Tip of the Iceburg...Sarah's Going Down

The Rogue, by Joe McGinnis hits the bookstores on Tuesday. At least two more books and a movie will be out by the end of next month. America is going to know way too much information about the former Governor of Alaska...You Betcha! I really don't think running for President of the USA is in the cards for Sarah Palin right now, do you?

Higher Ground

This is a wonderful video featuring musicians from all over the world. Enjoy the music and become involved in this beautiful movement.

It's The Inequality, Stupid: Eleven Charts That Explain All That's Wrong in America

Eleven charts. Yep, check out these little gems and then tell me you don't agree that the current financial inequality is a big problem for America.

See all eleven charts here.

Surface Ozone Kills Trees And Other Living Green Things

I recently found an interesting blog that needs to be shared here. It's called Wit's End and it is about trees...and how they are dying.

Please go here to read some shocking information and then begin to look at the trees around you with a new focus.

I still fail to understand how people can deny that we are killing our planet when it is happening right in front of them.

Make Sure You (and others like you) Are Eligible To Vote

Is there anything the GOP won't touch and taint in
their bid for power? We need to keep abreast of this
voting issue, or by election day, lots of people will be shocked to learn that their vote will not be counted. This article recently published in Rolling Stone Magazine, sheds some light...


The GOP War On Voting

by Ari Berman, August 30, 2011

As the nation gears up for the 2012 presidential election, Republican officials have launched an unprecedented, centrally coordinated campaign to suppress the elements of the Democratic vote that elected Barack Obama in 2008. Just as Dixiecrats once used poll taxes and literacy tests to bar black Southerners from voting, a new crop of GOP governors and state legislators has passed a series of seemingly disconnected measures that could prevent millions of students, minorities, immigrants, ex-convicts and the elderly from casting ballots. "What has happened this year is the most significant setback to voting rights in this country in a century," says Judith Browne-Dianis, who monitors barriers to voting as co-director of the Advancement Project, a civil rights organization based in Washington, D.C.

Republicans have long tried to drive Democratic voters away from the polls. "I don't want everybody to vote," the influential conservative activist Paul Weyrich told a gathering of evangelical leaders in 1980. "As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down." But since the 2010 election, thanks to a conservative advocacy group founded by Weyrich, the GOP's effort to disrupt voting rights has been more widespread and effective than ever. In a systematic campaign orchestrated by the American Legislative Exchange Council – and funded in part by David and Charles Koch, the billionaire brothers who bankrolled the Tea Party – 38 states introduced legislation this year designed to impede voters at every step of the electoral process.

All told, a dozen states have approved new obstacles to voting. Kansas and Alabama now require would-be voters to provide proof of citizenship before registering. Florida and Texas made it harder for groups like the League of Women Voters to register new voters. Maine repealed Election Day voter registration, which had been on the books since 1973. Five states – Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Tennessee and West Virginia – cut short their early voting periods. Florida and Iowa barred all ex-felons from the polls, disenfranchising thousands of previously eligible voters. And six states controlled by Republican governors and legislatures – Alabama, Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin – will require voters to produce a government-issued ID before casting ballots. More than 10 percent of U.S. citizens lack such identification, and the numbers are even higher among constituencies that traditionally lean Democratic – including 18 percent of young voters and 25 percent of African-Americans.

more here...

Happy Labor Day!! Check Out This Labor Day Reflection...from Michael Moore

Dang, I'm having trouble with the new, improved blog interface, but I think I have it figured out, finally. This is after deleting two previous blogs because I couldn't get my videos to post. So here goes...

Today's post is from Michael Moore's website and written by one of Mike's friends, Kevin Zeese. This post is packed with information. We'll save it here so we can come back to it when the GOP starts spreading their lies.

To read this article, go here.

"Sarah Palin: You Betcha!" Trailer

Here's a little documentary that needs some funding.

It looks like a hoot to me.

Check it out here.

Perry's Iowa Remarks Reveal Republican Strategy on Social Security

From Truthout

Wednesday 31 August 2011

by: Daniel Marans, Campaign for America's Future | Report

The media have portrayed Governor Rick Perry’s description of Social Security as a “Ponzi scheme” at a recent Iowa campaign event as the latest extreme statement of an unconventionally candid, conservative presidential candidate. But Perry’s full remarks reveal just as much about the Republican Party’s strategy for cutting Social Security as they do about Perry himself.

The question that prompted Perry to call Social Security a “Ponzi scheme” and the beginning of Perry’s response—which have not been flagged in the flurry of media attention over Perry’s statement—shed light on rank-and-file Republicans’ support for Social Security and the delicate strategy Republican politicians employ in talking about how to “reform” the program, as a result.

(For a point-by-point takedown of Perry’s biggest Social Security whoppers, click here.)

Here is the text of the question and the beginning of Perry’s response:

    Iowa Woman: The current Administration is promoting Social Security as an entitlement program (inaudible). The question is, is what it originally started out to be is not an entitlement program. Americans were working and putting money into it—

    Rick Perry: It was a retirement program. And actually it’s turned into a tax now—

    Iowa Woman: There is such a bad sum of people who are on it who have never put into it—

To read the entire article, go here.

Epic Waves In Tahiti Draw Pros

Check out this big-wave riding in Tahiti. These epic waves came in on an off day during the Billabong Pro competition. Surfers were towed out to catch the 25 footers.

I'm having trouble embedding the video, so go here for the video and article.

ALEC Exposed

ALEC, which stands for American Legislative Exchange Council, was created in the 1970s to work with conservative politicians to promote the interests of corporations and big business. Basically corporations work through ALEC to craft and write legislation that favors specific corporate interests. Those legislative papers are then handed over to politicians who present them as if they were personally authored bills.

Here is the ALEC mission as stated on their website.

Our Mission

The mission of the American Legislative Exchange Council is...

...to advance the Jeffersonian principles of free markets, limited government, federalism, and individual liberty, through a nonpartisan public-private partnership of America's state legislators, members of the private sector, the federal government, and general public.

...to promote these principles by developing policies that ensure the powers of government are derived from, and assigned to, first the People, then the States, and finally, the Federal Government.

...to enlist state legislators from all parties and members of the private sector who share ALEC's mission.

...to conduct a policy making program that unites members of the public and private sectors in a dynamic partnership to support research, policy development, and dissemination activities.

...to prepare the next generation of political leadership through educational programs that promote the principles of Jeffersonian democracy, which are necessary for a free society.


Here is a short video featuring author Cliff Schecter where he explains ALEC and how it works.

For more information, see "ALEC Exposed" in The Nation and this piece from the Center For Media and Democracy.