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Barack Hussein Obama
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** The name Barack is an African name meaning "blessed." It is a variant of the Hebrew name Baruch.
* "You can lead a Republican to the facts, but you can't make him think."
* "Electing a Republican is like hiring a carpenter who thinks hammers are evil."
Source: Daily Kos diaries
* Stolen from a Google Group:
"And this, children is Niagara Falls. It was built sometime in the late 1950s by Mr. Niagara to protect the United States from the evil forces of Canada." - A History lesson from 'Eeeeeek the Cat.'
* "If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed. If you do read the newspaper you are misinformed. " -- Mark Twain
* "Technology, while adding daily to our physical ease, throws daily another loop of fine wire around our souls." -- Adlai Stevenson
* "I prefer someone who burns the flag and then wraps themselves up in the Constitution over someone who burns the Constitution and then wraps themselves up in the flag" -- Molly Ivins
* "The tyranny of a principal in an oligarchy is not so dangerous to the public welfare as the apathy of a citizen in a democracy. -- Montesquieu, 1748
* Creed: "There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle." -- Albert Einstein.
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From 'The Hill's Congress Blog'
Comes Shocking News on the IMF Funds 'Mandated Conditions'
Just Agreed to by Congressional Democratic Leaders
New Funds Approved for IMF
Would Worsen Global Economic Downturn
Evans Politics, June 2, 2009
The Hill's Congress Blog, May 26, 2009, here.
"...The Senate (as of May 26th had) passed a $108 billion blank check for IMF expansion, as part of the military supplemental, in response to a request from the administration in fulfillment of the U.S. commitment to global stimulus pledged at the G-20 meeting in April. Since this appropriation was not included in the House version of the bill, it is possible that the funding might be stripped, as Rep. Obey has stated is his preference, and Republicans have threatened to do. More likely, it provides an opportunity to include various key reforms, without which the funding will likely not achieve its intended impact of global stimulus and may actually do more harm than good.
"The Center for Economic and Policy Research reviewed the IMF loans given to countries since the onset of the crisis in September 2008, and found that the IMF has been mandating contractionary economic conditions on recipient countries, including fiscal deficit reductions, monetary tightening, and inflation-targeting measures that are actually exacerbating the recessions in recipient countries. This is shocking news, confirmed by press reports from Latvia (hospital and school closures, wage cuts), Hungary (wage and pension reductions, tax increases, cuts in social spending), Ukraine (tax hikes, pension cuts), Serbia (mandated layoffs, tax increases), and other recipient countries, particularly given that the point of IMF funding is to provide countries with resources to stimulate their economies during the global recession."
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Evans Politics had of course heard these things about the IMF, that it was all about the rich, developed nations having their way with less developed nations by means of using loans to them to get the conditions they wanted for those nations. In Bush's time, loans were utilyzed to impose harsh conditions of reproductive rights on countries receiving loans. For example, U.S. aid (not specifically IMF aid) for AIDS treatment in Africa was tied to the imposition of harsh, repressive reproductive rights policies.
However, the IMF must not continue to be the agent for the agrandizement of developed nations at the expense of less developed nations. The Hill Congress blog article states that, "In the past, the IMF has made substantial reforms to its policies only when mandated explicitly by Congress to do so, and Congress has not had a similar opportunity in the last decade."
Under Bush and Republican leadership in Congress, this is perhaps somewhat understandable. However, we are under Democratic leadership, now, and this sort of imposition of mandated imposition of policies which hurt ordinary and poor people in less developed countries by the IMF must not be allowed to continue. Congress must make it its' business to tie funds made available to the International Monetary Fund to FAIR and balanced policy towards these less developed nations - policy which does not hurt those nations' ordinary people. - Paul Evans
Tentative Deal Struck on War Funding
Democrats Reach Deal to Fund War
Plus Honor $100 Billion Obama IMF Promise
Evans Politics, June 2, 2009
See Associated Press, "Tentative Deal Struck for War Funding," at Yahoo News, June 1, 2009, by Andrew Taylor:
Leading House and Senate Democrats have reached a tentative deal to provide nearly $100 billion in a war funding bill yesterday. The bill includes a "generous" line of credit for the International Monetary Fund and $76 billion for Pentagon operations.
