I mean, they sometimes result in people going free. When everybody knows that the police would *never* arrest an innocent person, and thus this results in dusky fellers walkin' the streets who ought to be in jail, not outside jail leering at our white womens and taunting us good God-fearin' white men with their long... err... trombones.
It just ain't right, ain't right I say! Which is why we need this law that says the military can lock up anybody, any time, without trial, even an American citizen, just by claiming that said citizen is a "terrorist". I mean, I feel terrorized by them dusky-skinned fellers, and by them young hippie folks with their drum circles and shit too, so why shouldn't we be able to lock one of'em up without trial anytime some white person somewhere feels threatened? I mean, it ain't as if they're real Americans, god-fearing white male Americans, after all!
Now, some fellers say, "well, they can pass this law, but the Supreme Court will just say it violates the Constitution and nullify it." You mean a Supreme Court packed with Republican-nominated judges? *SNORT!* All I gotta say is, are you fucking kiddin' me? Really? Alrighty, then!
-- Badtux the Republican Penguin
I have to say that I never thought anything would cost Levin my vote but this just might do it. I've been calling his office and writing as well as signing a petition about it someone was passing around.
ReplyDelete"Just might do it"? Pray tell, what would it take to CERTAINLY cost Levin your vote? Anything short of sawing off the heads of live puppies on Senate TV? I'm even going to vote against my ex-Congressional district's REP, Jackie Spier (who survived being shot in the Jonestown massacre when she accompanied murdered Congressman Leo Ryan as an aide) although I like her. I'm voting against EVERY incumbent (especially Hopey, who I predict WILL sign this) just on principle. Screw all of them. Assuming I even get an absentee ballot next year.
ReplyDeleteIt's amazing how little attention S.B. 1867 has gotten. Some "on one hand, but on the other hand" type coverage in the mainscum meeja, Dylan Ratigan has ranted about it a bit and I think there's been some coverage by other talking heads on MSNBC. I can harly stand to watch that network any more because there's SO much chatter about meaningless (at this time, at least) events pertaining to the 2012 Preznitial race. Look at the bright shiny object! Ignore Fukushima, and Peak Oil, and the American Empire's Global War On Everyone! There's a horse race amongst morons going on!
You know who's covering the crap out of this? RT TV, the Russian network. I'm so glad I can get that and al-Jazeera English on my cable TV. Not only do RT's Russkie anchors have segments on the Military Dictatorship Act, but Thom Hartmann, a cerebral American talk radio host who also has an hour-long nightly show on RT, has been giving it lots of air time. It never ceases to amaze me that I get better news about America from its Cold War enemy than I do from the "free" corpo media in the U.S. (RT's biases are evident in anything they do, and especially the stuff they DON'T do, about Putin & Co. But I can find Russia-skeptical news elsewhere.)
First on the list of terrorists to be renditioned... the rethugs from the Supreme Court and every politician that voted for this.
ReplyDeleteReason? Who needs a reason?
Evidence of terrorism? That's national security stuff. Don't ask again, I'm warning you.
Obviously, the fucktards that wrote this law don't really believe Obama is a Kenyan usurper bent on totalitarian rule. But who doesn't think the very next rethug president won't make himself the last president of the U.S., and its first emperor? This law is a golden ticket to lifetime rule.
@Bukko. In the case of Levin, it would take a lot. There are really very few issues that are so important to me that I would be willing to overlook the decades of service where I mostly have agreed with him. I'll also admit to a strong personal bias in his case that is unrelated to his politics. I don't really know what exactly might cause me to not vote for him because this is the first time he has taken a position on an issue that is so different than my point of view that it might be greater than the good he has done. So what would it take for Levin to *certainly* lose my vote? If he were caught accepting a bribe. If he decided to take a pro-life position. Otherwise, I don't know as I haven't really thought about what my single issue deal breakers are.
ReplyDeleteA lot depends on who runs against him too. Even in this case, where I am pretty upset about this, he would have to run against a Republican candidate who takes the opposite position on *this* issue and who is not pro-life. I am betting that isn't going to happen.
But "you can vote for a third party candidate," you say? Not in our current system. I can vote for someone else in the primary election and I am likely to do that. But in the general election, a vote for a third party candidate is almost the same as not voting at all. And not voting is kind of like voting for whomever wins the election.
On that note, while I respect your choice to vote for anyone you would like to vote for in 2012. I will say that if you don't vote for Obama and we're stuck with President Romney or worse President Gingrich, I'll blame the people who didn't vote for Obama almost as much as those who voted for the winner. (we really need to reform our electoral process).
Lynne, in 2000, when I lived in Florida, I voted for Ralph Nader because I believed his position that there wasn't a dime's worth of difference between the two political factions. That was a mistake, although Jaib! Bush! would have stolen the election for his idiot brother anyway. But now I believe there's not a dime between Hopey and whatever toad the Repukes put up against him. Maybe a nickel's worth.
