"Today the House cafeteria switched all the containers back from compostable and/or recyclable containers to styrofoam."

Via Wonkette:

From: ______@mail.house.gov
To: “tips@wonkette.com”
Date: Mon, Feb 28, 2011 at 9:38 AM
Subject: Bullshit styrofoam in the house cafeteria

Today the House cafeteria switched all the containers back from compostable and/or recyclable containers to styrofoam as another spit in the eye. This shit can’t be recycled, we are basically forced to throw Styrofoam in a landfill if we want to eat in the cafeteria.

Pretty much sums up the Republican party.

"Since taking office, Walker has made no attempt to bargain with state employees as required by law."

The following is a press release from Wisconsin State Employees Union AFSCME Council 24:

Title: Union files unfair labor practice charges against Gov. Walker

The administration of Gov. Scott Walker is breaking state law by failing to negotiate in good faith with state workers, according to charges filed today with the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission by the Wisconsin State Employees Union, AFSCME Council 24.

Since taking office, Walker has made no attempt to bargain with state employees as required by law. Even before taking office, Walker worked to scuttle a tentative agreement between the state and union members.

“This governor has never made any attempt to contact the unions he is attacking, much less negotiate in good faith as required by law,” said Council 24 Executive Director Marty Beil.

“Instead of trying to find real solutions to the challenges facing the state, the governor is attempting to dictate terms. This not only in ineffective, it’s against the law,” Beil said.

While Walker is trying to change the law to deny bargaining rights to 175,000 Wisconsin workers, he cannot ignore current law.

As they have every day since the governor created a state of crisis, public employees have made clear they are ready to agree to all of Walker’s concessions on wages, benefits and pensions.

Yet he continues to refuse to come to the negotiation table and insists on continuing his power grab to strip them of their collective bargaining rights. Not only is this a failure of leadership, it is against the law.

“It is time for the governor to be held accountable. He is ignoring the court of public opinion, with hundreds of thousands of peaceful protester and 74% of Wisconsin voters opposing his attacks on bargaining rights. If he continues to ignore the public, we have no choice but to turn to the courts,” Beil said.

"If we really want to tackle the problems of food in America, we must become more aware of how truly unequal we have become."

Liam Hysjulien:

In a 2007 New York Times article, Tara Parker-Pope cited that “a 2,000-calorie diet would cost just $3.52 a day if it consisted of junk food, compared with $36.32 for a diet of low-energy dense foods”(Parker-Pope 2007). The problem with many current food movements is they rest on a rational-based model that basically equates to “if you only provide consumers with the facts, they will come around to making the right choice.” And while this is a nice sentiment, you can provide people with all the pamphlets you want on the need for activity, the risks of childhood obesity, and the importance of a balanced meal, and they will continue to buy food that is basically devoid of nutrition. Part of this problem relates back to the work being done out of John Hopkins on understanding the biochemical relationship between food and addiction, and the other part is simply the fact that it is cheaper to get the same amount of calories from potato chips than apples. To put it in political terms, it’s the calories, stupid.

[...]

The reality is that we have very little concept in this country of how much people make and how much things cost. If we return to the New York Times article quoted above, it would cost a person $1,284 ($5,139 for a growing family of four) per year to eat 2,000 calories from junk food, and $13,140 per person ($52,000 for that same family) to eat the same amount of calories in a more healthy form. Now one could say that Americans should spend more money on food, but the reality of that happening seems increasing unlikely. Instead as prices increase, we are going to see a caloric race to the bottom, stagnant wages leading people to get their daily calories from cheaper, less nutritious foodstuff–this is what the “hunger-obesity” paradox essentially is. If we really want to tackle the problems of food in America, we must become more aware of how truly unequal we have become.

"The freedom that people like the Kochs want is the freedom for themselves to become royalty in America."

[source]

[source]

drm604:

The kind of "freedom" the Koch's are fighting for is not freedom for you and I. What they are fighting for is the least possible government interference in the dealings of large businesses. That may sound good in principle to some people. The problem is what it leads too.

Without anti-trust laws you end up with single parties controlling multiple industries. And controlling whatever parts of our lives depend on those industries. That is not freedom for us.

Without estate taxes you end up with dynasties stretching over generations and controlling more and more wealth and power. Power over the little guy. That is not freedom for us.

Without safety nets we all end up at the mercy of raw capitalism, where we can suddenly find ourselves with no income through no fault of our own. That is not freedom for us.

Without health care we can end up at the mercy of diseases that are no fault of our own. Diseases which will either kill us or bankrupt us. That is not freedom for us.

Without pollution laws you end up with the destruction of our lands and the pollution of our air and water. The fouling of things that at one time were pure and free for everyone. That is not freedom for us.

Without campaign finance laws you end up with the few ruling over the many. That is not freedom for us.

Without unions you have no protection from capricious firings and unsafe, unbearable working conditions. That is not freedom for us.

The freedom that people like the Kochs want is the freedom for themselves to become royalty in America. The freedom to tell the rest of us the way it will be.

THAT IS NOT FREEDOM FOR US!!!

(h/t I Cite)

We're with you, Wisconsin!

"The big shots are in charge, and they just don’t give a darn about the little person."

Bob Herbert:

It would be a mistake to think that this fight is solely about the right of public employees to collectively bargain. As important as that issue is, it’s just one skirmish in what’s shaping up as a long, bitter campaign to keep ordinary workers, whether union members or not, from being completely overwhelmed by the forces of unrestrained greed in this society.

The predators at the top, billionaires and millionaires, are pitting ordinary workers against one another. So we’re left with the bizarre situation of unionized workers with a pension being resented by nonunion workers without one. The swells are in the background, having a good laugh.

