nomadic

Yeah, that Bible reading is what is causing all the world's problems.>>

It's about time you figured that out. Seriously, noses in a book and the self-righteousness that's the result has blinded too many to the problems. Spare me the volunteerism schtick. The poor don't need your charity, though I'm sure they appreciate it. They need you to pay attention to the fact that they didn't fire themselves or evict themselves or choose to be destitute. The overwhelming majority want to work to make their own way. While people shop at the rows upon rows of discount marts they fail to notice that the reason they need them is they let their jobs go away.Then they run to church to pray rather than taking their congressman to task for letting corporations dictate the terms of how the government will let them get richer at the cost of bankrupting our workforce.
Pray if you feel the need. But, also, get out and actually do something other than have Christian pity on the poor. Give them the ability work and take care of themselves by making sure our elected officials do their jobs. They're accountable to all of us and not just the wealthiest who can lobby them.
Level the freakin' playin' field, don't pray for it. posted 04/30/2008 at 15:51:25

and so it goes.... again and again.
Nothing Rev. Wright has said is even remotely radical. Ronald Reagan failed to address AIDS for the crisis it was because his bigotry saw it as something "those OTHER folks have to worry about". Exactly how is that not a conspiracy of denial from the leading man on the right wing revolution?
What Rev. Wright said about damning America is in line with the governmental neglect of minorities, the elderly and our poor. Instead, we arrogantly left troops in the country that Muslims hold as their most sacred place. We ignored the ire that stirred up. We did so in the name of supposedly securing the region from the mad Saddam, our ... er.. former ally... when he bombed the Kurds.
I think Rev. Wright should take a break, while he's loathe to admit it, he's become a tool for right-wing propagandists. However, I sure won't point my finger in his direction and say "It's your fault Obama's catching heat!".
No, we all know that's not true. We all know that's not the problem. The real problem is that punditry now passes as news. They broadcast the opinions of discussion that too many people are too obsessed to walk away from. And to read white folks scared of their own shadows calling Rev. Wright a scary racist just blows my mind. I'm white, and have no such fear. It's absurd and insults even the most common sense..... which becomes rarer every day. posted 04/30/2008 at 15:20:01

Sorry, but the guy's right on the money and I'm a white guy writing that. Racism is alive and well in the USA and I just spent several days with white folks who are a little moneyed who think black folks are whiners, but they're all right as long as they trim their lawns and hedges in a timely manner for a good price (i. e. "cheap"). This man is far from extreme and just because lynching isn't a daily event that's no reason to pat ourselves on the back and say "everything's fine".
What really gets my goat is the way everyone lets the derogatory and hate filled speech about gays, people who get and perform abortions and those who are not "with" god, well, saying that stuff (which has been known to get people killed) appears to be just fine. But let a black preacher take the warmongers and dividers in our administration to task, men and women who have sent our sons and daughters off to die for duplicitous reasons, who willingly break all ethical and moral codes regarding our civil rights and order the deaths of thousand who did nothing to us, and the man damning these acts and the perpetrators, the architects of this horror, and HE deserves vilification in the broadest possible terms?
That sounds like the real bigotry come to roost. posted 04/28/2008 at 18:40:01

I've lived in and near blue collar PA, AL, FL, NC, and NE. There's nothing that Obama said that was in the least bit insulting to anyone who really listens to his words and not the pot shots and spin induced assumptions made on the news shows. In fact there is not one single insult unless gun ownership, concern of lost jobs to immigrants (often trumped up by politicians) and turning to church and its community when things are going badly (I know a lot of people who do this) are really bad things but even then he did not say they were.
But, heck, by all means, let the pundits, the ones who supported George Bush unwaveringly, tell you what to think. Don't listen for yourselves and carefully consider the words used and what they meant. The biggest problem with contemporary America is the way everything is reported by talking heads putting in their two cents (or vacuous wind) before we have a chance to actually determine what's been said much less what's going on without the spin merchants.
By the way, I'm from a strictly blue collar pair of parents. One from the south and from the north.
They both have no trust in Hillary Clinton or John McCain.