ReplyDeleteSo I don't care who wins in the U.S. Distance (and the fact that my permanent residency permit in Australia allows me to flee back there at any time until January 2014) makes it easier to feel that way. Obama will win anyway, because that's what the money powers want. Romney will fulfill the same role in the shadow puppet play that John Kerry did in 2004. Token opposition that followers of the other faction will be tepid about.
Peak Oil, credit system implosion and a host of other inevitable factors will bring on the global collapse by 2016, when the full-on military dictatorship happens. In the face of that, my vote for a third party candidate is a fart in a hurricane. I'd rather fart my beliefs than hold my nose and vote for a corporate toad, whether his name is Obama or Romney.
If you are unable to make a distinction between Obama and Romney/Newt, then by all means, vote for a third party or not at all. Although I have always felt that Obama is much more conservative than I would like and much more conservative than many people thought in the last election, I can see HUGE differences between his position and that of any of the Republican candidates on many issues: abortion, civil rights, taxation policies, etc Are those issues not important to you? Do you really see no differences there?
ReplyDeleteWhen is Obama supposed to sign it? I'm losing it looking for that.
ReplyDeleteBucko -
ReplyDeleteIf you don't see any difference between B. Hoover Obama and the pack of idiots, miscreants, lizards and thugs that populate the Rethug field, then you really need to take of your shit-colored glasses.
I, for one, welcome our new lizard overlords.
WASF!
JzB
I believe that the moneymen who keep things lurching ahead for the sake of corporate interests would moderate the behaviour of any "R" Preznit, even if it was Noot. Things will go the way the MIC and banks choose. Not from any strategic plan, but tactical plays, based on the needs of this week or the latest month. It doesn't matter who is in the White House, or Congrifts. The fix is in.
ReplyDeleteBut I also believe that Hopey has been pre-designated to stay in power, because he represents the interests of TPTB. Which is not us. The R Clown Show is a diversion to fool the rubes, just as Obama's selection was. I'd rather cast my votes for someone I half believe in, rather than for a "soft shit sandwich" as one of Tux's commenters so wickedly put it a few days ago. Like I said, though, I'm outside the borders of the USA, so it's more of an academic subject for me, the fate of the States. When they go down, we'll all go down, of course. Since I expect that anyway, no biggie.
Glenn Greenwald has written aptly about why Obama can take true liberals for granted, because of the idea that "we MUST stand by our man no matter what, because the goons on the other side are even worse." I'd post a link to that essay, but I can't find it with a simple Oogling, and don't feel like ploughing through a couple months' worth of Glenn. It's sunny outside today, I'm off work, and there's life to be lived! I say screw both sides, because they ultimately do the same thing.
"I will say that if you don't vote for Obama and we're stuck with President Romney or worse President Gingrich, I'll blame the people who didn't vote for Obama almost as much as those who voted for the winner." - Lynne,
ReplyDeleteBlame me, Lynne. Blame away. Obama is a self-confessed murderer of an American citizen (Anwar al-Awlaki was a repulsive person, but he was born in America), with not one tiny scrap of due process... no trial, no conviction, no examination of the evidence before a judge, nothing except an assassination order by Obama... a secret order, at that.
No one who truly believes in our constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties should find it in herself to vote for a president who uses assassination orders against an American citizen. That's an absolute deal-breaker for me. It's by no means the only deal-breaker, but it does break the deal, well and truly.
Before Obama, I was a member of the Democratic Party, a contributor to the DNC, the DSCC, the DCCC and a few other things that began with "D" ... for 35 (thirty-five) years. And my first contract programming job 20+ years ago was for the local Planned Parenthood, these days called PP Gulf Coast. And I even voted for Obama in 2008, before all the bad stuff he did later. I have no need to establish creds as a liberal or a Democrat; I got creds, packed full and running over.
Things have to be pretty bad before I would refuse to vote for the Democrat in the presidential race. And things are bad indeed. I won't do it. I can't do it. I can't vote for someone who murdered an American citizen without due process of law. Period. Blame me if you wish for whatever result you get, but you can't blame me for voting for a murderer.
Steve, that is the problem with our current electoral system. Once the primaries are over, your choices are limited.
ReplyDeleteYou can vote for the better (or least worse) of the two candidates. If you chose not to, you either don't vote at all or you vote for someone else. Both not voting and voting for someone else are, in a way, like voting for whoever wins the election. Voting for a third party candidate is essentially voting for the winner with a message. I will not deny that sometimes that message is really important but only if the candidate that more closely matches your views wins. I don't think George Bush cared that some voters were too liberal to vote for Al Gore for instance.
This is why Republicans do everything they can to keep certain groups of people away from the voting booths.