I asked Lynda Hiller if she felt generally optimistic or pessimistic. She was quiet for a moment, then said: “I don’t think things are going to get any better. I think we’re going to hit rock bottom. The big shots are in charge, and they just don’t give a darn about the little person.”

"I'm not sure how Walker thinks reducing the salaries of thousands of workers like me is going to save the economy."

Vikki Kratz, Wisconsin teacher:

My district has never required us to pay anything into the pension or for health care. We took those benefits in exchange for a lower salary. People accuse state workers of having cushy jobs, with exorbitant benefits, job security and fantastic salaries. So while admitting this makes me uncomfortable, I'm going to do it so you can see just how ridiculous that accusation is: My salary as a second-year teacher, with a Bachelor's degree and one class short of a Master's degree, is....$36,000.

Most of my friends in the private sector had starting salaries of much more than that. I know people who have less education than I do, who made $50,000-$60,000 in their first year.

It will take me about 15 years on the salary scale before I make that kind of money.

Walker's proposal would cost me about $400 a month. Frankly, I won't be able to survive. Because not only do I have the usual debt -- mortgage, car payments -- I owe tens of thousands of dollars in student loans. Getting a Master's degree is actually kind of pricey, but I assume you want a highly educated teacher in the classroom, right?

I'm not sure how Walker thinks reducing the salaries of thousands of workers like me is going to save the economy. With that kind of wage reduction, I won't be able to buy new clothes, go to movies, go out to eat, go to happy hour, buy Christmas presents, buy birthday presents, get haircuts or buy pet food. I won't be able to replace my 20-year-old furnace or my 20-year-old kitchen cabinets. I already gave up cable and I drive a used car with more than 140,000 miles on it. So it's clear I won't be buying any iPods or iPhones or anything else shiny any time soon.

Hell, with that kind of cut, I won't be buying food or gas, either.

"There's a difference between compromise and surrender, and the governor of Wisconsin wants us to surrender."

"This is the most amazing thing I've ever been a part of."

Boston, Albany and New Mexico show their solidarity with Wisconsin workers. The movement to reclaim America from the rich grows stronger every day.

NO SURRENDER!

Time to put on that comfortable pair of shoes, Obama

Promises, promises.

(h/t Firedoglake)

"YouTube is not democratic. Its architecture supports the popular."

Alexandra Juhasz:

YouTube is not democratic. Its architecture supports the popular. Critical and original expression is easily lost to or censored by its busy users, who not only make YouTube's content but sift and rate it, all the while generating its business.

[...]

Interchangeable and indistinguishable, entertaining but not threatening, popular YouTube videos speak to a middle-of-the-road sensibility in and about the forms of mainstream culture and media, pushing social-underliers into the weird cliques and hidden halls of high school—what I call NicheTube—where a video immediately falls off the radar, underserved and unobserved by YouTube's systems of ranking. Yes it's great to be doing your own weird thing for your wacky friends, but any one else who might be interested will never be able to join in because they will never be able to find you given YouTube's size and poor search systems.

[...]

The more controversial your ideas or methods, the quicker your demise. Free and easy to get on, the mob-rule system by which you get pulled off YouTube is user-initiated but corporate-ruled. Democracies maintain protections for minority positions and ours has labor laws, too, that compensate workers for hours worked.

"Bradley Manning is a very interesting person. He's kind of statesmanlike."

"There cannot be a compromise on this issue ... It is fully as important as ending slavery."

Robert Paul Wolff :

Right now, we are witnessing a blatant and unabashed effort by an emboldened right wing to strip working men and women of the simply right to organize and bargain collectively. Let us not be misled. Republicans are attempting to dismantle, piece by piece, the structure of social justice and welfare that it has taken a century and more to construct. They want to eliminate labor unions, terminate Social Security, phase out Medicare, get rid of safety and quality controls on products sold in the marketplace, and reduce the vast majority of Americans to the status of virtual serfdom, all in the name of free markets, liberty, and the American Way.

This is a fight worth fighting, and each one of us must do whatever he or she can do to support those who are on the front lines. Give money to the strikers and the Wisconsin State Senators who have absented themselves to block the Governor from forcing through a bill to destroy public employee unions. Sign petitions, go to rallies, and proclaim everywhere the truth that labor organizing is, in our country at this time, THE progressive thing to do. It is more important right now than buying a Volt or separating your garbage for recycling. It is even more important than saving the whales, although all of those are worthwhile efforts.

Get the Word Out

In Tobruk, Libya, they know what comes after protest.
Naji Shelwy, 36, says,

This is a revolution. We are not protesting and we are not doing a sit-in. We want it to be called a revolution. We have spilled more blood than in Egypt and in Tunisia.

Turn up your speakers, Corporate America!

"The SCFL endorses a general strike, possibly for the day Walker signs his 'budget repair bill'"

The Cap Times:

The South Central Federation of Labor is calling for a general strike of close to 100 unions, representing about 45,000 workers, if Gov. Scott Walker's budget repair bill is passed by the state legislature and signed into law by the governor.

The SCFL endorsed two motions at a meeting Monday night, one opposing all provisions in the bill and the other calling for the general strike if the bill becomes law.

"The SCFL endorses a general strike, possibly for the day Walker signs his 'budget repair bill,' and requests the education committee (of the SCFL) immediately begin educating affiliates and members on the organization and function of a general strike," the first motion reads.

The second motion said "The SCFL goes on record as opposing all provisions contained in Walker's 'budget repair bill,' including but not limited to, curtailed bargaining rights and reduced wages, benefits, pensions, funding for public education, changes to medical assistance programs and politicization of state government agencies."

"Wisconsin is just the beginning. The battle is for the entire nation..."