Rick posted 04/14/2008 at 23:39:01

ConservativeCouchPotato what a load of bunk. Tell me, which stations have run Muslim chants in the their prime time shows? Don't get me wrong, I'm glad it's not true but not because I'm anti-religious; I just wish I could see a profound change from the way religion is rammed down our throats all the time. My wife's an active and avid Christian but she never pushes her faith on anyone, not even me her husband and former aspiring Christian.
I'd love to see the humility, charity and tolerance she lives by and tries so hard to improve upon used as the standard example of all so-called Christians.
Maybe, just maybe I'd still be an aspiring one, and at the very least I'd stop being such an active critic. posted 04/11/2008 at 16:18:22

Isn't it nice that DoYogaFeelGreat assumes that everyone responding in the negative is a classic liberal. Ah, the assumptions of the real whiners, those poor, poor, so-called kristians. I personally quit trying to get all religion decades ago and I'm always amazed at how leaving church has not freed me from religious propaganda from all sides.
Next time, just to be fair the Idol contestants should sing a traditional Muslim based song. If they can make that popular I'd say we've come a long way.
On the point of the persecuted kristians, please, give the rest of us a break. You're all always bragging about your martyr status in the world even as you wield real political power to staunch freedoms you don't approve of.
Why don't you go back to being good little martyrs and leave the rest of us alone? Your god loves the humble and the meek and I for one would love to see that lifestyle put into practice. I, for one, would certainly be more sympathetic with your plight if you assumed that status. Where's the humility? Better yet, where's love, tolerance and mercy you all swear you're so famous for? posted 04/11/2008 at 16:06:53

Thank you for this insightful article. While my own efforts to join the military failed (flat feet, Navy, 1976) I'm married to an gal who has over 25 years in as both a former enlisted Ssgt. and current officer. Because of her career I've been following her around for over 25 years as the military spouse. Nothing you've stated in this article can be denied. In my experience you've nailed it.
The military members and their families do believe they are morally superior to civilians, a maddening concept when you see how many of the same social that affect civilians affect them more or less equally.
Most of that is due to the isolationist attitudes of most service members who roll only with their own and base civilian society through the harsh glass that is our popular media.
On the other hand, to see all these civilians who think they "get" us by slapping a stupid "we support the troops" ribbon-shaped bumper sticker on their car is pretty depressing. Then there is a whole generation of kids who split between the "military can do no wrong" and "the military members are pawns of the corrupt policies of the Bush administration" and you see that there's little hope for future generations to really understand the military either. To some degree both of those mind sets have valid points.
Anyway, you have a firm grasp on our present situation in the military. posted 04/10/2008 at 16:42:48

i think the neocon perspective does see this as a win as you suggest.
What they won and how they achieved it:
Scared the bejeezus out of mostly white Americans of all incomes by alleging that 9-11 was just the start of things to come (instead of taking responsibility for letting it happen).
Covered all the evidence that Iraq had absolutely nothing to do with the attacks by making assertions to connections that did need the proof of evidence to cow the citizens.
Cowardice became the means by which our phones could be tapped with no congressional oversight which made a lot of money to the telecom companies, now contractors for the U.S. spy game.
While good ol' Donald Rumsfeld was gearing up for war he was also getting approval for slashing militery benefits and reducing enlistment goals and downsizing the officer corp by reducing promotion slots.
Then came the big no bid contracts. Under the guise of needing services too fast to put out bids all the cronyism at the DoD paid off for friends of the regi.. er, administration.
Despite promises of the war paying for itself and *suggestions* that the war would be short with no prolonged occupation American money poured in. It was literally thrown to four winds to land in the laps of friends,enemies and all points in between provided they had enough power or ammo to claim it.
Then came the policing by our forces. With inferior body armor, weak transports and minimal field training for another type of war we watched our men and women get slaughtered along with Iraqi locals by really primitive but effective tactics like hard to detect pressure tripped mines, snipers, car bombs and suicide bombers. It didn't matter that a lot of these were not terrorists but genuine resistance fighters who refused to accept American occupation under the lie that we were liberating them from a dictator while also looking for WMD already discredited by numerous sources, incuding our very own state department and intelligence agencies. For every body that was blown apart -be it lowly civilian out shopping or one of our soldiers- this was mined by the media as the reason we had to stay put, to free these people.
The money's still flowing faster than oil from that region.
Rinse with openly idiotic rhetoric that enough guilty-minded Americans will listen to rather than look in the mirror and face our cowardly inaction as this travesty continues... and repeat..... every few months... and hope, despite any obvious lack of hope, that we will get used to our soldiers being killed for contractors to rake in tax dollar funded money, while things waver from just plain bad to desperately worse.
When worse returns to just bad again we can collectively wipe the sweat from our brows, hale our heroic soldiers (ignoring their pain is fine, because they did sign up for this duty, right? Nobody made them sign on the dotted line so our guilt is assuaged, right?) and try to explain the freedom isn't free to our kids as they have to take out another ginormous loan to pay for federally underfunded colleges turned into diploma mills.
In the meantime those contractors continue to rake in money hand over fist, sending their kids to the finest universities money can buy and become lords of the frat houses diddling desperate poor girls looking for distractions from their work to school stress.
This is a neocon dream come true. posted 03/21/2008 at 14:33:13