Is this truly what we have become in this country? Have we actually come to a place where such callousness and brutality against our fellow citizens is accepted and cheered? What has happened to us here?

I encountered this obscenity having just come back from a short visit with my father. He is 92 now, increasingly weak, very frail. He is pale, unsteady on his feet, and his memory has deteriorated dramatically in the last few months. My precious daddy is finally, truly old, and I don’t think he’ll be with us much longer.

My father is ill. He needs help, he does. He is blessed to have social security and Medicare, bank accounts, plus a supplemental health care policy, thanks to good fortune in education, work, talent, and being able to save a little money. Despite a lifetime of saving, though, his financial situation is worrisome. Last year, some thieves at Lehman Brothers waltzed away with a sizeable chunk of the money he worked a lifetime to accumulate.

I picture my father sitting on the ground in the condition he’s in, holding a sign saying “I’m elderly, weak, and sick. I need help,” while people mock him for his frailty. I see my husband, who was so desperately ill for four long years early in this godforsaken century: sweet Mike, 120 pounds of him, skeletal, wasting, so close to death. I imagine people scoffing at him for his weakness, for having become sick, as if it could not happen to any one of us.

On the way back from Ponca City, we passed workmen on the road, and a work truck flying a big American flag. I realized when I saw it that I have grown ashamed of my country. I am ashamed to live in a place where compassion is derided. I am disgusted to belong to a nation so insistent that our values are Christian, where so many who claim Christ use the Bible as a weapon. I am apalled when people boast of American exceptionalism while condemning and ridiculing those in need.

Maybe it’s my frame of mind today. It’s gray again, and cold. I’ve spent a couple of hours sitting across the table from my failing father, and I’ve watched my fellow Americans angrily jeering a man who says he is sick, mocking his weakness, his need. I’ve seen the red, white, and blue of my country’s flag blowing in the wind and I wonder if it means anything at all anymore.

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The bill would cost $940 billion, and reduce the deficit by $130 billion over the first 10 years and $1.2 trillion in the second 10 years. The deficit numbers Democrats have been most worried about, and will be key to convincing moderates to coming on board with the bill.

Here are the details, according to House Democrats:

1. CUTS THE DEFICIT Cuts the deficit by $130 billion in the first ten years (2010 – 2019). Cuts the deficit by $1.2 trillion in the second ten years. 2. REINS IN WASTEFUL MEDICARE COSTS AND EXTENDS THE SOLVENCY OF MEDICARE; CLOSES THE PRESCRIPTION DRUG DONUT HOLE Reduces annual growth in Medicare expenditures by 1.4 percentage points per year—while improving benefits and lowering costs for seniors. Extends Medicare’s solvency by at least 9 years. 3. EXPANDS AND IMPROVES HEALTH COVERAGE FOR MIDDLE CLASS FAMILIES Expands health insurance coverage to 32 million Americans Helps guarantee that 95 percent of Americans will be covered. 4. IS FULLY PAID FOR Is fully paid for – costs $940 billion over a decade. (Americans spend nearly $2.5 trillion each year on health care now and nearly two-thirds of the bill’s cost is paid for by reducing health care costs.

It’s getting harder for me to have any faith in the Democrat’s. Like Kucinich, I think this bill is bullshit and more corporate welfare for the insurance companies. Uninsured folks, like my son who has never had health insurance as an adult, will not be able to sign up for healthcare until 2013.

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As reported by radio correspondent Kitty Felde, and published by LAObserved, the money quote from Baca came after his testimony:

When a member of Congress is that misinformed, you gotta question whether or not they understand what their constitutional obligations are when it comes to public safety.”

You gotta hand it Sheriff Baca, he recognizes a knucklehead when he hears one. We have a hell of a lot of misinformed knuckleheads in Congress trying to scare and intimidate the American people and we need to show them the door.

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This bitch is about to head out on a road trip.

Mmmhmm, I’m going to join fellow pro-choice activists as we meet in Jefferson City to lobby our legislators to put prevention first and support the 2010 Prevention First Act.

Pause…look at clock…continue.

Lawd, it’s early.

Wince.

Anyhoo, bitchitude is on hold until my return to St. Louis…

…unless you follow my ass on Twitter!

Toodles.

Crossposted at the Angry Black Bitch.

