34 thoughts on “The American Political System . . .”

  4. From the Arab spring, to the summer libyian invasion, this must be the Arab Autumn. Winter will be coming soon, to a town near the moon, and OWS will wish it was the middle of June.

  5. Lots of apologies today, but 1st amendment rights are up for auction this week…aren’t they?
    Jimmy Fallon Show Band Plays ‘Lyin’ Ass Bitch’ To Intro Michele Bachmann
    StageRightShow

  6. @Woych – Forgot to add music to the mass-media psychological 24/7 abuse…somebody won that 1st amendment auction – *fishbone* – 10,000 years of civilization flowering right there….

  8. Well, OK.

    But is the real problem here Grover Norquist, who is an easy and justifiable target, or is it the entire culture of “K” Street?

    By the way, why do we not see, as someone smarter than me has suggested, an “Occupy ‘K’ Street” movement? The teflon actors in our society occupy D.C. Why is that? Will it change in 2012 when polls suggest that incumbents of both parties are at serious risk despite years of gerrymandering controlled only at a distance by the census?

    Accepting that we are talking about amorphous groups, are there actually some convergences between the essential messages of the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street?

    Thoughts?

  9. There is nothing to laugh about when women politicians are serenaded as “lying ass bitches” nor is it amusing when political cartoons lampoon a “male” politician as being someone’s “bitch” for being subject to or the recipient of another person’s actions. It may sum up the current state of American politics but it’s no badge of honor: It is not “cute” or “amusing” to denigrate women and sexually define political processes. When we grow up women politicians and the political process will be gender neutral.

  10. James, that cartoon is a great gift to give people before the Thanksgiving holiday, and it’s a gift this country needs more of. An honest/frank look at the situation, with a touch of humor.

    Here is my gift to the good regulars of this blog, about 20 minutes. This guy could teach a lot to the Congressman we have today (including Nancy Pelosi who is more interested in Botox, and shares in Visa stock than the future of this country), and having an alcoholic beverage with a colleague after 5pm might be a nice start.
    http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/connected-to-chicago-special/id398546460?i=88220773

  11. Yeah, this is pretty much it. One might argue that Grover is the posterboy for the insane culture of dysgovernment which has taken over. We know that for many decades there has been a problem, but it seems that the art of poor government has been honed to a fine edge recently, a malady which has evinced itself clearly in both parties. Sadly, this actually seems to be a global epidemic, whether it is US, Greece, Italy, Germany, Egypt, Syria, Iran, or almost anywhere. From my perspective the two largest British ex-colonies, Canada and Australia, seem perhaps the sanest of the rest of the world, outside of Scandinavia and Luxemburg. It is truly the age of the global oligarchs. If Nast were in his heyday, he would be completely exhausted all the time.

  12. And who made Grover Norquist king? People do not rise to places of power unless someone feels they have power or something someone else wants. Whose employing him or giving him cash — very few people are truly self-made. Follow the money.

    Bayard,

    You talk about the ex-British Colonies being sane. For the most part they do not let religion get in the way of electing a person to office. We as a country are so worried about one’s religion that I am waiting for the day when I will not be able to walk down the street without wearing some form of patch declaring I have no religion and am a Free Thinker.

    We have to grow-up as a society and realize governments are designed to govern based on a contract between the people and those they elect. It is not a contract with businesses, interest groups, religions, or any other group. It takes a special person with no desire for power to actually govern for the people. But the way we are set-up to run elections, currently, would leave this person with little or no campaign funds and few followers. We as a people do not seem to like real adults as leaders. I am guessing they would have a bit of a colorful, but moral, past that they would take full responsibility for. But, in the process of running, they would be hen pecked to death or ignored on a campaign trail for not genuflecting to those who feel they have the power and have learned how to create mob thinking. I blame this last bit on our educational system….

    To the educators, professor included, out there:

    What is the goal of Education? If any of you say, it is to teach, you are wrong. The goal of education is to inspire independent learning and critical thinking and apply it to one’s self and his or her civic realm. We use teachers to then teach reading, math, history, etc. as these are skills needed to learn and to think on ones own. We, societal we, reward the student who can read easily, do math, and does well on bubble tests. We do not reward students who can look this knowledge up or use tools, including people, to do the basic skills, but can take this knowledge and actually come up with solutions to problems and think. So people follow candidates and political ideas blindly because we have failed to teach them how to think critically. Unfortunately, most people think they have been taught to think critically because they have gone to school and worse college. It is why the Tea Partly Movement and Occupy do not solve problems – they are slogans and not well thought out ideas. They become dangerous in that they promote shallow one-sided thinking that then polarize our nation.

  13. I repete, if people believed everything they were taught in schools, this nation would be hurting in many ways. Oh yea, it is hurting in so many ways, besides education, you have bad laws designed to tap the strength of its citizens, the list goes on and they call it human capital, and money buys it.

