Quick which of these Obama policies do you like best -

by RWSpisak


Pretending that anyone left of Lieberman is an unrealistic airhead? 


Or extending the BUSH reduction of Habeas Corpus into a Presidential Policy that he claims the authority to not just hold people indefinitely but to be able to KILL them Extra-judicially? 


Or maybe you like an opening gambit that the Health Care Proposal which included a PUBLIC OPTION was abandoned before negotiations? 


Or lets first before the budget negotiations - UNILATERALLY cut funds for elderly heating oil? Not your favorite? 


How about when his Justice department arrests and hounds more whistle-blowers than any other President? 


Or maybe you liked when they bailed out the Bankers and Wall $treeters, who not only caused but profited from the the Housing Bubble's Collapse. They make money on both sides of the deal, and get a bail out of any costs - still take home massive BONUSes
and JACK UP THE CREDIT CARD RATES to a point that looks' like Vinny G's neighborhood.


NO CRIME ON WALL STREET - They've benefitted from the LETS LOOK FORWARD BS - that got the Cheney Crew off the hook. You figure Bradley Manning could have benefitted from a LETS LOOK FORWARD JUSTICE PLAN? 


Or maybe you like the failure to support the women who invented the Credit Monitoring Agency. 


Or maybe you prefer when they threw Van Jones, and the woman under the bus, not even waiting for the facts - when Breitbart serial video mugger drops a DVD on some conserva-twerp. 


If we don't show PARTY LEADERSHIP - that their argument "WHERE ELSE YOU GOING TO GO" doesn't get out the TROOPS 
- Go Cash a Corporate Check... 


Goldman Sachs has your number!

A Perry Rubio ticket... chilling?

Mr. Latham streamlined theocracy - oooh that's scary.

WOW that's mighty strong anti-constitutional medicine if you ask me. A Perry Rubio ticket chilling? 

They are photogenic which for many Americans that is obviously enough. 

I've heard nihilistic disappointed progressive activists propose supporting a Palin ticket, because she'll quit part-way and steer so far from sanity it might wake the sleepy/hypnotized majority enough to pry them away from 'murcan idol and next week's casey-escapade. 

I'd prefer a Elizabeth Warren, Feingold ticket. No, sorry in my opinion, gridlock IS preferable to a millennialist theocracy. 

But they like Bachman - have "photo-face" which the real Constitutionalist Kucinich, seems to lack. It's a shame that honesty and statesmanship don't photograph so easily.

solidarity & peace
Rick@AveryVoice.com

I'll give'm UNCERTAINTY!

We must put forth an alternative dialogue.
Since no one in the DEMOCRATIC PARTY LEADERSHIP seems to be able to break the COBRA STARE of the TEA PARTY.

Remember Al Gore's Social Security LOCKBOX that so much 'hay" was made of.

NOW - whose holding the bag with all the money to INVE$T yet they don't because of UNCERTAINTY - FDR or TRUMAN could have told them about where they can put that UNCERTAINTY. 

PAY IT IN TAXES OR HIRE AMERICANS - SIMPLE. End of UNCERTAINTY -

You who got a Multi-Million dollar PLU$ BONU$ - Invest it in American Jobs, or get TAXED - THEY SEEM TO LIKE SIMPLE PHRASES - 

TAKE IT TO EM PROGRESSIVES - 

While we can mental handle complexity - they use STUPID MANTRAS as a Paradigm Builder - 

It's not a TAX PROBLEM its a Spending Problem - they whine

YUP - You won't spend it on Jobs
OK - Then we'll help you make the Investment in Infrastructure and Jobs that you haven't got around to making yet.

The other (phrase that pays) for the T-Parte' set and those who cower in fear of them [the microscopic minority] they like 

"it's not that we're not taxed enough, its that we spend too much"

OK How would you like to pay for DEFENDING, EUROPE, ASIA, AFRICA, and our frenemy the SAUDIs and of course our frenemy ISRAEL. - Since they had no trouble swallowing 7 DEBIT LEVEL INCREASES
just during W's Reign of Terror - 

What'dy say we don't give the PENTAGRAM any more money until they start actually accounting for it! You know no missing palettes of thousand dollar bills.

