Redefining Patriot

I've been hearing on the radio and seeing on the teevee a lot about a government supported program called Safelink, that provides free cell phones and minutes to the economically disadvantaged. Which is a good idea, I guess, that in an emergency people are able to contact help. Why a cellular over a land line? I don't know, perhaps so the homeless can use them as well.
But hearing and reading about this program started me to wondering: how did this program get started with out the Tea Baggers protesting against it? I mean, if they going to get their knickers in a twist over health care reform, a basic necessity, then why haven't they taken to the Capitol steps over this?
Well, they soon will be. A Google search about this program's origins led me to this website, where the blogger suddenly finds they have problems with the government running deficits. A person who had no problem with spending billions monthly in Iraq and Afghanistan to no end, spending millions more on unconstitutional spying on American citizens because they are a patriot, now has a problem with assisting those people being crushed under the weight of the economy run into the ground by these "patriotic" programs.
I think we really need to redefine "patriot".

The New Downing Street Memos

In 1 May 2005, official British governments documents were leaked to the press, heretofore known as The Downing Street Memos (or, as they were known in England, the Downing Street Minutes). Nothing more than writings on a piece of paper, notes taken at a meting, they stated clearly that the US (under the Bush administration) was intent on invading Iraq and "the intelligence and facts were being fixed [by the U.S.] around the policy" of removing Saddam Hussein. For many people in the anti-war(or pro-peace, if you like)movement, it was the smoking gun that proved that the war in Iraq was not a necessity, rather an undertaking of choice, by an administration eager to enrich political donors and cabinet members enough to deliberately falsify documents. It was roundly ignored by the right as well as the corporate media as everyone was making a buck from the Iraq war.
Now, years later, an equally damning leak has made it's way into the press. Called ClimateGate, it shows through emails and documents leaked from the University of East Anglia’s Hadley Climate Research Unit that scientists were conspiring to falsify data to support an already arrived at conclusion, global warming climate change.
Now don't get me wrong, I don't think we should be dumping more pollutants into the atmosphere, but this seems less about protecting the environment and more about a select few becoming billionaires in the cap and trade carbon market (which shifts cost from polluters on to the consumer, and doesn't do much to end pollution)who seem to have a double standard about reducing one's carbon footprint. It's like selling low energy fluorescent bulbs on the premise of saving a few dollars to people too stupid to care about disposing of them properly.
The leaked emails, touted by the right as evidence that global warming climate change is all hype, will not even be published by the "liberal" New York Times, the same "liberal" paper that committed treason and aided Judith Miller in leaking the name of a CIA operative handed to them by a Bush administration official bent on punishing said operative's husband for declaring forged documents used to justify an attack against Iraq to be forgeries.
So I don't expect these leaked emails to be reported on by the corporate media anymore than they applied to Downing Street Memos. The agenda has been set, and not having fully drank from the global warming climate change Kool-Aid, I can see how they've been slowly selling people 'green' in much the same manner as they sold us the war in Iraq. Hopefully, the end result will not be the same.