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what is it in the american psyche that allows the dissonance between innocent until proven guilty and gleefully watching someone arrested and tased on ‘cops’? from the nightly news to the dozen or so ‘law and order’ episodes to the ads on the sidebar on facebook calling for fbi applicants, our nation has become a police state. oh, most of us don’t believe so- but in america, we hold people without legal counsel and we trick them into talking without one. i am most definitely not pro death penalty- not because some of these folks who did indeed commit heinous crimes shouldn’t pay the ultimate price— but because our track record with jailing innocent folks isn’t good.

our justice system is beyond flawed- when you have the patriot act and the military commissions act and hundreds of other laws on the books like the draconian ‘three strikes and you get life’ laws- well, appeal is tough. and if you do the crime, i absolutely believe that you should do the time. i guess i just have an outmoded sense of justice- i believe that if you are innocent you should be set free.

and, i don’t see things in black and white. i see myself sitting in that chair- and know that i wouldn’t want to be interrogated for hours on end without my legal counsel or forced into a van in the middle of the night to be spirited away while my loved ones didn’t know where i was. guilt isn’t supposed to be proven in the streets by arresting agents or officers- or in an hour’s time on a tv show. but it is- and america is not a land of liberty.

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Under the cover of a benign government information-gathering program, a Defense Department official set up a network of private contractors in Afghanistan  and Pakistan  to help track and kill suspected militants, according to military officials and businessmen in Afghanistan and the United States.

The official, Michael D. Furlong, hired contractors from private security companies that employed former C.I.A. and Special Forces operatives. The contractors, in turn, gathered intelligence on the whereabouts of suspected militants and the location of insurgent camps, and the information was then sent to military units and intelligence officials for possible lethal action in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the officials said.

While it has been widely reported that the C.I.A. and the military are attacking operatives of Al Qaeda and others through unmanned, remote-controlled drone strikes, some American officials say they became troubled that Mr. Furlong seemed to be running an off-the-books spy operation. The officials say they are not sure who condoned and supervised his work.

Jesus H. Christ…how does our government allow wingnuts like Furlong to stay employed? It’s immoral as hell, not to mention illegal, to hire contractors as spy’s and assassins.

Furlong also funneled money from a legit program to finance this horseshit. He is now the object of a DoD criminal investigation, according to the NYT writeup:

Officials say Mr. Furlong’s operation seems to have been shut down, and he is now is the subject of a criminal investigation by the Defense Department for a number of possible offenses, including contract fraud.

Even in a region of the world known for intrigue, Mr. Furlong’s story stands out. At times, his operation featured a mysterious American company run by retired Special Operations officers and an iconic C.I.A. figure who had a role in some of the agency’s most famous episodes, including the Iran-Contra affair.

The allegations that he ran this network come as the American intelligence community confronts other instances in which private contractors may have been improperly used on delicate and questionable operations, including secret raids in Iraq and an assassinations program that was halted before it got off the ground.

“While no legitimate intelligence operations got screwed up, it’s generally a bad idea to have freelancers running around a war zone pretending to be James Bond,” one American government official said. But it is still murky whether Mr. Furlong had approval from top commanders or whether he might have been running a rogue operation.

This should not surprise anyone as the Bush Administration had no problem breaking laws and of course the Geneva Conventions. James Bond? Hell..it reminds me of other activities our CIA has taken part in over the decades…like trying to kill Castro and half the leaders in South American countries. As for Mr. Furlong…guess what the fuckwit does now..go ahead guess. Alright I will tell ya..

Mr. Michael Furlong is now a senior civilian employee in the military, a full-time Defense Department employee based at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio.

No surprise there either.

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I have good news for those Rushpubliscum asshats: such a place already exists, and it’s on our southern border. The Mexican Government is well known for kowtowing to the rich, whoever they may be, and for having almost no regulations on how the elites conduct themselves. As a result, Mexico has surely become the exact kind of a Utopia that the Rushpubliscums have been trying to create here for at least the last 30 years.

And look at how well it’s working out for Mexico! Rushpubliscums! Teabaggers! Your Utopia awaits! What are you waiting for? Line up behind Caribou Barbie and go, go, GO!