I get it that you find voting for Obama distasteful and that you consider him to be a murderer. But other than Ron Paul, even in the narrow area of killing US citizens without a trial, do you really think that *any* of the Republican candidates would be less likely to do the same? There is a lot at stake too. There is likely to be a SCOTUS nomination and considering the make up of the court, that is major.
At any rate, regardless of how you vote in this next presidential election, I do hope you can see how really messed up our electoral system is. We have to demand reforms beginning with the proposed constitutional amendment to end corporate personhood regarding free speech. Ultimately, we have to do something to get away from this two party system so that we can have viable third or even fourth candidates. There are too many elections where the choices are Bad and Worse.
As Lynne put it, in a first-past-the-post system a vote for a third-party candidate is a vote for the winner. Those Nader voters in Florida in 2000? Every single one effectively cast a vote for George W. Bush.
ReplyDeleteThis isn't caused by some giant conspiracy of the two parties. It's caused by a simple law of mathematics, ADDITION. In a first-past-the-post system, it takes 50%+1 votes to guarantee election. That leaves 50%-1 votes for any other parties. So those other parties will naturally glop together into one big party and try to convert the two voters it takes to get 50%+1.
So what happens if one of the small parties does *not* glop into that second party? Effectively, *every vote for that third party is a vote for the first party, the one in the lead in the election*, because it's one vote not available to the second party for it to reach the 50%+1 threshhold. Most people realize this, so the only time third parties have ever become second (or first) parties in our system has been when one of the legacy parties disintegrated, like the Whigs did over the question of slavery.
So anyhow... given a choice between an Eisenhower Republican and a crazy lizard person from Planet Sociopath... what kind of insane logic says that voting for the crazy lizard person from Planet Sociopath is a good idea?! And before someone says "the money people will restrain him!", well, that worked well with George W. Bush, didn't it? (Hint: A good portion of our money people are crazy lizard people from Planet Sociopath too).
So anyhow, I'm pretty bummed about the fact that I'll be voting for people I'm not all that happy about in the fall of next year due to the fact that nobody sane (other than Obama, who's merely conservative) is running in any of the primaries, but if the party base refuses to put up candidates in the primary that are sane and reasonably liberal, or said sane and reasonably liberal people refuse to run because they feel they can't win... well. I can't vote for people who aren't running!
Which makes me wonder: Have we reached peak Gresham's Law when it comes to politics? Curious Penguins are... curious!
- Badtux the Curious Penguin
I'm starting to think the Republican Clown College debates are there to preserve the illusion that we have a liberal government. It's as much a line of b.s. as the mythical imperial presidency.
ReplyDeleteThe real power in the U.S. is in the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate where low-population red states get to vote their dirt over the wishes of high population coastal states. Without strong primary challenges in congressional and senate races congres-scum can continue to collect bribes from the 0.01% with impunity.
The presidential election, while important for supreme court nominations, is a distraction.
Lynne and Badtux, I understand most of the things you say. I understood them before you said them. I even advocated them in 2000 when I was still a Democrat and sparring with Nader voters.
ReplyDeleteBut Barack Obama is not Al Gore (perhaps I should say "not even Al Gore"), who was at least arguably the superior candidate in the race. (Sorry; Nader is a great activist and a terrible leader.) Barack Obama is a de facto Republican, a proponent of secret government and a manipulator willing to do any unconstitutional thing if it suits him politically. His speeches are grand, but he never governs the way he speaks. Ever.
You'll get no argument from me that the electoral system is broken. I believe it is equally inarguable that the GOP is using the flaws in the system to win elections by destroying the system further, and frankly, they're succeeding at it. If something isn't done, I predict our government will be defunct in about a decade. I'm old enough that that may not affect me, but... how about you?
I live and vote in Texas. One vote for or against Barack Obama in Texas will not even remotely possibly affect the outcome: Texas is certain to go for the GOP candidate. So I am free to vote for anyone I please without being responsible if Obama loses. It is a bittersweet position to have an inconsequential vote to cast, but I intend to make the most of it.
Is the presidency really a distraction in 2012? I don't know about you, but I have direct influence on the selection of one Representative and two Senators, no more... not enough to change anything. But in our current form of government, as practiced not as preached, the presidency is overarchingly powerful. Vetoes? Supreme Court nominations? Unitary presidential declarations of war without congressional approval? Executive assassination orders, contrary to due process of law though they may be? The president's got 'em all. S/he is not negligible... not a distraction.
Well, enough ranting. This was never an easy decision for me, but Obama has made it much easier by going so far outside the bounds of constitutional democracy that I could easily believe he is architecting a future dictatorship. Secret targeted assassination of American citizens was just the last straw. Somebody else needs to occupy (!?) that office, somebody who gives at least some weight to the Constitution.
[CAPTCHA text: "ching" ... Chinese fortune-telling approach, or the sound of American politics in action?]