Liam Fox:

The situation in Wisconsin is a microcosm of what is going on across the entire nation, and the beginning of a battle that will have to be waged from coast to coast. Two weeks after passing a bill that provides $150 million in tax cuts to corporations and the states wealthiest, the state government has turned around and decided to recoup those costs from the wages and benefits of the working class. It’s that simple. Steal from the poor to give to the rich…. from Wall Street, to Washington, to Madison Wisconsin, this is what is happening.

If you add the campaign to break the unions to the blatant theft of America’s wealth you can see the greatest concession to America’s corporations and moneyed class of all. The destruction of organized labor. The ultimate disenfranchisement of the working class… not only with their employers, but politically as well. The government in Wisconsin not only proposes cutting wages and benefits to public employees but wants to end collective bargaining. This will be repeated, state by state, from coast to coast. Without organized labor the only forces lobbying politicians, and supporting political campaigns, will be corporate.

[...]

Wisconsin is just the beginning. The battle is for the entire nation and whether America is of-by-and for the people, or, of-by-and for the corporations and the moneyed class.

"Without California’s dynamism, the US will lose its chief motor of growth and continue its long decline."

Richard Walker:

During the postwar era, California’s prosperity was underwritten by massive government investment and overseen by a reformed administration in the mould of the New Deal. At the same time, it rested on the basis of a skilled labour force, who were paid healthy wages, supported by unions and proud to see their children advance by means of public education. Inequality was muted, thanks to progressive taxation, inexpensive land and a quiet stock market. California lived off that legacy for many years, even as it entered the era of global competition and neoliberalism; indeed, its continued success seemed to vindicate the New Economy, even as the rest of the country sank into a post-industrial stupor. But the Golden State was sailing on sunk capital. Today, California has run aground on the reefs of inequality and racial division, inferior schooling and incapacitated government, while those who profited from the boom times have refused to share their good fortune with new arrivals. Without California’s dynamism, the US will lose its chief motor of growth and continue its long decline. The new working class in California will have to break the bonds of race and ideology, and demand good schools, more democratically accountable government and a more equitable economic settlement, if there is to be any hope that this gloomy trajectory can be averted.

(h/t thoughtstreaming)

"Without communism as a foil, capitalism stands alone, naked for all the world to see."

Michael Yates:

Without communism as a foil, capitalism stands alone, naked for all the world to see. Our myriad problems— widespread unemployment, declining real incomes, widening inequality, environmental destruction, racism, sexism, and the like—can no longer be blamed on communism or lessened by comparison to it. Therefore, it may be possible to blame capitalism itself for these problems, without automatically being accused of being a subversive. The recent “Great Recession” has made millions of people worldwide question the ability of this system to deliver either adequate food, clothing, and shelter or social cohesion and human happiness. The many radical developments taking place in Venezuela and Bolivia; the worldwide solidarity shown by Cuban medical personnel, most recently in Haiti; the upheavals in Greece and Ireland; the magnificent revolts in Tunisia and Egypt, all of these show a growing anger with the capitalist status quo and a willingness to entertain new ways of thinking and acting.

Government, not for the people, but against the people

Cory Doctorow:

This week has seen massive, broad based protests in Wisconsin over Tea Party governor Scott Walker's new labor bill, which outlaws collective bargaining, slashes real wages in the public sector (by increasing workers' share of pension contributions and other payments), and allows the executive to fire state employees without substantial due process. Walker brought down his bill with enormous bluster, promising to mobilize the national guard against the state's workers if they had the temerity to demonstrate against this gutting of their hard-fought rights. Thousands and thousands of protestors have surrounded the state capital, and Walker has had to retreat to a nearby corporate boardroom in order to give his budget address. Protestors are camping out around the clock, braving the Wisconsin February to stand up for their rights -- a little bit of Midwestern Tahir Square right there in America.

"This is America! This is America!"

Ray McGovern was forcibly removed from a Hillary Clinton speech for silently standing in protest. This is America.



Cogitamus:

During that speech Ray McGovern, a veteran who also served for 27 years as a CIA analyst, exercised his freedom of speech by standing and silently turning his back on Secretary Clinton. He was protesting the ongoing wars, the treatment of Bradley Manning, and the militarism of U.S. foreign policy. He did not shout at the Secretary of State or interrupt her speech. He merely stood in silence.

McGovern’s action was a powerful one and it threatened the Secretary of State. Two police officers roughed him up, pulled him from the audience, and arrested him. As you can see from the pictures, the 71-year-old McGovern, was battered and bruised, indeed his attorney reports he was left in jail bleeding.

Raw Story:

The official position of the US Secretary of State is that countries around the world should respect their citizens' rights to free speech, free expression and free assembly -- and that's precisely what Sec. Hillary Clinton said during a Tuesday speech at George Washington University.

Unfortunately, as she spoke, not 15 feet in front of her, a series of events unfolded that utterly undermined the message.

Former CIA agent Ray McGovern, an outspoken critic of US foreign policy, stood silently in the auditorium's center aisle, and turned his back on Clinton.

For his symbolic and otherwise non-disruptive protest, he was quickly accosted by security agents. As they struggled to pull him out of the room, a CNN news camera caught the tail end of the ordeal.

"SO THIS IS AMERICA?!? This is America? Who are you?" the 71-year-old McGovern shouted as he was hauled away.

Is there power in a union? HELL YEAH!

David Dayen:

Something truly incredible is happening in Wisconsin. Yesterday the protests against Governor Scott Walker’s bid to strip public employees of collective bargaining rights grew to about 13,000 before it was all done. The one public hearing on the bill lasted 17 hours, and Democrats picked it up again to continue to receive public comments. The Madison School District closed all schools because of what amounts to a wildcat strike by local teachers.

I just got word of the latest numbers. THIRTY THOUSAND people are out at the state capitol today. Phone calls are pouring in to legislative offices. Students are walking out of class in support of their teachers. State Sen. Robert Rauch (D) called it “the rebirth of the progressive movement in Wisconsin.” And the Republicans are starting to get nervous.