From what Evans Politics sees in the AP article, the bill also includes a few pretty generous earmarks, such as money for eight huge Boeing C-17 cargo jets sought by Senator Dianne Feinstein and top Republican Representative Jerry Lewis, both of California; and $489 million for Mississippi Republican Senator Thad Cochrane's pet project to restore Gulf Coast barrier islands.
"...The IMF funding is a top priority of Obama, who pledged the $100 billion line of credit at April's G-20 summit in London to help developing countries deal with the troubled global economy." Because the IMF funding involves the U.S. receipt of interest-bearing assets in return, its actual cost is ultimately only around $5 billion.
The $80 million which Obama requested to close Guantanamo was left out of this bill, and had never been included in the previous House version of an earlier bill. The Senate had previously voted down the Guantanamo funding 96 to 0.
On this bill, since about 50 liberal Democrats oppose the war funding and Republicans are sure to object to the IMF funding, ultimate passage remains uncertain.
Rest in Peace, George Tiller
Evans Politics, June 2, 2009
|
Extreme incitement to extreme acts has its consequences. It's not just the extreme wing of the anti-abortion movement. FOX News and the wingnuts on the right must stop their extreme language NOW. We've lost Martin Luther King, Jr., John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy from crazy people with guns with exteme views. They all got their ideas somewhere. The kind of language which incited Scott Roeder to kill Dr. Tiller, was promoted for years by the religious right and such news organs as FOX News. It needs to stop and it needs to stop now, before more people die. Fox News is using language which is quite extreme towards our President... do they think these sorts of words have no consequences? Read the article at the Guardian.co.uk titled, "For Years Anti-abortionists Tried to Stop Dr. Tiller. Finally a Bullet Did." |
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Rachel Maddow:
Former Right-to-Lifer Frank Schaeffer
Blasts the Extremists
He's still anti-abortion, he's still Christian, but he knows hate and
violence first hand. In fact his father wrote the book on it.
Everyone Should See
'Torturing Democracy'
'the definitive broadcast account of a deeply troubling chapter in recent American history.'
Video from Bill Moyers Journal, May 29, 2009
Evans Politics, June 1, 2009
90 minutes
There is a great article at Truthout on this by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship, called "Everyone Should See 'Torturing Democracy,'" which you can see, here. Here is the first half of the article, followed by an excerpt of the video, which I was able to find on the web. A link to the full video is provided, below.
*****
"In all the recent debate over torture, many of our Beltway pundits and politicians have twisted themselves into verbal contortions to avoid using the word at all.
"During his speech to the conservative American Enterprise Institute last week - immediately on the heels of President Obama's address at the National Archives - former Vice President Dick Cheney used the euphemism 'enhanced interrogation' a full dozen times.
"Smothering the reality of torture in euphemism, of course, has a political value, enabling its defenders to diminish the horror and possible illegality. It also gives partisans the opening they need to divert our attention by turning the future of the prison at Guantanamo Bay into a 'wedge issue,' as noted on the front page of Sunday's New York Times.
"According to the Times, 'Armed with polling data that show a narrow majority of support for keeping the prison open and deep fear about the detainees, Republicans in Congress started laying plans even before the inauguration to make the debate over Guantanamo Bay a question of local community safety instead of one about national character and principles.'
"No political party would dare make torture a cornerstone of its rejuvenation if people really understood what it is. And lest we forget, we're not just talking about waterboarding, itself a trivializing euphemism for drowning.
"If we want to know what torture is, and what it does to human beings, we have to look at it squarely, without flinching. That's just what a powerful and important film, seen by far too few Americans, does. 'Torturing Democracy' was written and produced by one of America's outstanding documentary reporters, Sherry Jones. (Excerpts from the film are being shown on the current edition of Bill Moyers Journal on PBS - check local listings, or go to the program's web site at www.pbs.org/moyers, where you can be linked to the entire 90-minute documentary.)
