Neocons already trying to take credit for the revolutions happening in the Middle East

Well that was quick. I don't think I've ever made an accurate prediction before. Go on, tell me how awesome I am. Eleven days ago, before Egypt, when Tunisia was still the only country rebelling, I said like a boss:

Mark my words, if this unrest escalates, and the idea of democracy becomes more popular throughout the Arab world, neocons will ignore the real reasons why it's happening, and instead point at Iraq. Bush sympathizers have been telling us for years to wait for history to judge him, as if they're expecting the entire middle east to look towards Iraq and succumb to democracy on their own. They're going to go back to the Vietnam-era "domino effect", and say it's all because George W. Bush showed the poor savages what democracy is."

Well, Elliott Abrams, a deputy national security adviser for the Bush administration, has fulfilled prophecy. Read it and weep. Literally. I'm weeping right now. Why would anyone say things like this? Why do such mind-numbingly stupid people exist?

Egypt protests show George W. Bush was right about freedom in the Arab world

For decades, the Arab states have seemed exceptions to the laws of politics and human nature. While liberty expanded in many parts of the globe, these nations were left behind, their "freedom deficit" signaling the political underdevelopment that accompanied many other economic and social maladies. In November 2003, President George W. Bush laid out this question:

"Are the peoples of the Middle East somehow beyond the reach of liberty? Are millions of men and women and children condemned by history or culture to live in despotism? Are they alone never to know freedom and never even to have a choice in the matter?"

The massive and violent demonstrations underway in Egypt, the smaller ones in Jordan and Yemen, and the recent revolt in Tunisia that inspired those events, have affirmed that the answer is no and are exploding, once and for all, the myth of Arab exceptionalism. Arab nations, too, yearn to throw off the secret police, to read a newspaper that the Ministry of Information has not censored and to vote in free elections. The Arab world may not be swept with a broad wave of revolts now, but neither will it soon forget this moment.

So a new set of questions becomes critical. What lesson will Arab regimes learn? Will they undertake the steady reforms that may bring peaceful change, or will they conclude that exiled Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali erred only by failing to shoot and club enough demonstrators? And will our own government learn that dictatorships are never truly stable? For beneath the calm surface enforced by myriad security forces, the pressure for change only grows - and it may grow in extreme and violent forms when real debate and political competition are denied.

[...summarizes the situation...]

All these developments seem to come as a surprise to the Obama administration, which dismissed Bush's "freedom agenda" as overly ideological and meant essentially to defend the invasion of Iraq. But as Bush's support for the Cedar Revolution in Lebanon and for a democratic Palestinian state showed, he was defending self-government, not the use of force. Consider what Bush said in that 2003 speech, which marked the 20th anniversary of the National Endowment for Democracy, an institution established by President Ronald Reagan precisely to support the expansion of freedom.

"Sixty years of Western nations excusing and accommodating the lack of freedom in the Middle East did nothing to make us safe - because in the long run, stability cannot be purchased at the expense of liberty," Bush said. "As long as the Middle East remains a place where freedom does not flourish, it will remain a place of stagnation, resentment and violence ready for export."

This spirit did not always animate U.S. diplomacy in the Bush administration; plenty of officials found it unrealistic and had to be prodded or overruled to follow the president's lead. But the revolt in Tunisia, the gigantic wave of demonstrations in Egypt and the more recent marches in Yemen all make clear that Bush had it right - and that the Obama administration's abandonment of this mind-set is nothing short of a tragedy.

U.S. officials talked to Mubarak plenty in 2009 and 2010, and even talked to the far more repressive President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, but they talked about their goals for Israeli-Palestinian peace and ignored the police states outside the doors of those presidential palaces. When the Iranian regime stole the June 2009 elections and people went to the streets, the Obama administration feared that speaking out in their support might jeopardize the nuclear negotiations. The "reset" sought with Russia has been with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, not the Russian people suffering his increasingly despotic and lawless rule.

This has been the greatest failure of policy and imagination in the administration's approach: Looking at the world map, it sees states and their rulers, but has forgotten the millions of people suffering under and beginning to rebel against those rulers. "Engagement" has not been the problem, but rather the administration's insistence on engaging with regimes rather than with the people trying to survive under them.