The Annual Unbrainwashed Anti-Holiday Rant

I really have come to loathe this time of year. Of course, I mean the holiday season, which starts officially tomorrow, although some radio stations have been playing Christmas music since Halloween, which means that millions of innocent people have had to endure that one person who insists on listening to Christmas music until you're ready to vomit anytime you hear "Holly Jolly Christmas", "Jingle Bell Rock", and "Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree", which seem to get played every hour and a half on these stations. And although 'officially' the 'shopping season' doesn't start until four o'clock tomorrow morning, some retailers, in an effort to prop up a dismal year, are letting you know they'll be open today, so that when Dad, Brother and Uncle Pete are relaxing post-meal on the couch watching the football game, Mom, Grandma, and Aunt Shirley can sneak off to KMart to buy more presents that will get lost in the post Christmas morning overkill, that is, after they've finished all the dishes.
And by this time tomorrow, we'll be inundated with stories of that one shopper who falls victim to the spirit of the season and is trampled to death by salivating shoppers pushing each other out of the way to have first dibs on some item they don't really need but couldn't pass up, because it was such a bargain.
This is also the time of year where advertising takes it's toll on me, and I can hardly stand to see another commercial with kids in their jammies waiting for Santa, elves, or dogs with 'reindeer' antlers on their heads. And it's also the time of year when Christ-centric fuckwads refuse to acknowledge that their might be other religions celebrating their various holidays as well, and threaten to boycott advertisers who do acknowledge it in the same breath as they do Christmas.
It's also the time of year when, despite warnings of anthropegenic global warning climate change, not to mention dire predictions of the arrival of peak oil, people cover their yards with displays consisting of so many lights they could be seen from space. Many communities erect Nativity displays, or allow them to be erected on public property.
Not any more in Chambersburg, PA, where every year the local garden club was allowed to erect an Nativity Scene on the ground surrounding the town fountain. That is, until the local Pennsylvania Non-Believers, an atheist group, stepped in. It seems they wanted to put up a sign for the solstice honoring Atheist war veterans. I mean, after the birth of Jesus, what could be more sacred than our soldiers?
Oh. wait a minute, this is a sign honoring our veterans, not our, troops, a difference indicated by where they are now, either over in Iraq and Afghanistan, making sure that the Good Ol' US of A gets first crack at what little oil there is left, or, over here displaying the symptoms of post traumatic stress syndrome, reminding those who gleefully sent them over there, that, yes indeed, war is Hell.
Anyway, the town council, sensing a political hot potato decided that, rather than allow a religious-free message be posted, decided to remove the Nativity. Score a point for the War On Christmas!

You're Still Here?

With all the attention being lavished on Sarah Palin now due to her recent book and tour, it's time ask ourselves: what about that other right wing nut-job from last year's campaign? No, I'm not talking about Joe Lieberman, I mean that other Joe, Joe the Plumber?
He popped up recently at a rally for Cherilyn Eagar, who's looking to unseat longtime Senator Bob Bennett and was interviewed by Editor & Publisher. In it, he hoped that Sarah Palin did not run for president in 2012, but praised her for writing nice things about him in her book. That's very nice of him since Palin is drawing large crowds to her book signings as Joe, not so much. Also, while Palin's book is sure to be on best sellers lists, Joe's book is in remainder bins.
Sam/Joe took used the interview as an opportunity to slam media coverage of himself, noting that the tax lien filed against him was sitting at the Ohio State Capitol in Columbus two months prior to his well-documented exchange with then-candidate Barack Obama over tax policy. He also criticized the media attempts to paint him as a wife beater and racist, but offered up no evidence to dispute these claims. He slammed journalists in general for making accusations at the same time he accused President Obama's policies as "unAmerican". Joe knows a lot about being a journalist following his ten days as a 'war correspondent" for the conservative Web site pjtv.com, where he failed to notice any of any of Israel's war crimes during Operation:Cast Lead.
Sam/Joe also criticized those who say Wurzelbacher is capitalizing on his fifteen minutes of fame. I mean, everybody gets book deals, record deals, journalism gigs, and appearance fees, right?

Once A Quitter..........

Looking for "Real America"? Look no farther than this video, which shows an angry mob booing Sarah Palin after she left before signing their books on her recent book tour. What Palin doesn't get is that these people own her, they waited in the rain, and while some staunch supporters may make apologies for Sarah stiffing them, there's also a certain percentage that will never buy a Palin endorsed product again.
I would have liked to have been in that bus as it sat their idling, her supporters outside chanting, but what went on in that fabulously ornate mobile billboard, we'll never know. Did her handlers hold her back as Sarah ambled to the door, not wanting to let her people, the real Americans, down? Or, did her handlers insist she go out and finish the job while Palin demonstrated why she is a rogue by refusing to meet and greet any of those people she will surely come to despise by the end of this tour? Whichever it was, I'm sure it was the real Sarah Palin, not the one she presents before the cameras, oozing contempt for the very people who will make her the next president of the United States.

