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Blogs about: Politics

Oh, wowsers: What’s more complicated and controversial than politics? Since the dawn of (relatively) civilized society, we humans have been trying to control each other, either for the common good or personal gain. We’re still working on getting it right, meaning there’s no shortage of hot-button political issues going in the world today, from local city council meetings to debates at the United Nations. The internet, thankfully, has helped level the playing field. It’s now possible to keep tabs on serious issues like government atrocities, the influence of money on politicians, and that all-important topic known as political humor.

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Friday, Jul 30, 2010
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Beyond the Christianization of Abortion
JohnShore.com 1 day ago

With all of my heart, I wish everyone was Christian. I wish divorce, drug abuse, alcoholism, spousal abuse, racism, and every sort of the exploitation and moral degradation amidst which we all live everyday was gone forever, burned away in the bright light of God’s infinite, immediate love for each and every one of us. But I don’t live in a place where that’s what’s happening. I live in this place. This world. This country. Many in America are, as I am, Christian. Many ain’t. But all we Americans live under the same form of government, one mandated by its defining documents to forever endeavor to strike with us, and for us, the best balance possible between Doing the Right Thing, and Doing Whatever We Want. We can drive whatever car we want—as long as it’s licensed, and we don’t drive it too fast. We can make all the money we want—as long as we give the government the percentage it requests/insists upon. We can have all the sexual c

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Presumed Guilty: The Injustices of Mexico’s Justice System
3 days ago

tweetmeme_url = 'http://en.wordpress.com/blog/2010/07/29/if-you-want-to-be-friends-with-everyone/'; tweetmeme_alias = 'http://bit.ly/bjxdU5'; tweetmeme_source = 'destigarribia'; IN DECEMBER 2005 Antonio “Toño” Zúñiga, a young man who worked as a street vendor in Mexico City, was abducted by police and accused of a murder he didn’t commit. He was held without charge, and there was no physical evidence connecting him to the crime. He had no link to the victim, and no motive. Witnesses could testify he was working at the market and provide an airtight alibi for the time of the murder. Despite this, Toño was found guilty and sentenced to 20 years in prison. Presumed Guilty, which airs tonight on PBS, is his story, as well as the story of Roberto Hernández and Layda Negrete, two self-described “lawyers with cameras” who are determined to expose a deeply flawed Mexican legal system which has no presumption of innocence. Hernandez and Negrete gained unprecedented

Today’s Posts in Politics
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Maturity, or so to speak
Squeaking Dolphins

As a long time student of history, politics and power, I must share my intimate conviction that we are living in very interesting times: the end of colonialism. Back in the 1920s and onward to the 40s and 60s, the world lived a wave of independence from colonial powers. As any student of history will tell you, the British, French, Germans, Russians,…divided up territory in fairly artificial ways in order to maintain a degree of influence over them. Interestingly, these artificial nations have matured and the peoples living within their borders have developed their own strong sense of identity. This identity, coupled with increasing relative power, has resulted in many of the conflicts we see and participate in today. By way of example, Yugoslavia has broken into its component parts. Czechoslovakia has as well. But let’s move a bit further east, Iraq’s new constitution recognizes the ethnic divisions within the country (Kurds, Sunni, Shiite) and institutionalizes it. A

Rep. Anthony Weiner Loses His Cool on House Floor
NewsFeed

Thank goodness for C-SPAN. Yesterday, Republican members of the House came up with enough votes to defeat a bill that would have provided free health care to those affected by toxins after the September 11th attacks. GOP congressmen objected on procedural grounds, because Democrats suspended the rules before debate, allowing them to block Republican amendments to the bill. The defeat drew ire from many Democratic congressmen, but nobody fumed more than Rep. Anthony Weiner, a Democrat from New York. One YouTube user’s comment compares Weiner’s rant to that of Gene Wilder’s Willy Wonka at the end of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. We call it a moment made for the Internet.

Colbert: A tax bomb! Quick, rich people, to your tax shelters!
Under the Mountain Bunker & Coffee Shop

Mocking the deficit “hawks.” BruinKid: Stephen Colbert had an incredible segment last night, where he basically destroyed the deficit hawks’ argument, and even showed how unrealistic the very concept of Reaganomics and the “trickle down theory” is, as he used delicious satire to blast the Republicans for blocking unemployment benefits for millions of Americans, claiming they’re concerned about adding to the deficit, while not caring about adding MUCH more to the deficit by keeping the Bush tax cuts for only the wealthiest of Americans. (DailyKos)

Love has 20/20 vision
laborious living
The No-Fail Way to Make Me Roll My Eyes
HumaNourish
Spot the missing word competition (No 2)
The Crosshead
"Jewish Money" List: Rep. McMahon Criticized For Releasing List of Jewish Contributors of Opponents
JONATHAN TURLEY
Sen. Kerry talks about yacht flap
WBZ AM
Obama Does "The View"
Current Concepts
The Amnesty Memo - The Corner - National Review Online
Joepf's Daily Links...........it's politics as usual.

Barack Obama, self- appointed ruler of America may be trying an amnesty end run.  According to an internal U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services memo going the rounds of Capitol Hill and obtained by National Review, the agency is considering ways in which it could enact “meaningful immigration reform absent legislative action” — that is, without the consent of the American people through a vote in Congress. via The Amnesty Memo – The Corner – National Review Online.