And they want to give the Pentagram the BIGGEST BUDGET EVER?
More than when we were NOSE to NOSE with Russia? 
NO CASH SHORTAGE THERE HUH - Who's Uncertainty are we worried about there?  - 

We can't let them knock down grandma and take the BUSH WAR MONEY and the BANKER BAILOUT MONEY from her.

She's going to need to eat something instead of her grandbabies this winter.

solidarity & peace

Rick@AveryVoice.com

The Long Slow Arc of Human Liberty

Whose TEA are they Brewing?

by Rick (at) AveryVoice (dot) com

The long slow arc of human liberty has set backs, and great leaps. Often when offense is heaped upon offense, so as to catch even the ear of the distracted, great things can happen.

The assault on SE Asia that necessitated the draft, within memory of activists yet on the front lines, awakened in some (if only in self-interest) if not in humane fellowship with the much put upon natives of southeast asia and activated Anti-War Millions across the globe.

The ruthless destruction of the shredded remnants of the middle class is so well coordinated and ubiquitous, so as to catch the eye of even the most casual observer. Again we have the coincidence of moral outrage and self interest. When a few years ago, a handful of economists  wrote of the obvious injustice of republican voodoo economic policy and those interested in economic fairness raised the alarm, they found themselves greeted with the shrugs of those too mesmerized by their (temporary housing bubble) and the new slave-labor manufactured electronic toys to care. They shopped at Walmart and thought themselves fortunate.

Now the price of refusing to notice the invisible economic policy elephant for what it was and is, a force, empowered to drive Americans to a new feudalism, the working poor are becoming suddenly aware that they cannot live their lives untouched and apart from these KLEPTOCRATIC POLICIES.

The illusion that they can ignore these thieves is dissolving before their eyes. The illusion that they can participate by voting(via republican-manufactured and programmed) black box voting machines, has resulted again and again in a curious pattern of "heads they win, tails we lose elections", resulting in UN-REPRESENTATION with the installation of radicals from the Corporate Party taking the reins of governance and steering policy toward an all-corporate all-the-time agenda.

We who strive to participate in policy have watched in horror as educational policy, investment policy and regulatory policy has turned onto a one way street of corporate give-away and away from serving any public interest. 

Arguments among the politically savvy over how best to wake the slumbering majority, (who dream only of returning to the comfort of their easy chair, so they can watch American idol) only serves the KLEPTOCRATS.  We activist few, must instead focus on informing all we can, of the precise damage being done, by the THIEVES  occupying the PANTALOONS of Public Servants.

Dan's* point, that we should take every opportunity to inform and engage our victimized neighbors, is well put, but I would add, we have to be aware of Cassandra's trap. Cassandra's message was accurate and dead-on, but unheeded. We must understand, no one likes to be told, they've left the door open for the BAD-WOLF.  The very significance of the danger makes it's comprehension, that much more difficult.

Explaining to the average voter that there are thieves and worse, in the halls of power only reminds them of two unshakeable facts, their victimization, and the necessity of immediate action. These indisputable facts are as welcome as an eviction notice. We must offer a realistic alternative to inaction. 

Anyone paying attention, has been made aware, that any hope of college for their children, will be increasingly difficult to obtain, even staying employed and in their homes has become less of a certainty. We must offer more than bad news,  that much their eyes have already told them. Victimized women and children, waters polluted, credit unavailable, services unreliable, expenses rising daily. Anyone looking with open eyes  sees a country in quite terrifying straits. No wonder, amusements, like VOICE and IDOL, are sought. 

 SOLIDARITY in Poland faced down the COMMUNIST TANKS and SECRET POLICE and the RUSSIANS EMPIRE, and WON. We may be facing similar dangers, but our overlords, must maintain the pretense of civil law.  We must carry the message of hope through joint action. Survival and change through unity. We must be proponents of unity of action. And not just in words. We must find our common cause. 

We can overcome, although we may not have yet crossed our Edmund Pettus Bridge. 

*Dan Tilson - suggested in an essay, that we should take advantage of the 4th of July weekend to inform our friends and neighbors of the dangers facing our country from the Right Wing Kleptocrats.

FOR THE RECORD... we'll be in Afghanistan FOR MINERALS (I mean Forever)

We've heard this song before, carefully enunciated lip-service to eventually "rebuilding" our nation [as an alternative to rebuilding the nation we've been blowing up]  (promises - promises)


We must [the Precedent says] honor the sacrifice of the young men and women we have previously sent to protect our economic interests. And out of respect for the destruction and havoc wreaked upon those young lives so cavalierly spent, we must, we must, we must, continue to spend EVEN MORE young lives [equally casually]. 