Sarah Palin's Coming To Town

Resigned ex-Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin kicked off her 2012 Presidential Campaign book tour today here in my hometown, with a book signing at Barnes and Noble, and lots of Grand Rapidians lined up to gawk and help push her ghost written tome on to the best sellers list. This is not surprising, as this is one of the most conservative parts of that state, a place where John McCain has been removed from McCain-Palin bumper stickers (like he was the weak link in that train wreck)on the back of elderly driver's Buicks, leaving Sarah, Plain and Tall. In fact some "news" networks went as far as to edit in old campaign footage to bolster the claims. I'm sure it was just because it's so much cheaper than sending a news crew out to film a bunch of obese and wrinkled septuagenarians who took time off from their busy schedule to stand in line.
Palin's book tour is focused on the "real America", because somewhere in the faltering brain cells of those few people left who still refer to themselves as Republicans, small cities and rural areas are more American than say, California or New York City. This is her way of saying that if you live in these outlying regions, and as long as you vote Republican, then your vote counts, darn it. And if you the other 78% of Americans, well, darn it, you're just not real enough to deal with everyday problems, such as your daughter's baby daddy posing for Playgirl, or being interviewed by Katie Couric as a political candidate, instead of as one working mother to another like you thought. Whatever it is, she's not going away anytime soon. You betcha.

So Much Useless And Pointless Noise Adding Up To A Giant Waste Of Time And Energy

By now, the pattern is familiar. Whatever President Obama does, no matter how trivial it may seem, is cause for criticism from the right. Obama becomes elected president, he isn't even an American citizen. Obama carefully weighs his options on Afghanistan, he is criticized for not making a decision, "whether or not it is right". The administration announces it's holding the trial of alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in NYC, the right brings out loser Rudy Giuliani.
It's to the point of ridiculousness now. During his state visit to Japan, President Obama bowed to the emperor, and the right wing noise machine goes apoplectic. Some infer that Obama must have grown up watching The Golden Girls.
How soon they forget.

The homophobes on the right never had a problem with Bush kissing the Saudi prince, of course, they'd even have Bush give him a rim job if it meant cheaper oil which with for them to fuel their gas sucking SUVs.
Now I'm not saying we shouldn't be able to criticize President Obama, once again, that was the right wing during the Bush administration, admonishing the left for criticizing the president during a time of war. Well, those wars that Bush started are still going on, so what has change but the party affiliation of the president, and the color of his skin?

The Easiest Job In The World Is Fact Checker At Fox News

..Mainly because they don't check facts, they merely make shit up. They already went to court to protect their right to lie to people and shield advertisers from negative publicity, after they won that case, well, you know the rest of the story.
recently, Sean Hannity aired a segment on Michelle Bachman's most recent tea bagger gathering. In order to inflate the numbers, someone edited footage from one rally that had a large number of lunatics onto one for Bachman's smaller lunatic fringe gathering. After being busted, not by media watchdogs, but a comedy show, Hannity weakly offered up this apology:

we screwed up - we aired some video of a rally in September, along with a video from the actual event,...It was an inadvertent mistake, but a mistake nonetheless.

Yes, someone inadvertently took one piece of file footage from another file and put it in with another accidentally. Happens all the time. On Fox News.
Now I seem to remember the professional prevaricators at Fox getting their tighty-whities in a bunch when Dan Rather reported on the Killian Documents, which were criticisms of George W Bush by his former commander in the National Guard.
Sean Hannity on the lack of media ooutrage over the documents, which were later found to be forgeries:

I was just thinking to myself, you tell me if I'm wrong here, if Republicans had forged documents or had gotten forged documents and gave it to a news organization, and they turned out to be false, wouldn't this be a much bigger story in the mainstream media?

Isn't this the same form of misrepresentation you're guilty of Hannity? More:

An article in The New York Observer today revealed some new information about the CBS investigation into the "Memogate" scandal. According to the story, freelance producer Michael Smith, he taped many of his conversations with CBS investigators and executives in the weeks after the scandal broke.