"I thought is was better that the animals die than stay there."

MAXIMUM TOLERATED DOSE

from decipher films

"The best answers to intimidation are joy and resolve."

[source]

Get out here! The weekend leading up to the Bidder 70 Trial of Tim DeChristopher, we are hosting the Uprising Summit February 25th – February 27th.

The Summit will empower people to find their own ways to create change. As participants we will celebrate and expand our personal and political power, with workshops, speakers, and hands-on activities for all ages and walks of life.

Tim is facing ten years in prison on two felony charges for derailing an illegal sale of public land from the outgoing Bush administration to private oil and gas developers.

The government is embarrassed by this very public trial, and wishes it would go away, but Tim has refused any kind of plea bargain because he thinks a jury of his peers should decide if he was justified in defying an unjust system that is dooming us to an unlivable future.

It is this kind of peaceful, powerful, and courageous civil disobedience that is largely missing from the climate movement. An outbreak of jury trials (and willingness to serve time if necessary) could create a political atmosphere that allows a reasonable governmental response to climate change–while bringing the damaging injustices of our current system into the spotlight. People pay attention when others make sacrifices. [source]

“We will be a movement; when we SING like a movement.”
- Tim DeChristopher

"Take the position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular."

"Cowardice asks the question, is it expedient?

And then expedience comes along and asks the question, is it politic?

Vanity asks the question, is it popular?

Conscience asks the question, is it right?

There comes a time when one must take the position that is neither safe nor politic nor popular, but he must do it because conscience tells him it is right."

- Martin Luther King, Jr.
from Remaining Awake During a Great Revolution

"What we have in America is the ideology of Robin Hood in reverse. The rich are robbing the poor."

[source]

Charles Sullivan, who has a Thoreauvian way with words, in a 2006 interview:

What we have in America is the ideology of Robin Hood in reverse. The rich are robbing the poor. No one should be permitted to get rich on the misery of others. In Venezuela people matter more than corporate profits. If the Plutocracy could bring back chattel slavery, I am quite certain that they would do so. Think about all that productivity without having to pay wages or benefits! But, of course, the people might rebel against that.

[...]

The people are so indoctrinated by the media that they are nearly comatose, and, hence, useless as citizens. They have little intellectual curiosity about the world, and they believe what they are told. The majority of the people do not have a clue about what is happening to them. The world is laughing at us. Why are Americans so damned obedient and gullible? Their minds are programmed by the most sophisticated propaganda apparatus ever devised, and they are much too obedient to authority.

[...]

No, the system cannot be reformed. It must be dismantled and built anew as a Democratic institution. The system is riddled with malignancy. The electoral process is controlled by special interest money. It is little more than a legalized form of bribery -- a sham that should never be mistaken for Democracy. That is why I get so frustrated when people think they are going to change the system through the vote alone.

We have a situation where industry is writing the regulations it is supposed to abide by. Washington is swarming with corporate lobbyists like flies around a pile of dung. The government is infested with Dung Beetles, and that cannot be good.

[...]

The poison tree can bear only poison fruit. When capital controls every aspect of the electoral process, it also controls the outcome of the elections. So the working class people have no real representation in government. If they ever figure that out, things will change and probably very quickly.

[...]

It is a country's dissidents that make a nation great, not its obedient conformists who always play it safe and obey authority. A stubborn refusal to follow the crowd, coupled with the ability to think for oneself, to question authority, and to challenge its very premise is the underpinning of any just civil society. Without these you have a nation of obedient sheep, mere automatons who have given up their humanity and sold their souls. Who would want to exist in such a place?

Mediocrity in government is always preceded by mediocrity in citizenship. Conversely, good government is the direct result of good citizenship. It is simply cause and effect. Output is proportional to input.

As Chuck Dupree has written, "it’s passing strange to live in a country where people could take control of their lives and their government, yet choose not to." May we learn from the Egyptians!

"A stubborn refusal to follow the crowd, coupled with the ability to think for oneself, to question authority, and to challenge its very premise is the underpinning of any just civil society."
- Charles Sullivan

May Egypt's revolution not become a platform for greater corporate tyranny

sharifkouddous:

1. Every street is filled with people cheering, celebrating, honking, dancing. Indescribable. #Egypt about 2 hours ago via txt
2. "Lift your head up, you're Egyptian!" - the chant of victory in #Tahrir #Egypt about 4 hours ago via txt
3. Unbelievable!! He's gone! Scenes of jubilations in #Tahrir. I will never forget this moment. #Egypt about 5 hours ago via txt
4. Was at #Tahrir earlier. Packed and thousands more streaming in. On @democracynow with @anjucomet now. Watch: http://www.democracynow.org

Remarkable! Along with the dictators we need to remove the corporate tyranny that dominates our lives.

Glenn Greenwald:

They're called "government" and "law." But those institutions are so annexed by the most powerful private-sector elites, and so corrupted by the public officials who run them, that nobody -- least of all those elites -- has any expectation that they will limit anything. To the contrary, the full force of government and law will be unleashed against anyone who undermines Bank of America and Wall Street executives and telecoms and government and the like (such as WikiLeaks and supporters), and will be further exploited to advance the interests of those entities, but will never be used to constrain what they do.

"The corporate state ... is creating a new form of feudalism, a world of masters and serfs."

Chris Hedges:

The corporate state, which has emasculated our government, is creating a new form of feudalism, a world of masters and serfs. It speaks to those who remain in a state of self-delusion in the comforting and familiar language of liberty, freedom, prosperity and electoral democracy. It speaks to the poor and the oppressed in the language of naked coercion. But, here too, all will end up in the same place.

