Chomsky on Al Jazeera

Nader on Obama

Today's talking point.

Today the US Supreme court rejected the application of the death penalty to child rapists. The ones that rape children not children that rape. I can imagine, since pedophiles are rightly condemned, many people will be saying this was a terrible decision. They will say these people do not deserve to remain alive.
So the talking point is, if child rapists know that they may get the death penalty, if the abused child talks, then they will not allow the child to talk. In other words they would murder the child, since either way if it talks he gets the death penalty or if he kills it, and is caught, then he gets the death penalty. In killing the child he makes it more plausible that he could get away.
Now I would much prefer the chance to recover from being raped as a child as opposed to attempting to recover from being murdered. No amount of counseling is going to bring a murder victim back to life.
Oh ya, and the death penalty has never been shown to be a deterrent.

R.I.P.

The Israelis are fucking monsters!

Ya right.

SO Tim Russert died on Friday and the accolades haven't stopped yet. The one problem I have is this narrative that he was a good journalist. THis notion that he asked the "hard" questions. One example they showed was him asking Cheney what if we aren't greeted as liberators in Iraq but instead as occupiers. Cheney responds that he doesn't see that happening and, that is it, no more questions. I remember because I was watching that Sunday and I remember screaming at the TV.
IT is amazing how quickly convenient myths are created. Years from now the story will be that we had bad intelligence on Iraq and there were no dissenting voices in the Intelligence Community. Nothing about the VIce President's office setting up its own intelligence group to create 'intelligence" about Iraq or Cheney personally visiting the CIA.
I just love the bullshit fairy tale about how America always tries to do the right thing for the right reason but sometimes we accidentally slaughter 3.2 million Vietnamese and 58,000 Americans.
What is sad is that American, who must live in total denial at all times, accept it.

Finkelstein

Here a student asks Dr. Finkelstein if he attended the Holocaust Denial Conference in Iran.

Go Moyers

One Billion Dollars Gone

Interesting fact

Obama will accept the Democratic nomination for President exactly 45 years to the day that Dr. King delivered his "I have a dream" speech.

My letter to the Journal Sentinel

Letter writer David Hughes showed the goals of American conservatives when he asked, "Why should I have to pay a tax for something I don't use?" in his rant against mass transit ("Don't fund transit," June 1). It seems to be the goal of American conservatives to tear up the social contract and attempt to hammer any human solidarity out of us. Basically, he is asking why he should care about others in society.

Another prime example of this thinking was the attempt to privatize Social Security. That's basically asking why we should care if the old widow across town has enough to eat.

If human beings are social animals, and reciprocal altruism is the basis of our advancement into a highly scientific civilization, do American conservatives suffer from some unknown malady that makes them go against human nature?

Justin Loper
Shorewood
Link to Journal Sentinel

Chutzpah

Today I was watching Good Morning America and they had a story about the children of soldiers. It was about a couple of women who make dolls with pictures of the children's father. Of course, it was such a heartfelt story from the media. The only problem is that they are guilty, the american media, for this war. Had they done their job and challenged the lies being put forth by the Bush Administration the war would have never been waged. All they had to do was pick up a copy of The Nation, Zmag, et al and they could have found plenty of sources and facts. But no.