Smith told The Observer that the tapes of his conversations proved that nobody at CBS, quote, "seemed interested in the truth."

And, so it seems, is anybody at Fox News.
Rather was run off CBS News by the right for his mistake. I think it only fair that Hannity be held to the same standard.
Contact Fox News here and demand they fire Hannity for such an obviously unfair and imbalanced piece.

Happy Veteran's Day!

Because Rupert Murdoch Cannot Have Enough Money

Now he's going to turn all his online News Corpse sites into subscription only. Good luck with that. People I know all over are clamoring to put money down on a web site to read the news.
To make his point, Murdoch says now his online newspapers will be "invisible" to Google users.
How will they find his online papers?
Murdoch thinks that because people demanded and pay for Fox News on their cable systems, that people who like that sort of propaganda will look for it online as well. Idiot. People won't look for it online because it would tear them away from Fox News, require them to get out of their comfy chairs, and require them to read. Fox News better because reading done for viewer. Viewer not even have to think, just do as Glenn, Bill or Sean tell them to. Viewer no like computers, computers reek of intellectualism.
Rupert knows you have two coins in your pocket, he can hear them clinking around. And, by God, he's going to find away to get them from you, even if he has to torpedo his own websites to get them.

Let's Excise All Unpleasantness To Keep Up Our Lives As An Illusion

I took my kids to see a movie yesterday, using movie passes my brother's girlfriend had given me almost a year ago as a thanks for helping her move into my brother's apartment. Given Hollywood's crappy output this past year, it took us that long to find a movie we could all finally agree on seeing. Our choice was The Men Who Stare At Goats, based on the book of the same name, mainly because Wilbur really wanted to see it, which meant of course his little brother wanted to as well.
The film centers on a journalist who stumbles on to the story of a lifetime as he investigates a psychic unit within the US Army. The unit is first run by Lt. Col. Bill Django as a new age alternative to standard military operational procedure, and uses psychic means.One scene, which takes place after Django has been kicked out of the military and Larry Hooper has taken over, concerns Hooper's experiments with mind control using LSD. After dosing a recruit and exposing him to flashing lights and loud noises, the recruit walks stark naked into the middle of the base and begins shooting aimlessly as other soldiers march and drill. The point of this scene is to illustrate not only the evilness of Larry Hooper, but of how use of techniques can have unintended consequences when used not for good, but for evil. No soldier is shot, but they do scramble for safety when the soldier begins shooting.
Well, now some people feel the scene should be edited from the film following the tragedy at Ft. Hood. Considering early reports indicating multiple shooters, this isn't very close to real life at all.
It's funny how sensitive Americans are when it comes to tragedies close to home, but when a tragedy occurs somewhere else, the insensitivity comes shining through.
I would say this is a recent development, that somehow, Americans became stupider or wimpier, but even The Manchurian Candidate was pulled from distribution because of it's eerily similarity to the Kennedy Assassination (You know, brainwashed patsy, part of conspiracy to assassinate a president)as well as scenes of the Twin Towers being excised from the first Spiderman movie.
But IMHO, this is being brought up to reinforce the single shooter theory, and negate any stories of second gunmen. Better the people thinkl it was due to the suspect having to misdiagnose cases of PTSD than think there was any sort of conspiracy.

Another Big Fuck You To The American People

It's nice to know that as the Republicans and Democrats waste time bickering in a non-rush to offer health care to millions of Americans that they can set aside their differences long enough to condemn the Goldstone report , because, even though it condemns the actions of both Israel and Hamas, it is still "biased". Why is it biased? Because Hamas, with their rockets their barely reach their target are much worse than the Israeli government dropping white phosphorous on civilian populations, targeting schools and other numerous infractions of international law.
So the Obama administration, which has sided with the criminals in the Bush administration, who tortured and committed numerous other crimes, has once again sided with the bad guys (okay worse guys) once again.
The report, which will go before the UN General Assembly on Wednesday, is just another in a long list of reasons Israel has used to stall peace talks. Israel also refuses to stop building illegal settlements, destroying Palestinian homes, and ravaging Palestinian crops until a peace agreement has been made, which gives them all the more reason to oppose a settlement.
But how about those assclowns in Congress? Seriously, it's almost as if the taxpayers don't exist. "Sorry your beloved family member had to die, but we had to protect more criminals who receive your money and have their health care taken care of by the US government.