We heard it in Viet Nam, we've heard it in the glorious and noble battles throughout our many many many glorious wars. We heard it about the glorious wars in Iraq. [We're still there, biggest embassy ever built - Or have you forgotten by the way.]  


And now we're hearing it again, this time in (mineral rich) Afghanistan. [Luckily most people have zero attention span, and less historical knowledge.] Let's not forget our very important secret wars in Columbia, Honduras, Chile, and one of my favorite SECRET WAR the War in Yemen. Which as Secret WARS go, is quite a HIT! - Number One with a DRONE MISSILE.


Won't it be great when ALL OUR ONGOING WARS can be run from strip malls by kids trained on VIOLENT VIDEO GAMES and all the boots on the ground will be filled by ROBOT FEET. BOY-OH-BOY will we be having some fun then.


Personally I was surprised, President "O" only once mention our noble struggle to defend the Afghan women the right to become CONSUMERS... Which we know, it the most important role a citizen can fulfill. Especially if they can buy DUCT-TAPE! About those Saudi women hoping for the freedom to drive... they're on their own.


solidarity & peace
Rick@AveryVoice.com

LOCKSTEP KOCH-WALK of Gov. Scott

Gov. Scott  with the lowest approval in the UNITED STAES. Has the "rating for a reason". The UNPOPULARITY stems, not from a modest electoral margin but from his CORPORATION FIRST POLICIES. 

His purging of a "public" meeting of all but the TEA PARTY TRUE BELIEVERS is more than an accident. It is the approach used by more and more republicans to shut down participatory democracy. LOCKING OUT DEMOCRATS and INDEPENDENTS is an profoundly ant-democratic approach to governing.  

The republicans in Florida have committed themselves to a course so radical that their only constituency are the CORPORATIONS and their Tea Party adherents. The republicans have bled government dry of revenue, by gutting all taxes and using this as a bludgeon to eliminate any services that might help working citizens in favor of their CORPORATE MASTERS.  The purchasers of YACHTS and PRIVATE planes must get a tax break, too bad it's at the expense of the elderly and the infirm, but for the social darwinists in the KOCH-LED republican party, the price for a tax-free corporatist gold-lated life style is not too high. It only requires the gutting of infrastructure for the working class. Luckily with the privatization of prisons, and the addition to the slave labor workforce will lower the pressure for more jobs.

One positive result of this LOCKSTEP KOCH-WALK style of governance is they have so energized Independents and Progressives, a new movement has spring up in response. Uniting like never before independents, Environmentalists, Democrats, Progressives, Economic Justice and Union-workers - Say hello to the Awake the State movement. 

Activists have come together across the state to oppose the wholesale give-away of public resources and Government fire-sale to corporate interests. Privatization of SCHOOLS, PRISONS and POLICY has been based on a strickly FACT-FREE Ideology-Only bias. And all of these public decisions are made and implemented in a monolithic corporate sanctioned privatized governance. WHen you purge access to the governance. When the reins of government are isolated in one corporate clad glove the public good, cannot be served. Ask around the privatization of the prisons has been brought to Florida by one powerful constituency... WHO? follow the money...   

[GREGG ALLEN] your reporter seemed content to accept the official view that he's disliked not for his mono-maniacal imperial corporatist style of governance but because he won his seat with a narrow margin.. His stepped up thwarting of electoral access... is merely just a side benefit of his TIN-EAR for democracy.  

solidarity & peace

Rick Spisak

www.AveryVoice.com

St. Lucie Government Center ALL-LIES AT 6:30pm

Treasure Coasters - You missed a real prime time DOG & PONY show tonight

A very light turn out less than 50 souls showed up at Port St. Lucie city hall chambers to be serenaded by a real comedy song and dance team. It was spectacular, not a wit, not a lick, not an infinitesimal speck of truth in the whole evening.

The "honorable" Gayle* [I was once for planned parenthood-before it counted] explained that the WHOLE LEGISLATIVE SESSION WAS UNBELIEVABLY FOCUSED, on ONE THING, and ONE THING ONLY. JOBS, JOBS, JOBS, JOBS, JOBS, JOBS, JOBS JOB (Sung to the tune of SPAM-SPAM-SPAM-SPAM).

