington except how irresponsible the Post was for actually doing the piece. No waste here. Move along. Nothing to see.

The sad part of this is that it is not exclusive of the Republican party. Democrats, Independents, and yes, some Progressives, once they get the "job," they realize that it is not to do the bidding of the real people that elected them, but to do the work of the corporate people who will see that they are still in their job and who will fund them quite handsomely to stay there.

The corporate people running the war that is destroying the lives of the real people in America will never give up their free line at the soup kitchen of the American government's tax monies. No sireee. And, thanks to all the tax breaks many of these corporates get from that same soup kitchen, the relationship is so symbiotic that neither side really is able to cut the other side off, for risk of dying.

It has come to that. We had that one moment of light that "a change is gonna come" feeling, in 2008,


when led by a grassroots coalition made up mainly of American people networked through the Internet, elected the first African American president, and overwhelmingly placed the Democratic party in charge. But after 18 months, and an upcoming "two year" job election by our elected lobbyists on the horizon, the focus from day one of Obama and the rest of the Democrats, Independents and Progressives the real people put in charge, things have not only not changed, some of stayed the same, and many have become worse. There are a small cadre of real people and corporate people that have something on the line in trying to highlight what the 2008 elected lobbyist actually did for the real people, but most of us already know what was done to us, because our collective asses really hurt.

And many of us with sore asses just won't get up come this November to stand in a line and punch a hole, when we already know we are screwed. Hell, the gas money alone to get to the polling place could probably feed a family of four at McDonalds.

At some point, this recession will turn into the depression, as the haves continue to hoard, and the have nots continue to be mislead, mistreated, maligned and ignored.

Hope doesn't seem to live in America anymore. But, anger, certainly is on the rise.

Addendum: Funny, after I put up this piece, AMERICAblog links to this article by Judy Woodruff, who addresses the same sentiments in my post, but takes the "change" part and gives it more "umph" as well as links and actual "changes" that have not come about, or just barely made a dent.

When "it" is in the air, "it" is in the air everywhere.

Is There An Agenda To Their Stupidity?

It's funny, my last few posts have been about how the American "people" seem to be not getting it based on all the forces of the Republican lie machine working (big business, money, lobbyists, PAC's, etc.), and lo and behold, AMERICAblog has a post, with more links (yeah, bust me, I'm tired sometimes of having to always "document" my rant) pretty much on target with what I put up, um, what, yesterday? "I think Jon Alter has seriously soiled himself here." And, here I thought I was in the gutter with the "doo doo" reference!

Just saying.

"... What if all of these "mistakes" aren't mistakes at all, but careful calculations? If so — and here I return you to Joe's point at the start of this post — it's working. No needle of outrage has moved; no Obama policy has been nudged toward change I can believe in. (In fact, "Team Change You Can Believe In" has managed to rebrand itself — "Team No Change You Can Notice" is sadly closer to the mark.)

A strategy this successful (admit it — it really is successful) is neither a series of "gaffes" nor the product of idiots. So best be prepared. I think we need to batten down, folks.

I've said a million times — Big Money enables Republicans and neuters Democrats. Money is handing a fortune to Republicans for this next election, and threatening Dems if Dems don't toe the line.

Money has all the bases covered. Money controls both opponents and the media who report the story. (If you have time, check out this from Digby — I think Jon Alter has seriously soiled himself here. I wish I had the video.)

And the people? They seem to be passing through this staged event like Disney patrons in super-size shirts and shorts moving to the next faux presentation. (And it probably won't surprise you to learn that, according to this new study, the only effect that facts have on the already-cemented-in is to harden the cement.)

Love the new GP contributor!