The Selective Amnesia Of The Cheney Family

Does Dick Cheney have Alzheimer's? Did he contract it from his years of association with Ronald Reagan? In recently released FBI documents of an interview with then Vice President Cheney, he claimed that he has no idea" who leaked Plame's name to Bob Novak, he does not recall any discussion with Libby of perceived nepotism associated with Wilson's selection for the CIA assignment, and that the vice president is relatively certain that he spoke to someone about the article but he cannot remember exactly who it was.(UPDATE:A list of 22 things Cheney can't recall about the Plame affair) Which is pretty much the same testimony Reagan gave in the Iran-Contra case.
Well, if Alzheimer's isn't contagious, it certainly is hereditary. Take Cheney's daughter, Liz (Please). When President Obama went to Dover AFB to honor returning fallen soldiers, she shot back "I think that what President Bush used to do is do it without the cameras. And I don't understand sort of showing up with the White House Press Pool with photographers and asking family members if you can take pictures. That's really hard for me to get my head around...It was a surprising way for the president to choose to do this."
What she fails to remember is that President Bush never met returning caskets at Dover, EVER. Neither did her father. With cameras, or not, the previous administration loved to send US troops to die, make money for their crony friends doing it, and never having to be reminded of the end result of their handiwork. In fact, in 2004, Bush wanted to slash over one billion dollars from the Veteran Affairs budget.
So I guess it's okay for Liz Cheney to blather on about things she chooses not to remember, it's her right as an American. The problem here is that in their mad rush to torpedo the efforts of the Obama administration to undo all the evil inflicted by the previous administration (which is certainly no mad rush unto itself), the Fox "news" organization will put anyone on who is willing to lie or selectively remember events to cast an unflattering light on them to further their corporate right wing agenda.

Satan Is Better Than Jesus

Why, you may ask, and I will tell you.
Studies have proved that intercessory prayer doesn't work, that in fact, God and Jesus either don't have all the magic powers that their followers claim they do, or they really don't give a fuck about humans.
However, Halloween candy prayed over by witches are chock full of demons. So if God/Jesus can't do anything about the demon filled candy offered for free to good little Christian children, they must not be as powerful combined as Satan is on his own.
And if Satan is more powerful than God/Jesus, using the same system used to determine which football team is better than another by virtue of number of victories incurred during a season, that means that Satan is better than Jesus.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I feel compelled to dress up as The Dude and mooch Milk Duds from my neighbors.......

The Pinnacle Of Retardation

Rep. Tom Price (R-GA) and 75 other House Republicans have introduced a resolution "expressing gratitude and appreciation to the individuals and families who participated in the Taxpayer March on Washington on September 12, 2009".
I'll let that sink in.



The irony of wasting taxpayer money "honoring" people who protested "skyrocketing deficits, taxpayer-funded bailouts, pork-barrel projects", in other words-wasting taxpayer money, is proof that the Republicans are more interested in embarrassing the Obama administration than actually accomplishinganything that falls beyond their limited abilities.
I mean, sure, those people should be commended for listening to some guy on television who told them when and where they should go, and what they should do when they get there. After all, we are not truly free until we blindly follow the commands of our favorite "journalists" on our favorite "news networks". And it was important to get these people off their couches, into the fresh air where they could walk on, drive on, or fly to taxpayer funded streets, sidewalks and airports to complain about taxes.
Good for you, Republicans, for acting like the self-involved and self-important people we always knew you were.