"Sherry Jones, a longtime colleague, and the film were honored this week with the prestigious RFK Journalism Award from the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights. 'Torturing Democracy' was cited for its 'meticulous reporting,' and described as 'the definitive broadcast account of a deeply troubling chapter in recent American history.'
"Unfortunately, as events demonstrate, the story is not yet history; the early chapters aren't even closed. Torture still is being defended as a matter of national security, although by law it is a war crime, with those who authorized and executed it liable for prosecution as war criminals. The war on terror sparked impatience with the rule of law - and fostered the belief within our government that the commander-in-chief had the right to ignore it.
"'Torturing Democracy' begins at 9/11 and recounts how the Bush White House and the Pentagon decided to make coercive detention and abusive interrogation the official US policy in the war on terror. In sometimes graphic detail, the documentary describes the experiences of several men who were held in custody, including Shafiq Rasul, Moazzam Begg and Bisher al-Rawi, all of whom eventually were released. Charges never were filed against them and no reason was ever given for their years in custody.
"The documentary traces how tactics meant to train American troops to survive enemy interrogations - the famous SERE program ('Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape') - became the basis for many of the methods employed by the CIA and by interrogators at Guantanamo and in Iraq, including waterboarding (which inflicts on its victims the terror of imminent death), sleep and sensory deprivation, shackling, caging, painful stress positions and sexual humiliation.
"'We have re-created our enemy's methodologies in Guantanamo,' Malcolm Nance, former head of the Navy's SERE training program, says in 'Torturing Democracy.' He adds, 'It will hurt us for decades to come. Decades. Our people will all be subjected to these tactics, because we have authorized them for the world now. How it got to Guantanamo is a crime and somebody needs to figure out who did it, how they did it, who authorized them to do it ... Because our servicemen will suffer for years.'" ...
Read the full article, here.
Torturing Democracy
See the full video, here.
Excerpt, part 1:
Keith Olbermann:
'FOX News Incited Dr. Tiller's Murder'
Evans Politics, June 1, 2009
By the way, the clinic in question delivered and arranged adoptions for, far more babies than were involved in late term abortions. Two doctors, independently of each other, had to recommend the abortion for overriding reasons involving the life of the mother before these were possible. |
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Good Morning Gaza:
The Radio Station Helping the Disabled
Evans Politics, June 1, 2009
AFP Video
Gaza has the highest percentage of disabled people of any country in the world. Out of a population of about 1.3 million, before the war, 70,000 people were disabled. About 3,000 more Gazans were disabled because of the latest Israeli invasion and bombing campaign. The U.N. Palestinian Refugee Agency funds Radio AlaRaza (sp?), FM 95, where there are 26 employees and about half have some kind of disability -- a radio station for the disabled community of Palestine, run by the disabled.
Embedding the video is disabled for AFP video
Click here to view this video about the Radio Station
for the disabled by the disabled.
Here is another video about the
Internews Humanitarian Media Response in Gaza
Learn how a West Bank network based in Hebron aided the people of Gaza
in getting information as to safety and relief efforts during the Israeli War.
President Obama:
The Beginning of a New GM
Evans Politics, June 1, 2009
Video from the White House
Sotomayor Derangement Syndrome
Posted on Evans Politics, June 1, 2009
Truthout, June 1, 2009, by William Rivers Pitt, photo from Wikimedia Common, quoted verbatim:
"They called it Bush Derangement Syndrome for eight years: the condition of being berserk with rage, hatred and fear over the acts and actions - nay, even the very existence - of George W. Bush and his administration.
"After last November, it became known as Obama Derangement Syndrome; symptoms included an obsession with birth certificates, a sudden ersatz sense of expertise on the intricacies of modern socialism and a general tendency to agree with anyone who disagrees with President Obama no matter how demented that opinion may be.