  14. Today is February 1st and I am faced with a conundrum. It is time to transition to a new role. I started this blog last Spring when we were in the thick of debate on Financial Reform. I had two intents. One was to make a difference in the debate by adding an insider’s perspective on the industry and many of its pronouncements. My second intent was to just do something every week to move towards my goal of personal integrity in my life. My employer was STEALING MY INTEGRITY every day in the way I and others were required to respond to the pressures coming from the most senior management. Of course, they would deny this and say that intermediary managers “misinterpreted” what their intent was. At various times, I would register my objections and be faced with looks of incomprehension. Why would a successful manager sabotage a career by objecting to our commonly accepted practices, particularly those that were making us look good on the internal metrics and making us such big bonuses? What craziness!

  16. The “AMERICAN” POLITICAL SYSTEM:

    http://therealnews.com/t2/component/seyret/?task=searchvideos&searchkey=interrupted

    OWS protesters interrupt Obama’s speechThe 99 percent approached President Barack Obama this afternoon, surpr…
    hezvo – Occupy Movement
    2011-11-23 05:39:16
    Karl Rove Speech Interrupted By Occupy BaltimoreKarl Rove Speech Interrupted By Occupy Baltimore…
    hezvo – Occupy Movement
    2011-11-20 13:29:58
    Raw Video: ‘Occupy’ Protesters Heckle Michele BachmannPublished on Nov 10, 2011 by AssociatedPress Occupy Wall Street prote…
    KMC – Satire
    2011-11-10 20:36:59
    Filmmaker John Sayles Talks About Battle of Blair Mountain, Film Matewan & GOP’s Union Busting EffortsUploaded by democracynow on 17 Jun 2011 DemocracyNow.og – In a Democr…
    KMC – Global Warning
    2011-06-18 07:15:45
    Bill Moyers Discusses Independent Media and Fighting Back Against Unbridled Corporate Greed and PowerUploaded by democracynow on 8 Jun 2011 DemocracyNow.org – In a specia…
    KMC – Global Warning
    2011-06-10 22:19:18
    RAP NEWS: Wikileaks vs The Pentagon – INTERNET WARSthejuicemedia | 30 July 2010 Rap News resumes its lyrical forays i…
    KMC – Satire
    2010-12-31 20:20:19
    Spring Break for Congress, Nothing for the Unemployed: 15 million Americans are jobless and nearly 17 percent of Black Americansracialjustice 08 April 2010 15 million Americans are jobless and …
    KMC – Satire
    2010-

  17. NO APOLOGIES TO BACHMANN / THE BAND WAS HONEST.
    AC360 – Michele Bachmann Flunking History
    SuchIsLifeVideos

  18. http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/11/mark-ames-how-uc-davis-chancellor-linda-katehi-brought-oppression-back-to-greece’s-universities.html
    WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 23, 2011
    Mark Ames: How UC Davis Chancellor Linda Katehi Brought Oppression Back To Greece’s Universities
    Yves here. Reader sidelarge raised the issue yesterday in comments, of UC Davis chancellor Linda Katehi’s role in abolition of university asylum in Greece. The story is even uglier than the link he provided suggests.
    By Mark Ames, the author of Going Postal: Rage, Murder and Rebellion from Reagan’s Workplaces to Clinton’s Columbine. Cross posted from The eXiled
    (Introduction excerpt)
    “A friend of mine sent me this link claiming that UC Davis chancellor “Chemical” Linda Katehi, whose crackdown on peaceful university students shocked America, played a role in allowing Greece security forces to raid university campuses for the first time since the junta was overthrown in 1974. (H/T: Crooked Timber) I’ve checked this out with our friend in Athens, reporter Kostas Kallergis (who runs the local blog “When The Crisis Hits The Fan”), and he confirmed it–Linda Katehi really is the worst of all possible chancellors imaginable, the worst for us, and the worst for her native Greece.”

    see what is coming here next: read the article. No more LIES ! The CAT is out of the BAG!

    http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/11/mark-ames-how-uc-davis-chancellor-linda-katehi-brought-oppression-back-to-greece’s-universities.html

  19. What’s comical, trenchant, or resonating with *truth* in a message that is at once sexist, and intentionally misleading?

    Sorry, don’t mean to sound like a prude, but “b”-word” is unhelpful.

  22. “The American Political System…”
    The American Political System is the pernicious control fraud system that has captured government systemic agency and converted it to a power brokerage for riding private enterprise as political economic expansion; while consolidating its power concentration with the minority leveraging political financial control and dictating to the majority.
    The informal sociopolitical network coexistent to this scalar power is an offsetting network of loosely interdependent vested interests that act in hegemonic relations as coalitions and loosely nit silos of variably aligned confederated “entities” in pursuit of common interests, and / or divergent prospective, with perspectives on past to future “forward looking” interpretations of realism in polar opposition to potential ideals. The factions among billionaires and think tanks depend on a consensus driven market share, and the dominating alignments make the prospects for rules and regulation their measured priority. Most everything else follows in degree not in kind.

    You have created an interesting idea James Kwak, …raise a question of interpretation and open the stream
    to see what appears…with a little creativity…this could develop into themes rather than streams; or maybe then…just half baked dreams? Worth some experimenting!

