No Kiss From the Economist (1st Diary)
The Economist opens its article on Democrats and the War with a picture of a button showing The Kiss. In a rather condescending manner the article uses the Lamont campaign to paint a picture of the...
View ArticleCIA destroyed tapes of "harsh interrogations"
On the NY Times site an article by Mark Mazzetti indicates new information that the CIA destroyed tapes of interrogations because they feared that the tapes would provide evidence that could be used to...
View ArticleI Said I'd Vote JRE-I Just Couldn't
I've been adamant that I would continue to support and vote for JRE and the issues that I believe he best addressed, and I've said that I would vote for him today no matter what. I went to the polling...
View ArticleNew York Times reporting $85 B "Loan" to AIG Update, correction
New York Times reports that an $85 Billion loan is being given to AIG in return for an 80 percent stake in the "troubled" insurance company. This continues a trend of bailing out those corporations...
View ArticleFollow up to Arken's Ike blackout diary #5
I write few diaries, so I'm glad to be able to offer this as a follow-up to this important diary The flow of information is a critical matter in the working of a democracy, the greatest pushback we...
View ArticleDow under 9000/ Poverty in the Heartland- 2 Updates
I certainly don't know if it will stay there, but the Dow just dropped under 9000. I just got back from a visit in Hoosierland, and things were grim there last week, they are grimmer now. GM a big...
View ArticleDow in the tank again-Pump in more $ fast
What could we do with the money we are wasting by throwing it into the financial sector of the economy? With these many billions, we could rebuild the rail system, we could retool Detroit, and the...
View ArticleSpat upon by Hippies
You probably think I mean the myth that real soldiers got "spat upon by hippies" don't you? Well, I was a semi-real soldier (or would that be a real, semi-soldier, since I was in the USAF) who was...
View ArticleHouse approves the stimulus package
I just got an alert from the NY Times that the House has approved the stimulus bill to the tune of $819 billion. 244-168 is the vote tally listed by the NYT. I hope this is just a start, and I'm sure...
View ArticleThe World Turned Upside Down
The 4th amendment received a shot of life from the Supreme Court today. In Belton (453 US 454), the rule was taken that once the police arrest someone in a car they have the right to search the...
View Article5 Million Jobs Lost
According to the NY Times, the economy shrank at the rate of 6.1% the first three months of this year instead of the predicted 4.7% decline. This steep drop is evidence of the task before the country...
View ArticleBankruptcy for Chrysler
It is with very mixed feelings that I read that Chrysler is going into bankruptcy. According to the NY Times, a swift, "surgical" process, was set to be filed in United States Bankruptcy Court in New...
View ArticlePimping away for a sad day
This is just a very short diary, more of a pimping project, actually. I remember Kent State 40 years ago. Its disconcerting to think that it was so long ago, and that these kids would be getting...
View ArticleWhile we fight the meta war
While I think the Meta-war is necessary and I'm not unwilling to take my part in it, the real deal is going down all around the industrial world. The price of US exceptionalism is that we seem to...
View ArticleWho the Devil is talking on my computer???
I'm sitting here at work, waiting to get called into the arena and killing a little time, when all of a sudden my computer breaks into an audible commercial. I can't even figure out what is going on...
View ArticleI Will Close Gitmo
Heh, and I thought that meant sometime soon. And I thought that meant sometime within the first year he took office, I can't remember exactly why I thought that, something I heard somewhere I guess....
View ArticleYour Best Job
Meteor Blades has a piece up about Jobs and Deficit reduction. In a poll he cites it says that 54% of Americans believe that Manufacturing is most important or 2nd most important as an underpinning...
View ArticlePrayers for Levon
According to a post by his wife Sandy and Daughter Amy, Levon Helm is in the last stages of his battle with cancer. I am not much of the praying kind, but if you are send one his way. Levon had one...
View Article27 years to life
I spent yesterday with a man who was given a 27 years to life sentence. The crimes were serious, but not violent and it was a shock when the sentence was handed out back in the last years of the...
View ArticleNo Charges in Boys Death
Sonoma County Sheriff's Deputy Eric Gelhaus will not be tried in the shooting of Andy Lopez. Jill Ravitch the Sonoma County District Attorney fresh from re-election has ruled that her office will not...
View ArticleThree years after shooting a teenager
In 2013 a young kid was walking to a local field that kids played in. He was carrying a BB gun that bore some resemblance to an AK-47, but had attracted no attention and was not pointing the damned...
View ArticleWatching the fire from afar
While I'm here in the Midwest taking care of family business my beloved Sonoma County is burning. My wife, just a week post surgery, saw the orange glow over the Calistoga hills and had just a couple...
View ArticleSunday at the Midwest Cafe
I’m sitting in a little Mom&Pop restaurant in trump territory Indiana. It’s Sunday morning and there are Sunday clothes and farmer duds at the various tables. An old retired guy from my little town...
View ArticleIt was raining....
In Flanders Field the poppys grow trump he can’t see them though He’s eating fries in some Hotel Because he heard some raindrops fell The gallant men who fought and died He shrugs off and orders...
View ArticleA great Public Defender has died
Fifty-nine year old Jeff Adachi, The elected Public Defender of San Francisco has died. Mr. Adachi leaves a record of public service and advocacy for reform in the Criminal Justice system that is...
View ArticleRetired Local Minister Has Died
I didn’t know Don Schilling except by sight. I knew his wife, Dee, more by reputation as a fellow lawyer in the Sonoma County area, where she was known to be a fighter. I didn’t know of Don’s early...
View ArticleCensure as an option
According to Robert Costas, Senator Manchin has called for a a censure vote to censure trump. Reports indicate that there may be some appetite for this option. The virtue of this is that it a vote...
View ArticleGreat speech by Sen. Sanders
I just watched Sanders lay down a number of markers that will be discussed at the next debate. If Biden can do a decent job of answering those questions, then he should able to face down trump to the...
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