"Last week, the malady mutated into a whole new thing - Sotomayor Derangement Syndrome - and boy, but it's a doozy. Ranting incoherence, brazen racism and suicidal ideation swept through the ranks of the far right after Judge 
Sotomayor was nominated to replace Justice Souter on the high court, symptoms that became worse by orders of magnitude as the week wore on. By the weekend, those suffering from Sotomayor Derangement Syndrome had not only struck the bottom of the barrel in their attempts to tear the Sotomayor nomination down, but had plowed right through the wood and burrowed deep into the slime and ooze beneath.
"Among the most egregious examples was none other than G. Gordon Liddy, a man nobody had really listened to since his felony crime spree in Washington, DC, made him the subject of banner headlines in the waning months of the Nixon administration. During his Thursday radio broadcast, Liddy began his assault on Sotomayor along the oft-repeated "she's-a-racist" tack popularized by Liddy's right-wing brethren last week. "I understand that they found out today that Miss Sotomayor is a member of La Raza," fumed Liddy, "which means in illegal alien, 'the race.' And that should not surprise anyone because she's already on record with a number of racist comments."
"Not content to keep his comments at this particularly heady level of stupid, Liddy forged onwards and downwards. "Let's hope that the key conferences aren't when she's menstruating or something," said Liddy, "or just before she's going to menstruate. That would really be bad. Lord knows what we would get then." Unless Mr. Liddy was hatched out of some Monster Idiot condor egg somewhere, he has or had a mother at some point in his life. One hopes the good Mrs. Liddy, if she still lives, will take a moment to slap her sick-minded son across the mouth for denigrating her gender in such adolescent and obnoxious terms.
"Former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich wasn't shy about going the extra idiotic mile last week regarding Judge Sotomayor. On Friday, Gingrich sent out a fundraising letter restating his earlier accusations that Sotomayor was a racist, and then went next-level with his rhetoric.
If Civil War, suffrage, and Civil Rights are to mean anything, we cannot accept that conclusion. It is simply un-American. There is no room on the bench of the United States Supreme Court for this worldview. The checks and balances between the three branches of government are designed to prevent any small faction of society from exerting undue influence over the rest of us. If President Obama will not withdraw his nomination, then the Senate has a duty to ensure that judges with who hold these beliefs are not confirmed to serve on the Supreme Court.
Concerns about Sotomayor's activist view of the law grew so great that, despite the fact that President George H.W. Bush appointed her to the district court in 1991, 29 United States Senators voted against her nomination to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in 1998. THIS time ... she shouldn't even get a vote, and should be withdrawn from consideration. It's just not right - every American should expect that their sons and daughters from every background can rise by applying the work ethic under equal protection under the law.
Your background should NEVER impact the application of law under the U.S. Constitution. It should not be a consideration by the judge or an expected consideration by the judged. Decisions made by the highest court in the land should be made on the basis of what is right and wrong - not who is right and who is wrong!
"Civil war, suffrage, civil rights, un-American ... wha? Oh, wait, that's right, this was a fundraising letter, which means it doesn't have to make sense. With this letter, Gingrich is seeking to raise money from the same subsegment of the GOP base that vacuums up change from between the couch cushions and sends it to the RNC whenever they get a direct mailer warning about evil immigrant hordes conspiring with Hillary Clinton to abort all Christian fetuses, or something to that effect. Gingrich will turn a nifty profit with this letter, even if it is all nickels, and use the funds to position himself further as the far-right's darling candidate for the 2012 presidential election. Sense? Meh. There's money to be made.
"Michael Savage, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and the other leading lights of right-wing demagoguery raised a similar-sounding ruckus. Limbaugh went so far as to compare Sotomayor to disgraced racist Republican David Duke - a strange comparison, as this would normally be a reason for Limbaugh to support Sotomayor - and all of a sudden, many so-called "responsible" members of the GOP suddenly found themselves rushing to contain the damage.