Those trapped in the blighted inner cities that are our internal colonies or brutalized in our prison system, especially African-Americans, see what awaits us all. So do the inhabitants in southern West Virginia, where coal companies have turned hundreds of thousands of acres into uninhabitable and poisoned wastelands. Poverty, repression and despair in these peripheral parts of empire are as common as drug addiction and cancer. Iraqis, Afghans, Pakistanis and Palestinians can also tell us who we are. They know that once self-delusion no longer works it is the iron fist that speaks. The solitary and courageous voices that rise up from these internal and external colonies of devastation are silenced or discredited by the courtiers who serve corporate power. And even those who do hear these voices of dissent often cannot handle the truth. They prefer the Potemkin facade. They recoil at the “negativity.” Reality, especially when you grasp what corporations are doing in the name of profit to the planet’s ecosystem, is terrifying.

"In this inhospitable landscape of consumerism and greed, the idea of democracy remains a utopian dream."

We live in a corporate tyranny.

Charles Sullivan always sums things up very nicely (I've quoted him before here and here, and you can read more of his articles at Dissident Voice):

The problem isn’t big government; it is the merging of corporations and big business with government and the philosophical system that engenders it: the market fundamentalism spawned by rapacious capitalism. When corporations, which are motivated by profit rather than regard for the public welfare, merge with government, people are removed from the equation and they are replaced by capital. Thus money is equated with free speech and corporations are given the rights of human beings without the social and moral responsibility of citizenship. This is what capitalism does. Free markets are not an expression of democracy; they are a manifestation of corporate fascism and belligerence.

[...]

The effects of market fundamentalism are profound and global in extent. Locally owned small businesses were forced out, behemoths like Wal-Mart and Target, with their slick advertising campaigns and corporate bribes, moved in. Diversity was exchanged for monoculture and monopoly. The Walton’s took in billions of dollars, but workers at every point of the supply chain suffer both in the US and in sweatshops around the globe. A few people are getting fabulously wealthy while the people who produce the products we buy so cheaply are exploited, the majority of them forced to live in squalor and poverty. None of the blue collar employees at Wal-Wart and Target earns a living wage.

According to the dictums of capitalism, profits matter but people do not. To understand what is being done to working people, one has to examine the entire production and distribution chain, not just the terminus at Wal-Mart and Target. Low prices at big box retail exact a high social and environmental cost. These are concealed from public view.

[...]

Market fundamentalism, the idea that deregulated markets are the arbiter of all values, not Christianity, or Islam or the philosophy of Thoreau and Emerson, is America’s real religion. The shopping mall is the holy shrine of the gluttonous consumption demanded by capitalism. This provides an example of people serving the economy rather than the economy serving the people.

In this inhospitable landscape of consumerism and greed, the idea of democracy remains a utopian dream rooted in socialism and class struggle, a philosophy we have been programed to despise, just as we were conditioned to loathe our own emancipation by falsely equating market fundamentalism and capitalism with democracy. These institutions of usury and greed find their grotesque expression through the corporation and the corporate state. Government is an antagonist to freedom when corporations infest the hallowed halls of our so called democratic institutions. They are a cancer that erodes hope and eats away at human dignity.

"The idea of democracy remains a utopian dream rooted in socialism and class struggle, a philosophy we have been programed to despise."

"Corporations are given the rights of human beings without the social and moral responsibility of citizenship. This is what capitalism does."

Democracy Now! Egypt special on Friday

Tune in Friday for our 2-hour special program on the developments in #Egypt. STREAM LIVE 8-10amEST: http://ow.ly/3U5Vg #jan25 about 1 hour ago

The people are YOUR daddy now, Mubarak!

Today Mubarak spoke of being the father to the children of Egypt. It didn't go over well.

The people have woken up to the fact that they don't need a "daddy" to guide them.

They need democracy, they need their civil liberties, and they need their freedom, immediately, from a despised tyrant of 30 years.

On the verge of revolutionary victory!

AJELive

1. AymanM #Egypt state tv news presenter says #Mubarak speech expected to be LIVE on air #jan25 6 minutes ago via web Retweeted by AJELive and 82 others
2. AlanFisher @RawyaRageh reports from Liberation Square there is strong sense of anticipation - people believe their moment has come 25 minutes ago via web Retweeted by AJELive and 20 others

"Major nonviolent campaigns have achieved success 53 percent of the time, compared with 26 percent for violent resistance."

From "Why Civil Resistance Works" by Maria J. Stephan and Erica Chenoweth:

Implicit in recent scholarly debates about the efficacy of methods of warfare is the assumption that the most effective means of waging political struggle entails violence. Among political scientists, the prevailing view is that opposition movements select violent methods because such means are more effective than nonviolent strategies at achieving policy goals. Despite these assumptions, from 2000 to 2006 organized civilian populations successfully employed nonviolent methods including boycotts, strikes, protests, and organized noncooperation to challenge entrenched power and exact political concessions in Serbia (2000), Madagascar (2002), Georgia (2003) and Ukraine (2004–05), Lebanon (2005), and Nepal (2006).

[...]

Our findings show that major nonviolent campaigns have achieved success 53 percent of the time, compared with 26 percent for violent resistance campaigns.

[...]

Our findings challenge the conventional wisdom that violent resistance against conventionally superior adversaries is the most effective way for resistance groups to achieve policy goals. Instead, we assert that nonviolent resistance is a forceful alternative to political violence that can pose effective challenges to democratic and nondemocratic opponents, and at times can do so more effectively than violent resistance.

[...]