Three people connected to the U.S. Consulate in Mexico’s deadliest city, Ciudad Juarez, were shot to death by men who intercepted their cars as they returned from a child’s birthday party, officials said Sunday. Two of the dead, an American couple, were discovered slain in their vehicle, their uninjured baby crying in the back seat. President Obama on Sunday expressed outrage at the drive-by slayings. The three victims were killed in broad daylight Saturday near the city’s border with El Paso.

Ciudad Juarez, a key entry point for drugs into the U.S., has seen a staggering increase in bloodshed as narcotics gangs battle for control of smuggling routes, turf and market share. Mexico’s raging drug war has claimed thousands of lives, including those of some Americans. But this appears to be the first time in recent years that Mexican drug traffickers have attacked U.S. diplomatic personnel and their families.

In response to the escalating violence, the State Department on Sunday told employees they could send family members and other dependents home to the U.S. from six northern Mexican cities where Washington maintains consulates. It also updated its existing travel warnings, cautioning Americans about traveling to or within northern Mexican states and strongly cautioning American youth about spending their spring break in Mexico.

The dead couple were identified by Mexican authorities as Lesley A. Enriquez, 35, an employee of the consulate, and her husband, Arthur H. Redelfs, 34. Redelfs was a detention officer with the El Paso County Jail, a relative told the Associated Press. Neither the relative nor U.S. officials in Washington were able to specify Enriquez’s job at the consulate.

The third person killed was identified as the husband of a Mexican employee of the consulate. He was traveling with two children, both of whom were injured, according to the state prosecutor’s office in Ciudad Juarez.

A security official in Ciudad Juarez said the victims were obviously targeted but that the motive was still under investigation.

“The information we have indicates they were specific targets, but the motives behind the attack are not yet known,” said the official, who was not authorized to be quoted by name.

Later Sunday, the state prosecutor’s office said it was working with U.S. federal agents and believed the attackers might belong to one of two drug gangs, the Aztecs or the Linea, both fighting for control of parts of Ciudad Juarez.

The mayor of Ciudad Juarez said the gathering the victims had attended was a child’s birthday party. U.S. State Department spokesman Fred Lash said the party was attended by a large number of officials connected with the consulate.

“A lot of the people were there and they were all coming home when this happened,” Lash said.

Witnesses said gunmen apparently tailed Enriquez and Redelfs for several blocks before opening fire. Enriquez was struck in the head and Redelfs in the neck and arm, the prosecutor’s office said, and the car, bearing Texas license plates, drifted for some yards before crashing near the Santa Fe international bridge that links Juarez with El Paso.

When police approached, they first heard the cries, then found the child in the back seat. She was estimated to be several months old and was not injured. Investigators found spent 9-millimeter bullet casings, suggesting the attackers used high-caliber handguns to kill the parents.

At almost the same time, the husband of another consulate employee, identified by the prosecutor’s office as Jorge Alberto Salcido, 37, traveling in a separate car, was cut off by gunmen in sport utility vehicles.

They shot him to death and injured two children with him, ages 4 and 7, the office said.

U.S. officials in Washington said a fourth adult, traveling in Salcido’s car, was also injured. It was not clear if that person was Salcido’s wife, who works at the consulate, or someone else.

In a statement Sunday, the White House said Obama “shares in the outrage of the Mexican people at the murders of thousands in Ciudad Juarez and elsewhere in Mexico.”

Obama said the U.S. would “continue to work with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and his government to break the power of the drug trafficking organizations that operate in Mexico and far too often target and kill the innocent. This is a responsibility we must shoulder together.”

For nearly a century now, Mexico has been a right wing paradise. If you’re rich there, you’re a God. And it didn’t, and doesn’t, matter how you came to be rich; once you’ve got it, you can do whatever you want to do to keep it. Until Chimpy’s economic disaster made migrating to the US an untenable alternative for millions of impoverished Mexicans, the system had worked out quite well for the elites in both countries; the Mexican Government got rid of potential threats to its hegemony, and US elites got plenty of checp, willing labor which they could use to depress the US standard of living and extract ever-more concessions from US workers in the US elites’ pursuit of obscene wealth.

Now, of course, migration to this country can leave the impoverished Mexican even worse off than staying at home, and when you couple the anger in Mexican society with the Government’s sudden attempts at long last to bring their drug oligarchs under control, you have a recipe for unbelievable violence, as the have-nots try to get, and the already-gots try to protect their turf.