If the Arab regimes learn the wrong lessons and turn once again to their police and their armies, the U.S. reaction becomes even more important. President Obama's words of support for both the demonstrators and the government late Friday, after speaking with Mubarak, were too little, too late. He said Mubarak had called for "a better democracy" in Egypt, but Obama's remarks did not clearly demand democracy or free elections there. We cannot deliver democracy to the Arab states, but we can make our principles and our policies clear. Now is the time to say that the peoples of the Middle East are not "beyond the reach of liberty" and that we will assist any peaceful effort to achieve it - and oppose and condemn efforts to suppress it.

Such a statement would not elevate our ideals at the expense of our interests. It turns out, as those demonstrators are telling us, that supporting freedom is the best policy of all.

"All these developments seem to come as a surprise to the Obama administration, which dismissed Bush's "freedom agenda" as overly ideological..."

Are you shitting me? Does he not know about that one little time Obama visited Cairo and spoke to the entire Muslim world?

"I know there has been controversy about the promotion of democracy in recent years, and much of this controversy is connected to the war in Iraq. So let me be clear: no system of government can or should be imposed upon one nation by any other.

That does not lessen my commitment, however, to governments that reflect the will of the people. Each nation gives life to this principle in its own way, grounded in the traditions of its own people. America does not presume to know what is best for everyone, just as we would not presume to pick the outcome of a peaceful election. But I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things: the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn’t steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose. Those are not just American ideas, they are human rights, and that is why we will support them everywhere.

There is no straight line to realize this promise. But this much is clear: governments that protect these rights are ultimately more stable, successful and secure. Suppressing ideas never succeeds in making them go away. America respects the right of all peaceful and law-abiding voices to be heard around the world, even if we disagree with them. And we will welcome all elected, peaceful governments – provided they govern with respect for all their people."

Sorry, B-Rock. According to Elliott Abrams, you never gave that monumental speech.

Granted, my prophecy wasn't entirely fulfilled. He didn't mention Iraq a whole lot specifically, and instead focused more on the "BUSH LIKES FREEDOM AND OBAMA DOESN'T" idea. Of course, that's why half of all conservatives right now are freaking out over what actual Egyptian freedom would look like -- that of the Muslim Brotherhood, a religious, nonviolent, political party, potentially gaining the support of the Egyptian people after Mubarak falls. When it serves their interests, Republicans love freedom!

And the saddest part of all? This is going to work. Neocons are great at rewriting history. They've already convinced their supporters that Republicans founded America. World War II of course fixed the Great Depression, and the New Deal had nothing to do with it. Ronald Reagan single-handedly destroyed the Soviet Union, and he personally tore down the Berlin Wall brick by commie brick. A couple years ago I asked a German coworker at camp her opinions on the fall of the wall. She's lived in Germany for her entire life. She'd never heard of Ronald Reagan.

I'm not trying to undermine all the freedoms that Iraq has gained because of George Bush. Iraqis have their democracy. It's a good democracy, and it works, and I'm extremely happy for them. But 109,000 innocent civilians died in order to achieve it. That's not combatants. That's every day people, just like you and me. That's 9/11, thirty-six times over. And this is the lowest estimate. Other estimates range wildly from 150,000 to 600,000 to over a million deaths. How many Egyptians have died for their revolution? About a hundred, give or take. I hate playing numbers games with human lives, but it's really hard to ignore when the difference is so drastic. And I'm not claiming speak on behalf of the Iraqi people on whether they're happy about their new government or not, because they don't speak as one universal voice. Their opinions are extremely divided about it. My point is that Bush's method of achieving freedom in the Middle East is invading nations and stealing their oil at the cost of the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent people. That's not how you establish democracies. Democracies happen when people rise up for themselves to fight their own battles, to form their own governments, the way they choose. Like how America did it.

Sunday Youtube Post

Protests around the Arab world dramatically escalate

Edit: 32 are dead and at least 1,032 are injured in yesterday's protests in Egypt.

Well, the world media once again shows its glaring incompetence by jumping onto the most important story of the last several years, a month late. This is why the internet is my news source. A lot has happened today. It's like five in the morning in Egypt right now, but this video is from Egypt's "yesterday."