"'Republican leaders scrambled yesterday to contain some of the more incendiary and racially tinged remarks that have been aimed at the judge,' reported The Washington Post on Friday, 'fearing that continued personal attacks on Sotomayor could severely damage the GOP's appeal to women and Hispanics. Sen. Jeff Sessions (Ala.), the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, said he was 'uneasy' with some of the remarks and urged Republicans to focus on her legal record.'
"'After a week of escalating race and gender rhetoric from the right over the Sotomayor nomination, it's now looking like some in the Republican Party - those concerned with actually getting elected - have become alarmed by the political damage the more extreme members of their party may be doing and are moving to rein in the vitriol,' reported Eric Kleefield of Talking Points Memo on Friday. 'It's the starkest example yet of an interesting division within the right, one that has been apparent for some time, but which the Sotomayor nomination has not only crystallized but accelerated: the right-wing bomb-throwers obsessed with ideological purity versus the right-wing pragmatists who want the party to actually win election again some day.'
"By the end of last weekend, Sotomayor Derangement Syndrome had blown this rift within the GOP wide open. Establishment conservatives are now directly pitted against the vocal ideologues on their right flank and a GOP base that seems to be avidly listening to them. For a party already traumatized by arguments over immigration, two decisive routs in a row at the polls, and an absolute absence of any real leadership, the advent of this newest intra-party bloodbath is the worst possible situation.
"Stay tuned."
General Motors Declares Bankruptcy
Evans Politics, June 1, 2009
CBS News: "Obama: GM Has 'Chance to Rise Again:" June 1 2009:
"(CBS/AP)
Saying that a collapse of U.S. automakers would have been "devastating for countless Americans," President Barack Obama said General Motors' bankruptcy filing would give the "iconic company a chance to rise again."
"GM president and CEO Fritz Henderson said it wasn't the end of the company, but "the start of a new and better chapter," after asking Americans to "give us another chance."
"GM filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection Monday in a deal that will give taxpayers a 60 percent ownership stake and expand the government's reach into big business.
"Government and company officials hope bankruptcy process will last 60 to 90 days. If successful, GM will emerge as a leaner company with a smaller work force, fewer plants and a trimmed dealership force.
"GM's bankruptcy filing is the fourth-largest in U.S. history and the largest for an industrial company. The company said it has $172.81 billion in debt and $82.29 billion in assets."
*****
In addition to the $20 billion the government has already sunk into General Motors, Obama committed the U.S. to a further investment of $30 billion more. Business analysts say that because of GM's indebtedness and the general business climate, the U.S. might expect to recover only about $3 for every $5 it puts into the company. The company was also forced to accept a new target of 10 million cars as an accepted "break even" goal in sales, whereas previously, the goal had been a break even goal of 16 million car sales. The company that emerges from bankruptcy, hopefully within 60 to 90 days, will be a smaller, leaner GM with fewer models and employing far fewer employees than the almost one million workers at one time tied to the manufacturing giant.
Despite skepticism by the conservative community about the 60 percent stake in GM that the U.S. will have, the President made assurances that the government's goal is to cut GM loose on it's own as soon as it is viable, and that, moreover, the U.S. will not be directing the day-to-day management of the company.
From the CBS article: "In addition to the U.S. stake, the Canadian government would take a 12.5 percent stake, with the United Auto Workers getting a 17.5 percent stake and unsecured bondholders receiving 10 percent. Existing GM shareholders are expected to be wiped out." ...
"The bankruptcy papers will permanently close nine more plants and idle three others to trim production and labor costs under bankruptcy protection. 21,000 more jobs will be eliminated. GM will also outline additional dealership cuts that could total 2,600."
Read the full CBS News article, here.
The bankruptcy filing came at 8 a.m. this morning and is the third largest in U.S. history.
Read the factsheet the government has released with details of the bankruptcy plan, here.