  23. Yeah, wouldn’t it be cheaper, in light of the budget crisis, to do away with congress and let the lobbyists decide for themselves? What a detour …

  24. I agree with Anonymous and Woop about the misogyny exhibited by the cartoon.

    Does it surprise me that misogynists abound? No. Does it surprise me that Simon and James embrace it? Yes.

    I mean, if instead of the “b” word it was the “n” word, would they still embrace it – and have linked to it? I seriously doubt it. But the sentiment would be virtually identical.

    So…Simon & James, why are you comfortable with expressions that degrade women?

  25. Leveraging 100 to 1 has all the reality of a dog p_ssing on a tree and walking away satisfied that he now owns the tree.

    The USA tax laws passed by liars, thieves, and murderers – AKA *public servants* of the people – have economically slammed the middle class below Global Crime Inc. franchises in the USA.

    And with the passage of the Patriot Act giving the Secretary of the Treasury full power to pull anyone’s financial records at will and not for any suspected terrorist activity, well, here we are – a decade into the ponzi scheme of war lords who go to war based on *prophecy* – mirror mirror on the wall, who is the richest of us all? – curious, is it Cheney…?

    So with all these modern ethical boundaries (who cares how you got rich – pre-emptive war still works good), I also could care less what names hooligans call women – they’re all rabid raccoons to me, when one on one you can take them out when they come for you – all options on the table.

    I’m thinking that after Obambi – Part Deux – next up is a gay Marine as President. Think of the terror that will inflict, psychologically, on simple global peoples….this is what they do to you if you do not obey *the law*.

  26. Righteous indignation. Pomp and stomp distraction on rhetoric. Sickening display of missed priorities and self proclaimed innocence…I recently joined the Republican Party and now I have special speaking rights with God. He tells me he can save me, but he’s not so sure about you guys!

  27. Michele Bachmann Flunking History

    How about the fact that African-Americans had to use different toilets, drinking fountains, eat in seperate resturants, sit in specific seats on a public bus up until at least the mid-1960’s? That’s equality?

  28. Well goldy, it was a start, and Bruce, can you check and see if i’m on that saved list? Got 3 other names good to go, but there alot o interference on this channel.

  29. Well, we all belong to the Human Race . . . so where are we racing too. Based up past history, we will all face extinction eventually. Just as well sit back and enjoy the trip and . . . learn to all live together in Harmony according to Mother Nature and Father Time. Neither can we ever control nor escape. As the old saying goes, “better to hang together, or we will hang separately”. The only really good outcome for all is to pay homage to our Creator and live for and part of the Common Good. The only thing one can take into the next level of existence will be the everlasting personal relationships we had here on planet Earth. Our Creator obviously created us for a purpose, it is up to each of us to find our own path in our personal journey to discover truth and return to our Creator having lived a life of involvement with all creation as well as with one another. Happiness can only come from searching for, finding, and sharing in these eternal friendships.

  30. @Gold – so what are you saying – Michelle Bachmann was actually the brains behind USA slave labor and race segregation? Is that what she got wrong?

    Corps dismantling USA infrastructure and manufacturing and setting up shop in countries that don’t acknowledge a difference between slave labor and *citizen* is – wha’? – righting the wrongs of social engineering in 20th century USA…?

  31. @ Bruce, hey, you did’nt get hold of some of that 8% 3 month Italian paper now did ya? Thats crazy unsystainable doublin of yo money, far out. And i’ll take the CDS adventure that pays trice that, first of the year. After that, you’re on your own.

  33. I like this video because the more Bachman talks, the more she looks and sounds stupid. I hope she is spending her own campaign money. I don’t really care, she’s wasting somebody’s money!

  34. Pharma Fraud Rock
    (Tunr: Jingle Bell Rock)
    Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud rock
    Pharma Frauds sting and Pharma Fraud ‘ca-ching’
    Snatching and catching up bushels of money
    Here comes a consent decree
    Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud rock
    Pharma Frauds slime with Execs doing time
    Ducking and pratting in the courthouse square
    In the frosty air.
    What a bright time, it’s the right time
    To lock the cash away
    Pharma Fraud time is a swell time
    To go inspecting with the FDA
    Giddy-up OSI, pick up your feet
    Fraud watch around the clock
    Fix and mingle with the tap-dancing feet
    That’s the Pharma Fraud rock.
    Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud rock
    Pharma Frauds sting and Pharma Fraud ‘ca-ching’
    Snatching and catching up bushels of mon (ey)’
    Have the plea bargains now begun?
    Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud, Pharma Fraud rock
    Pharma Frauds slime with Execs doing time
    Ducking and pratting in the courthouse square
    In the frosty air.
    What a bright time, it’s the right time
    To lock the cash away
    Pharma Fraud time is a swell time
    To go inspecting with the FDA
    Giddy-up DOJ, pick up your feet
    Fraud watch around the clock
    Fix and mingle with the tap-dancing feet
    That’s the Pharma Fraud
    that’s the Pharma Fraud
    That’s the Pharma Fraud rock!

    Happy Holidays!

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