The protests continued well into the night. I think they might still be going on, but if not, they've only died down within last couple hours. Yemen, Algeria, Albania, and Jordon have all joined Egypt and Tunisia in revolt. In Algeria alone, at least eight people set themselves on fire, A a pro-democratic tidal wave is going on in the Arab world, and nothing is going to stop it. It's safe to say that the Egyptian government right now is on the brink of collapse. The president's wife has fled the country, as well as much of the wealthy and upper class on their private jets. Reports were saying that some police were refusing to fire tear gas at the protesters. The headquarters of the ruling party has been burned down. At least five people were killed. The president said that the government is being disbanded, and a new one will be established tomorrow. He's still the president. He's reshuffled the cabinet to appease his people before, and reforms never happened. The protesters aren't going away.

The military was called out around midnight I think (Egypt time), but instead of fighting against the protesters, they decided to protect them. From what I've been hearing, the Egyptian people have a tremendous amount of respect for their military, and they were looking forward to the armed forces being called out to the streets. It's the police that the government tightly controls. And the people certainly had reason to be happy about the army's arrival: after all these reports of police beatings and shootings, it's been confirmed that the military and the police have been shooting at each other. When I was watching the live feed of Al Jazeera English earlier, I saw protesters cheering as military vehicles were driving by. A lot of people are on edge about what's going to happen tomorrow if the protesters have to stand up against a military that does not want to stand against them either. Or they may not stand against each other at all.

In an utterly beautiful display of restraint and sanity among all the chaos, a large group of protesters at one point lined up outside the national museum--which houses relics thousands of years old--to protect it from being looted. The military took over for them after their arrival. I WANT PICTURES.

Egypt is one of America's most important allies. It's also rated as one of least democratic governments in the world. In a disgusting and embarrassing display of hypocrisy, the western world - a world founded on freedom and liberty - refuses to take sides when a people are fighting and dying for human rights. Nearly every comment from every government I've heard today is "well we like the protesters, but we also like the government, tee hee!" We give $1.5 billion dollars to the Egyptian government every year. Here's a tear gas can with "Made in U.S.A." printed on it.



Egypt shut down the entire internet yesterday. Nobody can make cell phone calls either. People are being shot. Joe Biden said yesterday that President Mubarak is not a dictator, and he should not step down.

President Obama spoke about today's events, and gave a slightly saner analysis than Joe Biden. He spoke with Mubarak shortly after his announcement about disbanding the government, and urged him to lift the restraints on the internet and cell phone use. He said that reforms are necessary, and that he is willing to work with both the Egyptian government and the Egyptian people in order to achieve them. I don't really know why he's willing to work with a government that shoots its people in the streets.



An Egyptian blogger made it quite clear that the west needs to stay the fuck out of this:

"We don't expect anything from Obama, whom we regard as a great hypocrite. But we hope and expect the American people – trade unions, professors' associations, student unions, activist groups, to come out in support of us. What we want for the US government is to completely get out of the picture. We don't want any sort of backing; just cut aid to Mubarak immediately and withdraw backing from him, withdraw from all Middle Eastern bases, and stop supporting the state of Israel. Ultimately, Mubarak will do whatever he has to do to protect himself. He will suddenly adopt the most anti-US rhetoric if he thought that would help him save his skin. At the end of the day he's committed to his own interests, and if he thinks the US won't support him, he'll turn somewhere else. The reality is that any really clean government that comes to power in the region will come into open conflict with the US because it will call for radical redistribution of wealth and ending support for Israel or other dictatorships. So we don't expect any help from America, just to leave us alone."

Nobel laureate Mohammed Elbaradei, an Egyptian opposition leader who joined in the protests in Cairo, said this:

"The Egyptian people will take care of themselves. The Egyptian people will be the ones who will make the change. We are not waiting for help or assistance from the outside world, but what I expect from the outside world is to practice what you preach, is to defend the rights of the Egyptian to their universal values."