We argue that nonviolent resistance may have a strategic advantage over violent resistance for two reasons. First, repressing nonviolent campaigns may backfire. In backfire, an unjust act—often violent repression—recoils against its originators, often resulting in the breakdown of obedience among regime supporters, mobilization of the population against the regime, and international condemnation of the regime. The internal and external costs of repressing nonviolent campaigns are thus higher than the costs of repressing violent campaigns. Backfire leads to power shifts by increasing the internal solidarity of the resistance campaign, creating dissent and conflicts among the opponent’s supporters, increasing external support for the resistance campaign, and decreasing external support for the opponent.

[...]

Second, nonviolent resistance campaigns appear to be more open to negotiation and bargaining because they do not threaten the lives or well-being of members of the target regime. Regime supporters are more likely to bargain with resistance groups that are not killing or maiming their comrades.

A fascinating read as we all watch one of the most significant and inspiring revolutions of modern times. A nice slideshow from April 2010 by Chenoweth is also available.

"We are in deep shit. And we know it."

"Marx can give us a lot of help."

"A new methodology of liberation."

Stellan Vinthagen:

People have seen that the mobilization of ordinary citizens is what state actors are most afraid of, whether they preside in Iran, Venezuela, France, Iceland, Burma, Egypt or Israel/Palestine. Here is something that seems more powerful than the force that grows out of the barrel of a gun. The “revolution is not a dinner party”, as Mao said, but neither is it a civil war, as he and his followers mistakenly believed. It is the prime fear of all authoritarian leaders: a united people that disobey and practice freedom without fear.

[...]

Today we have an opportunity to build alliances that are truly heterogeneous, that target all forms of suppression of rights, from the excesses of ‘neoliberalism’ to ‘authoritarianism’ or ‘religious fundamentalism’ - a new global network and consciousness of social power that can create real alternatives to the depressing visions of ‘Jihad vs. McWorld’ that mesmerize policy elites.

Civil resistance is a strategy and a form of struggle, a struggle against oppression without the use of violence, a non-military and popular struggle. But it is not a ‘non-struggle’, content with refuting the illusion of liberation from the machine gun. It is a struggle that builds on the supreme value of saving, protecting and improving human life. It builds on the idea of civil relations and on the strength of a united people.

[...]

Radical movements of different sorts have long suffered from the contradiction between talking about human liberation while practicing the killing of humans. But now the global public’s revulsion against political killing coincides with the arrival of a new methodology of liberation. To make this change, political ideas, values and words will not suffice. The prospect is more realistic when the struggle itself, the means of liberation, is guided by these ideas and values put into practice through civil resistance - the rights to life and liberty and the respect of diversity that are the fruit of people power.

"You have blindly charged into the Anonymous hive, a hive from which you've tried to steal honey. Did you think the bees would not defend it?"

Wired:

A U.S. security firm that claimed to have uncovered the real identity of Anonymous members responsible for a recent spate of web site attacks became a victim of Anonymous itself, when members of the online vigilante group breached the company’s network and stole more than 60,000 internal e-mails.

The group posted the e-mail spool Sunday on the Pirate Bay torrent site for anyone to download and sift through.

Anonymous:

You think you've gathered full names and home addresses of the "higher-ups" of Anonymous? You haven't. You think Anonymous has a founder and various co-founders? False. You believe that you can sell the information you've found to the FBI? False. Now, why is this one false? We've seen your internal documents, all of them, and do you know what we did? We laughed. Most of the information you've "extracted" is publicly available via our IRC networks. The personal details of Anonymous "members" you think you've acquired are, quite simply, nonsense.

So why can't you sell this information to the FBI like you intended? Because we're going to give it to them for free.

[...]

You have blindly charged into the Anonymous hive, a hive from which you've tried to steal honey. Did you think the bees would not defend it? Well here we are. You've angered the hive, and now you are being stung.

It would appear that security experts are not expertly secured.

We are Anonymous.
We are legion.
We do not forgive.
We do not forget.
Expect us - always.

"Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the machine."

"This is not just a Facebook revolution or an Internet revolution. ... This is about the needs and demands of the Egyptian people."
- Mona El Seif

Thoreau, from Civil Disobedience:

The soldier is applauded who refuses to serve in an unjust war by those who do not refuse to sustain the unjust government which makes the war; is applauded by those whose own act and authority he disregards and sets at naught; as if the state were penitent to that degree that it hired one to scourge it while it sinned, but not to that degree that it left off sinning for a moment. Thus, under the name of Order and Civil Government, we are all made at last to pay homage to and support our own meanness. After the first blush of sin comes its indifference; and from immoral it becomes, as it were, unmoral, and not quite unnecessary to that life which we have made.

[...]

If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go: perchance it will wear smooth—certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the machine. What I have to do is to see, at any rate, that I do not lend myself to the wrong which I condemn.

"I am always on the side of the revolutionists..."

[source]

"I am said to be a revolutionist in my sympathies, by birth, by breeding and by principle. I am always on the side of the revolutionists, because there never was a revolution unless there were some oppressive and intolerable conditions against which to revolute."
- Mark Twain,
quoted in the New York Tribune,
April 15, 1906

(h/t Rustbelt Radical)

Obama Shame On U

[source]

N.Y. Times:

The United States and leading European nations on Saturday threw their weight behind a gradual transition in Egypt, backing attempts by the country’s vice president, Gen. Omar Suleiman, to broker a compromise with opposition groups without immediately removing President Hosni Mubarak from power.

"There is still zero tolerance for bison being bison on our public wildlands."

Guardian:

Hundreds of buffalo from America's last great remaining wild herd could be sent for slaughter after being driven from Yellowstone national park by high snow and harsh temperatures, conservationists warned today.

Nearly 400 buffalo have been captured and penned on the northern boundaries of the park after wandering in search of food during an unusually severe winter.