Feminism pop quiz
Cubik's Rube

Someone I’m following on Twitter, @quietriot_girl, recently put out a call for any interested men to discuss feminism. I volunteered, and she sent the following list of questions, to which I’ve attached my answers here. 1. Do you consider yourself to be a feminist? If so, why? If not, why not? Yep. People have many different ideas of what feminism means, but all the formulations I’m most familiar with seem to describe philosophies that I consider important and worth following. One of my housemates at uni had a bumper sticker up in her room with a quote to the effect that “Feminism is the radical notion that women are people”. I can get behind that. It’s not exactly a revolutionary observation that gender discrimination against women has been a pretty shitty and widespread thing throughout much of the history of civilisation, and we’re still not over it today. There are still ways in which unhelpful and unfair stereotypes and assumptions about w

Aliens Take Over Lindsey Graham's Brain Seeks To End Birthright Citizenship
ACGR's "News with Attitude"

Dan Amato 7/29/2010 I was absolutely flabbergasted and still sit here stunned as I read the latest news. It is if aliens have come down and somehow switched Lindsey Graham’s brain with that of Tom Tancredo and the vast majority of the American People. On Greta Van Susteren, Lindsey Graham announced that he has “got to” introduce a constitutional amendment to end “birthright citizenship” and the continued practice of “anchor babies”. This is an issue that most politicians have avoided like the plague. I have actually asked some in interviews and they have at that point ended the interview or ignored the question. For Graham to come out on this… well read and watch for yourself. And now… the rest of the story. …..

When Politics and the Environment Converge, Unique Quotes Happen
CZARNEZKI.COM

Via Political Wire’s Quote of the Day: “I think they should name it something better. The top ends up flatter, but we’re not talking about Mount Everest. We’re talking about these little knobby hills that are everywhere out here.” – Kentucky U.S. Senate candidate Rand Paul (R), in an interview with Details magazine, on mountain top removal coal mining, noting many people “would say the land is of enhanced value, because now you can build on it.”

Government Has Run Amok Since 9/11
THE INTERNET POST

Those who understand the exploitative nature of big government suspected that the U.S. response to the 9/11 attacks had little to do with the security of the American people and much to do with power and money. Still, the magnitude of the scam, as revealed by the Washington Post last week, is astonishing. Naturally, the politicians justify the growth in intelligence operations on national security grounds. To make sure such attacks never happen again, they said, new powers, agencies, personnel, and facilities were imperative. Now the truth is out: the post–9/11 activity has been an obscene feeding frenzy at the public trough. Any resemblance to efforts at keeping Americans safe is strictly coincidental. “The top-secret world the government created in response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, so unwieldy and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, how many programs exist within it or exactly how many agencies do

The Redundant Truth!
Michael Knell - The Blog

If I were to ask who the most unpopular and disliked people are today, I doubt it would take anyone long to come up with politicians or bankers, and probably both. We take at face value what these people tell us at our peril. However when you stop to analyze the reason for this, you find they are only a small part of a great culture we live in today. When cars are advertised not for their performance, safety, miles per gallon, comfort, spaciousness, or even reliability, but deceptively on what the latest computer graphics technology can make them appear to do in a commercial, irrelevant things they can never really do, why should we be surprised when a politician or a banker equally doesn’t produce what they pretend? We have developed a culture based on being deceived, almost as a form of self-harm, a kind of penance – but for what? So much scientific research has been carried out, so many serious articles written, and television documentaries made, to prove there is no mag

The Jewish Community Debates BDS
Shalom Rav

As the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement gains momentum, I’ve been pleasantly surprised to see at least two internal Jewish community conversations in which this painful, volatile issue with was debated with intelligence and mutual respect. Last month, the New York-based org Jews Say No sponsored a debate/discussion featuring Israeli activist Yonatan Shapira, Birthright Unplugged director Hannah Mermelstein, Forward editor JJ Goldberg and J Street board member Kathleen Peratis. It takes thirteen YouTube clips to see the entire program, but I highly recommend watching it from beginning to end. I found it informative, intelligent, passionate – and ultimately inspiring for the way a Jewish gathering could discuss such a potentially divisive subject so gracefully. (Click above for the first clip, then surf to the Jews Say No website to watch the next twelve.) For its part, Tikkun Magazine held its own Jewish roundtable on BDS featuring Tikkun editor Rabbi Michael Lerne

Tamilzha, Tamilzha!
Gomathi Reddy

My son struggles with his Tamil, as he tries to read the name of his favourite star Vijay’s new movie on the block.    As a naturalized second-generation citizen of Chennai, I am more adept at Tamil than my own mother tongue, Telugu.  Looking at him struggle with Tamil makes me wonder if I made the wrong choice of Hindi and Sanskrit at school for him, based on my own language-learning experiences at school. For me, Tamil at school was tough.  It is one thing to learn a language, with the purpose of learning to communicate, and totally another miff of an effort to try to become half-gurus by the time you are 13, with so much being thrust on you, in the pretext of language, its semantics and grammar.  I managed to glean over most of what is called Sangam Literature, by the time I was 13 and never managed to understand the intensity and purpose of it all – not even a word!  Schooling was all about aiming for high grades in all other subjects, and managing to scrape through Tamil. All this

President Obama on the View
WTIC News/Talk 1080

Rich Hanley, Assistant Professor of Journalism at Quinnipiac tells us why reaching out to a different TV audience was a good idea.