I'm very worried about what could be the political outcome of all this. One of the reasons why the American revolution was so successful was because we were completely isolated from the rest of the world. The founders made it quite clear after they won that they wanted nothing to do with the massive clusterfuck that was European politics. In contrast, look at the French revolution. The French revolted only a few years after we did. What happened? Being in such close proximity to all the European powers, the vultures immediately swooped in and tried to take advantage of the huge gaping hole in the power structure of Europe. You had all these political shifts in France going back and forth, and thousands of people were needlessly executed. Then Napoleon assumed control, and depending on which historian you ask, he either marched through Europe in a bloody trail of conquest, or gloriously defended the interests of the French people from the prying monarchical clutches of the rest of Europe. Outside influences fuck revolutions, and they are going to happen in the Middle East very soon.

And already we're seeing Iran shove its fucking nose into this. Iranian newspapers closely tied to the government are coming out strongly in support of the protesters. There's the very real possibility of the Muslim Brotherhood moving in and taking over. There are two ways this could realistically tip: either in the direction of a democratic tidal wave, or a new Islamist Empire, circa the 7th and 8th centuries. Judging by the fact that these protesters are asking for more civil rights, I'm hopeful that they're not going to fall for bullshit anymore.

It's a little hard to believe that a single man sparked all of this. This is all happening because of Tunisia.

Favorite Albums of 2010

A little late to the "Let's review the year!" party, but whatev. In no particular order. Ninja edit: Actually that's sort of a lie, Go is probably my favorite 2010 release.

Jónsi - Go





Gorillaz - Plastic Beach





The Black Keys - Brothers





The Ascent of Everest - From This Vantage





Daft Punk - Tron: Legacy





Trampled By Turtles - Palomino





El Trío de Omar Rodríguez-López - Ciencia de los Inútiles

PRESIDENT OBAMA'S TELEPROMPTER IS GONNA STEAL THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

Barack Obama's state of the union address tonight was moderate, sane, and not partisan in any way. Much of it was a rally to come to together. It was the same message he's been repeating ever since he was thrust onto the national stage. Republicans responded to it by continuing to be the most blatantly partisan and idiotic shitbags they can possibly be. These people are taken seriously by half the country.

For some reason, Republicans felt it necessary to respond to the president's state of the union tonight twice. One response was from the actual Republican party, and the other was from the Republicans again, but as the Tea Party I guess. Because they're two separate entities, you know! The Tea Party hates both parties, tee hee!

Here's the Tea Party's response. You can watch it if you really want to. In it, Michelle Bachman literally compared Republicans fighting against Barack Obama to American soldiers who fought the Japanese on Iwo Jima. Obamacare is cutting fetuses out of pregnant women and impaling them on bayonets! How's all that hopey changey stuff working out for you, America?



On the chart she introduces at 1:15, the numbers she attributes to Barack Obama were actually the results of the Bush Administration. She blamed the FY 2009 deficit on Obama. I'm glad we can all agree that Republican policies fuck the country.

She also said unemployment "spiked" and the stimulus "failed." Here, I have charts too.





Tonight, Barack Obama made a goal for the United States to be run on 80% clean energy by 2035, strongly emphasized K-12 education, and vowed to crack down on corporate tax code loopholes. I don't know if any of that will happen, but I'm going to go with the guy who tells me how great America can be, rather than the party who lies right to my fucking face. I'm not the sharpest knife, but I'm certainly not dumb, and I don't appreciate being treated like it. Fuck these people.

Stephen Colbert Rejects Keith Olbermann's Powers

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Tunisia Update

The Tunisian Prime Minister, an ally of the former president, has vowed to step down and leave politics forever after the elections in a few months. Things are looking good for the Tunisian people right now, but there's still a lot of reasons to be cautious. I'll just quote from Al Jazeera:

Indeed, the problem with most post-colonial nationalisms - whether that of the first generation of independence leaders or of the leaders who replaced (often by overthrowing) them - is precisely that they have always remained infected with the virus of greed, corruption and violence so entrenched by decades of European colonial rule. Tunisia's nascent revolution will only succeed if it can finally repair the damage caused by French rule and the post-independence regime that in so many ways continued to serve European and American - rather than Tunisian - interests.