Buffalo Field Campaign:

Friends of the Buffalo,

On Friday the Park Service released the 62 bison that they captured in the Stephens Creek trap starting the first week of January. Sadly, this was a hollow gesture. On Monday Park Rangers herded approximately 300 bison, including many of those released just three days earlier, into the trap. On Tuesday they captured 21 more. Wednesday another 20 were trapped. Today BFC field patrols report that 45 to 50 additional bison were captured, bringing the approximate number of bison currently confined in Yellowstone’s trap to 390.

These buffalo, members of America’s only continuously wild population, are currently confined behind cold steel walls where they are being treated like cattle. Feeding them hay and alfalfa, running them through squeeze chutes, and testing them for antibodies to brucellosis, Yellowstone officials have announced they will slaughter some, and possibly all, of these irreplaceable creatures.

Twenty-seven more buffalo have been killed by state and tribal hunters along the Park’s western and northern boundaries, bringing the total number of hunt kills documented by BFC patrols to 128. A buffalo died from wounds suffered inside the Stephens Creek trap on January 12 and another was shot by Department of Livestock agents on January 24th, bringing this winter’s total kill to 130. If the Park Service decides, as they have hinted, to slaughter all the buffalo in the trap, this would represent the loss of more than 520 bison, or 15 percent of the entire population. And it is barely February.

Support the Buffalo Field Campaign.

Saturday's Democracy Now! Egypt special

Democracy Now!:

On Saturday, Feb. 5, Democracy Now! will broadcast a two-hour special from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. EST on the Egyptian uprising and the growing pro-democracy protests across the Arab world. The show will be hosted by Democracy Now! senior producer Sharif Abdel Kouddous in Cairo along with Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez in New York.

Watch on Free Speech TV and Link TV. Urge your local radio station to carry the broadcast. The show will stream live on DemocracyNow.org.

Tune in on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. EST.

"We are living in exciting times, momentous ones. Every bit of me wants to be on that square tonight..."

Thoughts on Egypt from one of my favorite bloggers, Rustbelt Radical:

Getting rid of this regime is a lifetime opportunity to remake Egyptian society. Freedom for Egypt means things like freedom from the imperialist system; the IMF, the World Bank, the logic of the market and the curse of capital. Freedom from the Empire means freedom from the United States and its imposed order; from the Camp David Accords to MacDonalds, from the daily humiliations a dependent nation suffers at the hand of its ‘ally’. What is a democracy when the most defining relationship a citizen has is through their role in the economy and yet it is precisely there that ‘democracy’ is off limits? The quest for democracy need not stop at the voting booth, but in all manner of institutions and organization. The neighborhood committees and strike networks offer ground gained already with which to experiment. And most central to the possibility of a radical new departure: a democratic control over the economy. Democracy is no empty vessel in a society riven by antagonism and class conflict, but one determined by the class in whose interest it is exercised.

We are living in exciting times, momentous ones. Every bit of me wants to be on that square tonight, facing down reaction and preparing to march on the Palace tomorrow. The actions this last week have an enormous emotional impact, as I am sure readers who’ve been watching know. I feel guilty for not being there and jealous too. Genuine revolutions, and I believe that is just what we are witnessing, come around on time scales that count by generations. Let’s not take them or their tasks lightly. As a risen people make history this week, they are prying open possibilities that were supposed to be impossible. Revolution, a utopian impracticality (to say the least) in most times becomes the only practical thing to do at certain times. The overthrow of the Mubarek regime, and with him the policies which discredited him, is now a practical necessity in the life of the Egyptian, dare I say Arab, Nation.

"What is a democracy when the most defining relationship a citizen has is through their role in the economy and yet it is precisely there that ‘democracy’ is off limits?"

"Now capitalism is God and human beings are its subordinates."

Charles Sullivan:

Driven by the religion of market fundamentalism, capitalists championed the deregulation of industry and markets. Money triumphed over people. With deregulation the disparity between rich and poor reached historic proportions. Corporations that were ostensibly created to serve the public interest mutated into a malignancy that is eroding civil liberties and killing the planet.

The duplicitous meanings of democracy are used interchangeably by the plutocracy, leaving the American people ambivalent and confused. This was an engineered bait and switch that went virtually unnoticed by a naïve and somnolent public. And thus capitalism, the very antithesis of democracy, became synonymous with representative government in the public mind. Few people have bothered to question, much less challenge, the secular matrimony of capitalism with democracy.

The perversion of democracy permitted non-persons — corporations — to have representation in government by shutting out actual persons. Prostituted by corporate money, politicians put profits above the needs of the people. Capital gained primacy over human beings, and the market was deified as an omniscient, divine oracle. Now it is regarded as a primal force of nature too powerful to be controlled by mortal men and women.

Owing to the perversion of language created by the elite, Webster’s definition of democracy must be revisited and reinterpreted. Corporations have replaced people in the formula and capital has become synonymous with free speech. Webster’s definition of democracy was altered to become “Government by the corporations; a form of government in which supreme power is retained and directly exercised by the corporations.” Now capitalism is God and human beings are its subordinates.

Warning: I plan many postings on market fundamentalism. It's the defining problem of our time. Its soulless logic must be eradicated from our lives.

"Capital gained primacy over human beings, and the market was deified as an omniscient, divine oracle. Now it is regarded as a primal force of nature too powerful to be controlled by mortal men and women."
- Charles Sullivan

"It’s you or them, baby, and they’re determined it’s going to be you. So keep acting like slaves..."

Ian Welsh:

The cost of the financial crisis is a millions of destroyed lives, including many many deaths. You don’t see any of the people who caused it having moral crises over the fact that they caused a depression, do you?

As the sociopaths on Wall Street like to say, they eat what they kill. What they don’t say is that what they kill, is you. If you’ve lost your house, if you can’t afford your medicine, if your interest rates or the cost of your food has gone up, if someone you know has died due to poor or not health care, odds are high that’s because they made that choice, because that suffering pays for their bonuses, for their foie gras, vacations in the Hamptoms and so on.