President Obama on GM Bankruptcy
Short speech to GM workers, June 1, 2009
Progressive Groups Push Public Plan
Politico, June 1, 2009, by Chris Frates, excerpt quoted verbatim:
"Billing it as their largest health reform campaign ever, progressive leaders are planning to spend at least $82 million to push reforms that include a public health insurance plan option.
"The campaign, expected to be announced Monday, is designed to put public plan opponents on notice that supporters are ready for a fight.
"'We know that the pharmaceutical industry and the insurance industry and conservative opponents to reform have huge piggy banks filled with money they plan to use to counter real health care reform, and we plan to fight back and fight for what we want,' said Jacki Schechner, a spokeswoman for Health Care for America Now, a coalition pushing for the public plan.
"The substantial investment by 11 progressive groups is funding a nationwide push that includes organizing grass-roots supporters and paid advertising, phone banks and direct mail.
"The coalition plans to bring at least 5,000 people to Washington on June 25 to make more than 300 lobbying visits. And in mid-June, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean plans to deliver hundreds of thousands of signatures to Congress, demanding that lawmakers pass a public plan.
"'We’re drawing a line in the sand that any legislation passed has to include a public plan,' said Mary Rickles, a spokesman for Dean’s Democracy for America. 'Americans deserve to choose between a public option and for-profit insurance companies.'
"The $82 million will be spent by Health Care for America Now, the Children’s Defense Fund, MoveOn.org, Americans United for Change, USAction, Campaign for Community Change, Rock the Vote, Campaign for America’s Future, the AFL-CIO, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, and the Service Employees International Union." ...
Together, they represent more than 30 million people.
Read the full article, here.
Visit the Health Care for America Now! website, here.
To call your Congressman and Senator and ask them to support a public health care plan option, click here. This is easy to do and you will not have to pay anything to do it. Let's put some heat on Washington!
Right Wing Talking Heads
Drive Bus Off Cliff!
Sotomayor Talk and Analysis
Evans Politics, June 1, 2009
Keith Olbermann's Countdown 10:36
Empathy, Sotomayor and Democracy:
The Conservative Stealth Strategy
A Truthout Original, May 31, 2009, by George Lakeoff, photo modified from Truthout © Reuters, excerpt quoted verbatim:
"The Sotomayor nomination has given radical conservatives new life. They have launched an attack that is nominally aimed at Judge Sotomayor. But it is really a coordinated stealth attack - on President Obama's central vision, on progressive thought itself, and on Republicans who might stray from the conservative hard line.
"There are several fronts: empathy, feelings, racism, activist judges. Each one has a hidden dimension. And if progressives think conservative attacks are just about Sotomayor, they may wind up helping conservatives regroup.
"Conservatives believe that Sotomayor will be confirmed, and so their attacks may seem irrational to Democrats, a last gasp, a grasping at straws, a sign that the party is breaking up.
"Actually, something sneakier and possibly dangerous is going on.
"Let's start with the attack on empathy. Why empathy? Isn't empathy a good thing?
"Empathy is at the heart of progressive thought. It is the capacity to put oneself 
in the shoes of others - not just individuals, but whole categories of people: one's countrymen, those in other countries, other living beings, especially those who are in some way oppressed, threatened, or harmed. Empathy is the capacity to care, to feel what others feel, to understand what others are facing and what their lives are like. Empathy extends well beyond feeling to understanding, and it extends beyond individuals to groups, communities, peoples, even species. Empathy is at the heart of real rationality, because it goes to the heart of our values, which are the basis of our sense of justice.
"Progressives care about others as well as themselves. They have a moral obligation to act on their empathy - a social responsibility in addition to personal responsibility, a responsibility to make the world better by making themselves better. This leads to a view of a government that cares about its citizens and has a moral obligation to protect and empower them. Protection includes worker, consumer, and environmental protection as well as safety nets and health care. Empowerment includes what is in the president's stimulus plan: infrastructure, education, communication, energy, the availability of credit from banks, a stock market that works. No one can earn anything at all in this country without protection and empowerment by the government. All progressive legislation is made on this basis.