Just you wait-what you see in Mexico right now you will see here in a few short years. It’s already happening in parts of our southwest, particularly in Arizona.

Crosssposted at Reconstitution 2.0

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Pause…consider…continue.

With daylight savings time, my body thinks it’s 2 o’clock in the morning…so this early wakefulness is even more fucked up that the clock claims it is.

Shit.

Fuck it, let’s be productive…shall we?

Longtime readers know that this bitch isn’t a football fan. The only time I hear about my hometown football team, the Rams, is when I’m forced to sit through football news to get to hockey news. But, to borrow a wee bit of language from Quintin Tarantino, I am aware that there is this sport called football that is played for fun and for profit and that lots and lots of other people enjoy it the way I adore hockey.

I was a little late catching the news that the Rams may or may not be courting a certain Michael Vick. As a matter of fact, I had no clue until St. Louis Alderperson Antonio French took to Twitter last weekend with the following tweet “If the Rams pick up Vick, I’ll buy season tickets. (Yeah, I said it.)”

French added… “@kailsburg Good idea. The Rams hire Vick then pay for the new animal shelter as a mea culpa. I like it.”

Blink.

Pause…sip coffee…continue.

Now, this bitch isn’t about to indulge in Vick bashing.

Catch your motherfucking knee before you kick something and hurt your own damn self!

This bitch is not a Vick apologist. I’m do, however, hope that his life post incarceration is not another cautionary tale of violence and animal cruelty.

I believe people can change for the better or for the worse…people can change and, in our current prison culture, we’d do well to support programs that help them change for the better.

However…and you just had to know there was a however fixin’ to come…I’m more than a little disturbed by the dismissive attitude some are voicing toward Vick’s crimes and the apparent reason behind that dismissive “fuck it, go Rams!” attitude.

Shit, as much as I adore the St. Louis Blues…and trust a bitch, I LOVE my Blues…I wouldn’t casually dismiss the actions of a confess animal torturer/murderer just ‘cause he had serious game. Sorry, but if former Blue Matt Danton had Ovechkin skills I wouldn’t be lobbying for the Blues to bring him back no questions asked. Danton, who was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder, is making his way back onto the ice…slowly and with great care and a lot of eyes watching to see what’s what…and this bitch happens to think that’s the best thing for him and the game.

If I had a dollar for every time someone has actually verbalized that they don’t give a flying shit what Vick did as long as the Rams start winning, a bitch would be able to pay for that new animal shelter Mr. French tweeted about the Rams building.

‘Tis that kind of thinking that makes me think something is rotten in the state of Denmark.

Given what we know about the connection between animal cruelty and domestic violence…animal cruelty, serial killers and violence…and dog fighting in St. Louis city, a bitch would hope that my fellow residents would pause and consider before getting giddy over fielding a motherfucking winning football team.

In the wake of the St. Louis Cardinals defiant and dismissive attitude toward criticism of their hiring Mark McGwire as a hitting coach even though it’s obvious as a motherfucker that McGwire’s hitting skills were enhanced (and a bitch has to wonder what kind of advice he can offer other than to shoot up and then deny, deny, deny while cashing the hell in)…cough…a bitch finds the addition of the “We don’t give a fuck as long as the Rams win” Vick spin disturbing as hell.

We are what we celebrate.

And I’m beginning to see a very fucked up theme here.

The sad as hell thing is, a bitch thinks that there are arguments to be made for Vick…I think he could do good work in a city that could use examples of folks getting out of jail, making a good life for themselves, not downplaying but rather owning their crimes and working within the community to help young people avoid falling into the wretched shit that sent their ass to jail in the first place.

But that’s not what these Rams fans are saying…is it?

And tossing out a suggestion that the Rams build a shelter isn’t clever…’tis so flippant that it is the very definition of insulting.

Sigh.

Yeah, we are what we celebrate…

…and that’s what worries the hell out of me.

Crossposted from the Angry Black Bitch.

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Yes, I admit, before last year, I never had a clue what “teabagging” was. I’m a coffee drinker anyway.

And though I’ve spent many, many hours observing aquatic flora and fauna while using a mask to see and a snorkel to breathe, I apparently still don’t know what “snorkeling” is.