The Perfect Career Choice For A Prime Motivator

George W. Bush, a motivational speaker? Surely, a former alcoholic and cocaine abuser who skated through life on his famous father's political and business connections has no clue about motivation. Until you think about it.
After all, he motivated citizens of two great cities in two different countries (Baghdad and New Orleans) to find a new place to live. He motivated defense contractors to overcharge the US taxpayers for services in Iraq by cutting their taxes and stopping any oversight. He also motivated a group of cronies to loot money from the Iraqi people.
His lack of oversight within his own administration motivated the office of the vice-president to commit treason and out a CIA operative as retaliation for the people who were motivated to forge documents to start a war being exposed as the motivated liars they are by her husband in a NYT op-ed.
The Bush administration were also motivated not to regulate the banking industry, leading us into the economic mess were in now. Fortunately, he wasn't too much of a motivator that the alleged opposition party dare investigate any of the motivation behind his criminal acts.
And now, in the end, he has motivated the Cheney family and friends to fight to keep Dick out of jail for war crimes he authorized while Bush was off motivating the whole left blogosphere to rise up against him. So, for $100,000 a pop, Bush can motivate people to acquire an approval rating of 22%, just like he had.
And people wonder why the economy's in the toilet.

Grow Up, It's Halloween

The United States has become a haven for overly sensitive, namby-pamby cry babies whose sensibilities are easily offended any time some one dares to make a joke.
Take The Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles. They've become deeply offended by an 'illegal alien' Halloween costume. the costume features an orange jumpsuit stamped 'illegal alien', a rubber alien mask, and a green card. While I will fully admit the costume isn't clever, or funny, only the most sensitive of types would be offended by it.
Like Jorge-Mario Cabrera, the director of communications for CHIRLA. who thinks because the costume comes with a green card, that it's "an ignorant attempt to poke fun at a small community." Yes, but a small community of criminals who have entered the US illegally. Now, I am not opposed to immigration. Everybody in this country has ancestors who have emigrated from some other place. What I am against is those who operate outside the law, and yet seem to want to claim so sort of legal protection. I'm sorry, but you're a fucking criminal, no better than the previous presidential administration we had, which placed itself above the law as well. And if you're offended-good, you should be ashamed. Don't do disrespectful things then demand my respect.
1 in 6 Americans are living in poverty, there is no work in California, and the real unemployment rate in this country is at 16%. An influx of more unemployed people who are willing to work for less flooding the labor pool is the last thing we need. So don't cry to me if some uncreative redneck decides to wear a costume poking fun at your illegal activity. I'm sure they would find it just as funny if you wore a toothless mask with singed eyebrows and went as a meth-head.
After all, it's Halloween!

Gang Raped By The Corporatocracy In The Permanent Terror-Security Industrial Complex

Remember back in 2000, when George W. Bush was running for the presidency, and a number of female Republican politicians stood up and told us repeatedly that "W stands for women!"?
Or how about last year, when John McCain cynically chose Sarah Palin as his running mate because the Democrats had abandoned women by choosing Barack Obama as their presidential candidate over Hillary Clinton?
Of course, we all knew it was bullshit. The Republicans only care about women when they're white, pregnant, of hooked up to a life support machine. The rest of the time they could careless about women, unless they're trying to keep their wives from discovering their mistresses.
When Sen. Al Franken added an amendment to a defense appropriations bill that would not allow the US to do business with corporations that will not let their employees seek legal action in rape cases, 30 Republican Senators voted against that bill, including that guy who last year wasn't going to turn his back on women, Sen. John McCain.
So while right wing bloggers make a big deal about Hollywood liberals defending Roman Polanski, there seems to be a lack of outcry from the right about Jamie Leigh Jones who was brutally drugged and gang raped by her co-workers. Keep in mind, Franken wasn't asking these companies to change their policies, he was asking the tax payer funded government from funding more atrocities by denying companies that condone gang rape any more government contracts.
Guess we know where the right really stands on the issue of women's rights. They're not as important as the right of the corporatocracy to rape them with impunity.