It’s you or them, baby, and they’re determined it’s going to be you. So keep acting like slaves, so they can dine off your suffering, misery and death.

Noam Chomsky:

If one-tenth of one percent of the population is gaining a preponderant amount of the wealth that’s produced, while for the rest there 30 years of stagnation, just fine, as long as everyone’s quiet. That’s the scenario that has been unfolding in the Middle East, as well, just as it did in Central America and other domains.

[...]

For the last 30 years, we have had state-corporate policies specifically designed—specifically designed, not accidentally—to enrich and empower a tiny sector of the population, one percent—in fact, one-tenth of one percent.

[...]

But yes, those Egyptian lessons should be taken to heart. We can see clearly what people can do under conditions of serious duress and repression far beyond anything that we face, but they’re doing it. If we don’t do it, the outcome could be quite ugly.

"A world wide sit-in ... show Egyptians that the whole world is supporting them."

[source]

U.S. Egyptian Embassies:

Los Angeles. 4929 Wilshire Blvd., ste. 300, 90010

New York. 1110 Second Avenue

San Francisco. 3001 Pacific Avenue San Francisco.

Washington. 3521 International Court Northwest, Washington

"I am sick as fuck of being fleeced, with the aid and connivance of my supposed elected representatives."

Jolly Roger:

Let’s frame what they are doing correctly. Does anyone call sitting around and playing the Wall Street Wheel of Fortune “earning” money? Is THAT productive labor, or is it playing around with money that isn’t yours? And does the CEO who slashes American jobs, and guts the benefiits of any workers who remain “earning” his money? Considering that he TOOK from the guys and gals down on the shop floor?

This shit is theft, plain and simple. They’re stealing it from you and me, and giving it to themselves. Hell, they aren’t satisfied with stealing every dime you or I might have from actually doing productive work; they managed to get a whole new scam set up where they could steal Treasury money, and leave us on the hook for THAT, too.

And they’re stealing it NOW at a faster rate than they were even before they gutted the economy. If this is “capitalism” and “free market economics,” please-keep it. I’m not sure any system could be worse, certainly not that “socialism” the blue-haired Klanbaggers are so scared of.

I am sick as fuck of being fleeced, with the aid and connivance of my supposed elected representatives.

"If this is 'capitalism' and 'free market economics,' please-keep it."

"One of the greatest manifestations of mass protest in history. ... There is no turning back."

Fred Goldstein:

The outpouring of Egyptians on Tuesday, Feb. 1, is one of the greatest manifestations of mass protest in history. More than 1 million people overflowed Tahrir Square in Cairo; hundreds of thousands came out in Alexandria, Suez, Mansoura and other cities throughout the country. It is truly world-historic in proportion. Nothing will be the same after this.

All classes, all but those strata irreversibly tied to the old regime, have united behind a national democratic revolution to topple Hosni Mubarak’s 30-year dictatorship. They have risen on a scale and with the power of a social volcano.

These demonstrations took place even though the regime shut down trains and other mass transportation and blocked the Internet. Many people walked miles to reach the demonstrations.

Direct reports to Workers World from Tahrir Square are that the slogans are anti-imperialist, anti-U.S., very anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian, against the Egyptian business class, against the entire regime and calling for a new “pro-people” constitution. There is no turning back.

The protests have risen and spread within the extraordinarily short time of eight days. And, most importantly, the movement is still on the rise. The mass upsurge has leapt over the heads of everyone — the Mubarak regime, its imperialist backers and the political opposition in Egypt. All forces are rushing to catch up to developments. But with each recalibration by the Obama administration or the Mubarak regime, or those who call themselves “the opposition” in Egypt, the masses take another leap forward, leaving everyone behind.

At this writing Egyptian television is showing the bizarre scene of Mubarak sitting in his office, discussing measures to be taken with his newly appointed cabinet, while more than 2 million people just blocks away are calling for an end to the entire regime. It is like watching the ghost of someone who has died — but thinks he is still alive.

"The market fanatics are going to kill off every humane, life-enhancing, generous, imaginative and decent corner of our public life."

Philip Pullman:

Like all fundamentalists who get their clammy hands on the levers of political power, the market fanatics are going to kill off every humane, life-enhancing, generous, imaginative and decent corner of our public life. I think that little by little we’re waking up to the truth about the market fanatics and their creed. We’re coming to see that old Karl Marx had his finger on the heart of the matter when he pointed out that the market in the end will destroy everything we know, everything we thought was safe and solid. It is the most powerful solvent known to history. “Everything solid melts into air,” he said. “All that is holy is profaned.”

Market fundamentalism, this madness that’s infected the human race, is like a greedy ghost that haunts the boardrooms and council chambers and committee rooms from which the world is run these days.

[...]

The greedy ghost is everywhere. That office block isn’t making enough money: tear it down and put up a block of flats. The flats aren’t making enough money: rip them apart and put up a hotel. The hotel isn’t making enough money: smash it to the ground and put up a multiplex cinema. The cinema isn’t making enough money: demolish it and put up a shopping mall.

The greedy ghost understands profit all right. But that’s all he understands.

Shout it from the rooftops! Market fundamentalism must go!

The world says "step aside, Mubarak!"

"For three decades, the United States pursued a Mubarak policy. Now we must look beyond the Mubarak era and devise an Egyptian policy."

- John Kerry

"It’s increasingly clear that stability will come to Egypt only after Mr. Mubarak steps down. It’s in our interest, as well as Egypt’s, that he resign and leave the country."
- Nicholas Kristof

"The United States wants Mubarak to stay in power, but the people have decided."
- Jimmy Carter

"At this historic moment, the American people must stand in solidarity with the people of Egypt as they call for a new leader and new direction in their country."
- Dennis Kucinich