Eric Massa (D-NY) announced his resignation from the House of Representatives over what? Tickle fights? Well, ok, maybe it’s good we don’t have such dreadful violence in our halls of government when we have the urgency of pointless cruel wars to wage and a world to militarily dominate.

I guess it’s more important for us to be outraged that an individual might be in bed with someone against our approval.

After all, this kind of distraction is very important to a corporate media that would rather spend countless hours and pages of print on tantalizing trivia, than discuss the topic of an entire government in bed with Wall Street and insurance corporations.

Thank goodness we have all those radical right politicians to tell us what this shocking lapse of decency means. I saw House of Representative Reich Wing leader John Boehner demanding a thorough investigation into who knew what and when about what and when and how and where and why and who Massa did, however and whatever he did. After all, Boehner is only trying to protect the high ethical standards of Congress, you know.

Sean Hannity dutifully gave cover with his assertion that it, “…Looks like this is only the latest instance of intimidation to come from the Obama White House.”

Meanwhile Republican hetero-scoundrels John Ensign and David Vitter remain in office to dictate morality to the rest of America. This is in addition, of course, to protecting the high ethical standards of the Senate.

As we take comfort in Republicans maintaining our government’s upstanding behavior, we need someone to guide and enlighten the rest of us in this time of national moral distress.

Enter Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck.

First we behold Rush’s eloquent conservatism and racial sensitivity in colorful display as he explained the political ramifications and complexities of Massa’s vacant House seat.

“So, David Paterson will become the massa who gets to appoint whoever gets to take Massa’s place. So, for the first time in his life, Paterson’s gonna be a massa.”

Now, if any of you liberals out there see anything racist in this, it only proves Rush was right when he said, “Liberals are the racists.” Liberals are so racist, they see racism everywhere, even in Rush. He’s got us there, doesn’t he?

Next up we have the mighty Beckerhead himself, fresh from defending the innocent against Socialist, Marxist, Fascist churches with their social and economic justice agendas. On his radio show, Beck stated: “I beg you, look for the words ’social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church website. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words.”

Hmm, code words, as in, “fair and balanced” means both right wing AND radical right?

After cautioning us against the horrible iniquities of church-driven social and economic justice, Glenn was going to bring the hammer down on the sinister Democratic Party with the help of Eric Massa. Glenn devoted the entire hour of his TV show for an interview with Massa. He was about to blow the lid off the entire ring of moral turpitude in the Democratic Party. He had just the guy to break open the inside story.

The irony was, while attempting to frame the crooked Democrats, Beck actually got Massa to blurt out the REAL reason behind the corruption in DC. Massa told him campaign finance reform was the first step needed to combat corruption.

Beck ignored this, of course. Instead he apologized for “wasting” our time. Thanks for the groundbreaking journalism there, Glenn. But fear not, even when wasting our time our hero genius still offers us a very valuable lesson.

“You cannot lie to the American people for very long unless you’re really good.”

Yes, it takes one to know one, eh, Glennie?

So, thanks to our Reich Wing heroes and the corporate media, America can rest easy in our moral certainty and enjoy the show.

Naughty is naughty, but corruption is business as usual. No story there.

Crossposted at Freedom Rants.

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She flew her entire Washington, DC office staff of 20 people, including herself out to Long Beach, put them up in a four star hotel and commandeered one helicopter each from the Los Angeles City and Los Angeles County Fire departments and gave herself and her entire staff an aerial tour of the 37th District.

Lopez questioned the rationale of this junket and drew his own conclusion:

Richardson told me she considered the aerial tour an excellent use of time and money, saying she’s been trying to get her staff trained since she won a special election in 2007 after the death of Rep. Juanita Millender-McDonald. She argued that her district’s location and facilities make it a unique security risk, and that her staffers need to understand the district’s complexities in order to put up a better fight for funding of local projects…

It seems particularly indulgent to tie up two emergency-service helicopters to observe things such as how close homes are to refineries, as Richardson argued. Anybody with a computer can go to Google Earth and essentially fly anywhere, zooming in and out as if piloting a helicopter.

My question of Richardson is, how would the constituents of her district been been served had those two helicopters collided in mid-air and she and her entire staff were killed? It is quite apparent that this mental midget is more concerned about squeezing the taxpayers out of every conceivable perk of office for her own self aggrandizement than doing any useful work for her constituency.

This was not Laura Richardson’s first rodeo trick (click for more).

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