Scannon's Corollary To Godwins' Law

"As an [online] discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches."-Godwin's Law
Any online discussion about Israel will end with the probability of anyone critical of the state of Israel being called an anti-Semite-Scannon's Corollary to Godwin's Law
We weren't always the bad guys. back in WWII, we faced down evil and triumphed, only to become what we feared most, the governmental embodiment of evil.
And no, this is not directed at President Obama, who has been called a Fascist/socialist/communist by the same people who supported the country's shift to the right, extreme far right, under the previous administration.
Right now, the US is considering a reassessment of the 2007 NIE that stated Iran had abandoned it's nuclear weapon program in 2003. Thge terror-industrial complex needs a new monster to shake at us, now that Saddam Hussein is dead and Osama Bin Laden is more than likely passed on as well. That "monster" is Mahmoud Ahmedinejad, a man so scary to millions of people that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned Iran that "the world will not wait indefinitely" for Iran to meet it's obligations on it's nuclear plans. Iran has, of course, repeatedly stated that they are seeking nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, and has opened up it's nuclear sites for inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency, which has found no evidence that Iran is doing anything except building a nuclear power plant thereby meeting it's "obligations" on it's nuclear ambitions.
In the meantime, the US has thrown it's support behind Israel, which has been accused of 37 different war crimes under the UN Goldstone report. The US, ready to impose economic sanctions on Iran for...absolutely nothing wrong, was one of the six countries voting against a resolution on the so-called "Goldstone report", which accuses both Israel and Hamas militants of war crimes committed during the 22-day Gaza conflict last December and January. Once more becoming part of the terror-industry complex.
Similarly, Israel has refused to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty and open it's nuclear sites up for inspection. And, by US law, according the the Symington Amendment, the US is forbidden to send aid to Israel until it does sign the treaty and open up it's sites to inspection.

So now we are the bad guys, the evil empire, ready to terrorize the world or our own people to meet our ends. WE threaten one country with sanctions for obeying the law while simultaneously enabling another to break every law of decency we used to hold as an ideal for the rest of the world.

Community Organized Television Is Coming....................................................Look Out!

Born At The Crest Of The Empire had a link to this post of how the television networks are jumping on the I-Participate bandwagon next week, with 60 television shows mentioning the program, or writing it into their scripts.
Which, since it's an Obama initiative, means once again the cries of "indoctrination" are rising from the right. Funny, I don't remember any complaints pre-Iraq war from these people about the propaganda foisted on the American people. But now, it's different, with that no Xmas celebrating secret Muslim in the White House.
But for me, the humor lies in the comment section over at Big Hollywood.
"I'd like to avoid this nonsense even if it means boycotting all TV for a week."-Oh, don't take such drastic measures. I'm sure Fox News isn't involved.
"I don't watch TV (except Fox news) anyway"-Ladies and gentlemen, the root of the whole problem.
"When coerced, it is not volunteerism, when service is involuntary or unpaid, it is slavery.
It is bad enough that the government is stealing our freedom, now they want us to help. "-Yes, we must do what the television tells us because we are all mindless zombies.
"Voluneerism is something that we should all be compelled to do because it is the Christian thing to do...it is expected of us. Certainly not because Pres. Opompous orders us to do it so it, like everything else, must reflect positively on him (because in Obamaland....EVERYTHING is about him!)."-Ladies and gentlemen, a true display of Christian love and understanding. Everything in America should be compelled to be about Jesus!
"I think someone should plan a counter campaign to turn off the tv during this period. Instead everyone should spend time with their families. I pledge to not watch tv during this period. I will instead enjoy the outdoors, spend time with family, or actually help another person without expecting payment in money or political credit."-As opposed to the rest of the year when you stay indoors, watch television ignore your family and don't do a thing without expecting financial enumeration for it.
It goes on and on, with people bemoaning their inability to watch television without being offended by someone actually asking them to be part of making a better society (oops, that's Socialism)and being indoctrinated into that whole community thing. In all this is a little less sinister than television participating in Nancy Reagan's Just Say No To (Some) Drugs program(which I'm sure they whole heartedly endorsed) back in the 1980's.
I know I will be watching very little of it, not because I hate Obama, but because television is a time thief, and 99% shit anyways. If you define yourself by what you watch on television, you are really nothing at all