The only problem, of course its just not true. She somehow didn't mention 18 anti-abortion bills. The privatization of prisons based on NO FACTS AT ALL! She did speak to privatization when she said - if a company does it, then GOVT - Shouldna!

She wax enthusiastically about the incredible effort the LEGISLATURE MADE to focus, on NOTHING BUT JOBS. When they mandated a requirement that all students take an online course with no funding that must've been a jobs bill. When they cut hundreds of jobs in social services and slashed school budgets that must've been a jobs bill too eh? You think?

Oh, and improving education by giving less money to students, and limiting teachers salaries and the unfunded mandates to require DIGITAL CLASSES. We all know how pervasive technology is, how many have computers, she positively twinkled. (SHE's so very cute - Just ask her!)

She also told the story about how small government republicans forged one GIGANTIC DEPARTMENT from 15 former agencies. It's all about transparency she said. And she said, coquettishly drawing an arc with the tip of her shoe...  just like a family we all have to live within our means. Just like a family... Does everybody understand?

And we here to talk about the Medicaid changes just signed by the governor today. 

 A FLORIDA HEALTHCARE INDUSTRY NEWSLETTER [Homecare]  characterized part of the MEDICAID REFORM  this way 

"A final appropriations bill approved Friday also moves the Sunshine State to a single-source supplier for all Medicaid incontinence supplies. Schwinghammer called that move an "inappropriate, sweetheart deal" that amounts to lost incontinence supply business for HME providers in the state. According to Schwinghammer, the decision is the result of a major out-of-state company's long-term efforts to corner the market by advocating a competitive bid system that only it can likely win."

In a Georgetown University study of the medicaid pilot program (started by Jeb Bush) states "Children, parents and people with disabilities who rely on Medicaid have experienced enormous disruption as a result of plan turnover in Broward, Duval and surrounding counties. ... There is no clear evidence that the managed care pilot programs are saving money, and if they are whether it is through efficiencies or at the expense of needed care"

Clearly like the "LETS PRIVATIZE ALL THE PRISONS (South of Lake Okeechobee)  DIRECTIVE" (by the grace & lobbying MUSCLE of Wakenhut) this Legislation is driven completely fact - free,  strictly at the behest of the lobbyists checkbook.

The New York Times reported it this way "The pilot program appears to have been far from successful, according to the Georgetown report: H.M.O.’s fled because of low reimbursement rates. Among those leaving was WellCare, which left 55 percent of Duval County’s Medicaid patients in limbo. The company was later accused of cherry-picking Medicaid patients to maximize profits, and five of its former executives were indicted on fraud charges."

When after a thoroughly rote description of how we all must do more with less Senator Negron was asked since the republicans are so quick to compare the constraints on government to the same constraints on a family budget, why is the solution that every family uses to solve budgetary shortfalls that of adding more revenue - Why are additional revenues OFF THE TABLE. When floridians are told they must pay more for less services how are TAX BREAKS for LUXURY YACHTS and PRIVATE AIRPLANES off the table. 

Looking nervously around for the nearest exit, he said, I can't speak for anybody else, but I told my constituents I would never raise taxes, then he broke out the OLD REPUB SAW - "we don't have a revenue problem we have a spending problem"... and besides he said, I never heard anyone in the minority side of the aisle, demanding taxes. No one stood up on the other side and demanded more taxes for my constituents.

You'll... want to continue... your presentation now Gayle, he said emphatically and dashed from the room. I had early congratulated Senator Negron, for taking spoken questions from actual constituents. I had spoken too quickly, Ms. Harrell had gotten the memo, she would only be taking written questions. Her aide read one softball after another. 

When during the absolutely neutered question read by her aide the issue of electoral reform arose she said, once there were some people who tried to change their status - in the future our elections will be fairer. Less republicans? I said to hopefully?

There was one, useful fact, she told us that there would be a REDISTRICTING HEARING in Stuart in Early August 15th, 6-9pm  at the Blake Library in Stuart. So there was one little fragment of fact provided after all.

Remember we don't tax corporations and YACHT SALES because we must all sacrifice... It's not a revenue problem its a spending, its a spending... its a spending problem.

* She is an honorable woman, like all the proper oligarchs.

solidarity & peace

Rick@AveryVoice.com