"The president wrote of empathy in The Audacity of Hope, "It is at the heart of my moral code and it is how I understand the Golden Rule - not simply as a call to sympathy or charity, but as something more demanding, a call to stand in somebody else's shoes and see through their eyes."
"President Obama has argued that empathy is the basis of our democracy. Why do we promote freedom and fairness for everyone, not just ourselves or the rich and powerful? The answer is empathy. We care about our countrymen and have an obligation to act on that care, and to set up a government for the protection and empowerment of all. That is at the heart of everything he does.
"The link between empathy and democracy has been established historically by Professor Lynn Hunt of UCLA in her important book, Inventing Human Rights. To hear her speak, please if you have time (57 minutes), watch the video below."
(This video is a wonderful historical and philosophical examination of the underpinning of empathy as the basis of human rights. I cannot recommend it highly enough - PE):
*****
"The link between empathy and progressive thought is spelled out in my book Moral Politics and in my new book The Political Mind, just out in paperback (http://www.amazon.com/Political-Mind-Cognitive-Scientists-Politics/dp/0143115685).
"In describing his ideal Supreme Court justice, President Obama cited empathy as a major desideratum. Why? Because that is what our democracy is about. A justice has to take empathy into account because his or her decisions will affect the lives of others. Before making a decision you have to put yourself in the shoes of those who your decision will affect. Similarly, in judging causation, fairness requires that social causes as well as individual causes be taken into account. Empathy forces you to notice what is crucial in so many Supreme Court cases: systemic and social causes and whom a decision can harm. As such, empathy correctly understood is crucial to judgment. A judge without empathy is a judge unfit for a democracy.
"President Obama has described Justice Sotomayor in empathetic terms - a life story that would lead her to understand people who live through oppression and deprivation and what it does to them. In other words, a life story that would allow her to appreciate the consequences of judicial decisions and the causal effects of living in an unequal society.
"Empathy in this sense is a threat to conservatism, which features individual, not social, responsibility and a strict, punitive form of "justice." It is no surprise that empathy would be a major conservative target in the Sotomayor evaluation.
"But the target is not empathy as it really exists. Instead, the conservatives are reframing empathy to make it attackable. Their "empathy" is idiosyncratic, personal feeling for an individual, presumably the defendant in a legal case. With "empathy" reframed in this way, Charles Krauthammer can say, echoing Karl Rove, "Justice is not about empathy." The argument goes like this: Empathy is a matter of personal feelings. Personal feelings should not be the basis of a judicial decision of the Supreme Court. Therefore, "justice is not about empathy." Reframe the word "empathy" and it not only disqualifies Sotomayor; it delegitimizes Obama's central moral principle, his approach to government, his understanding of the nature of our democracy, and progressive politics in general.
"We cannot let conservatives get away with redefining empathy as irrational and idiosyncratic personal feeling. Empathy is the basis of our democracy, and its true meaning must be defended." ....
Read the full article, here.
PROOF: Torture does NOT work
and Never Stopped an Attack on America
Keith Olberman:
NO Terrist Attacks Were Disrupted
From the Use of Torture
Evans Politics, May 31, 2009
Video from May 30, 2009
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* Bush weighs in with own claim torture stopped attacks.
* Bush and Cheny claims are shown to be another lie, just like the lie of the Iraq - Al Queda Link, just like the lie of proof of weapons of mass destruction. Just another lie. Prosecute or Pardon! |
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*****
“Every company in America should be on its knees thanking Jesus for being born. Without Christmas, most American businesses would be far less profitable.” -- Bill O'Reilly
...and THIS, kiddies, is how the Republican leadership really feels. This is why the Republicans lost the election. Their leadership feels not humble joy of celebration at Jesus' birth. No, they're mainly glad they can make money off him. This is out of touch with the feelings of the American people.
If you like my politics pages, send your friends a link to them! And let me know what YOUR favorite news and views websites are. Email me with your own favorites, send me really good news stories, and let me know what you think of my website. - Paul