The stakes could not be higher. The "Tunisian Scenario" could lead either to a greater democratic opening across the Arab world, or it could lead to the situation in Algeria in the early 1990s, where democratisation was abruptly halted and the country plunged into civil war when it seemed that an Islamist government might come to power. We can be sure that leaders across the Arab world are busy planning how to stymie any attempts by their people to emulate the actions of Tunisia's brave citizenry.

And to top it all off, protests inspired by Tunisia have now erupted all across Egypt.

CAIRO — Thousands of people calling for the end of the 30-year rule of President Hosni Mubarak clashed with riot police in this Egyptian capital on Tuesday, on a day of some of the most serious civil unrest in recent memory here.

The protesters, mobilized largely on the Internet and energized by recent events in Tunisia, occupied one of the city’s most famous squares for hours, beating back police assaults with tear gas and water cannons.

“Freedom, freedom, freedom,” they chanted. “Where are the Egyptian people?”

Security officials said several thousand people demonstrated in Alexandria, and there were also reports of large demonstrations in other cities, including Mansoura and Mahalla al-Kobra. There a video posted on the Internet showed people tearing up a large portrait of Mr. Mubarak — an act whose boldness here is hard to overstate.

State television made no mention of the protests, and sporadically through the afternoon, cellphone networks were interrupted or unavailable.

There was no immediate count of arrests or injuries, but the clashes in Cairo left dozens of people bleeding in Tahrir Square, one of Cairo’s best-known settings, near the Egyptian Museum and a Ritz-Carlton Hotel under construction. Tourists gawked, and older protesters said they had never seen anything like the defiant demonstration.

Just blocks away, in sharp contrast, calm prevailed and traffic was light for Police Day, the national holiday the protesters co-opted for their campaign against the government.

Mohammed Ashraf, a 22-year-old law student, said the blood drenching his white sweater was from a police officer. Like other protesters, he echoed the deep-seated frustrations of an enduring, repressive government that drove Tunisians to revolt:: rampant corruption, injustice, high unemployment and the simple lack of dignity accorded them by the state.

“Our government is unjust,” Mr. Ashraf said. “I’m not happy. The state is very aggressive with people.”

At least six young Egyptians have set themselves on fire in recent weeks, in an imitation of the self-immolation that set off the Tunisian unrest. Egypt has forbidden gas stations to sell to people not in cars and placed security agents wielding fire extinguishers outside government offices.

[...]

The marchers included young people documenting the clashes with cellphone cameras and middle-aged people carrying flags of the Wafd party, one of Egypt’s opposition groups. A young doctor, Wissam Abdulaziz, said she had traveled two hours to join the protest. She had been to one protest before, after the police were accused of fatally beating a young man in Alexandria named Khaled Said to death last year.

“I came to change the government,” she said. “I came to change the entire regime.”

Rush Limbaugh: Liberals should be "silenced" and "not be allowed to buy guns"

Crosspost from tumblr. Here's the transcript. Rush and a caller also say that the Tucson shooter is a "liberal," which is hilarious enough, but then it took a turn for the terrifying.

"I’ve got the solution to all this. I’ve got the solution to most crime in America. From this day forward, somebody propose it, liberals should not be allowed to buy guns. It’s just that simple. Liberals should have their speech controlled and not be allowed to buy guns. I mean if we want to get serious about this, if we want to face this head on, we’re gonna have to openly admit, liberals should not be allowed to buy guns, nor should they be allowed to use computer keyboards or typewriters, word processors or e-mails, and they should have their speech controlled. If we did those three or four things, I can’t tell you what a sane, calm, civil, fun-loving society we would have. Take guns out of the possession, out of the hands of liberals, take their typewriters and their keyboards away from ‘em, don’t let ‘em anywhere near a gun, and control their speech. You would wipe out 90% of the crime, 85 to 95% of the hate, and a hundred percent of the lies from society."

Well, here it is. With the Republican Party trailing further and further right every day, one of them finally went full on fascist and proposed that all opposition should be silenced, and their means of fighting back taken away. If he was trying to discourage me from potential gun ownership, then it had the exact opposite effect. Now my urge to own a gun is stronger than ever.

WE LISTNE TO TEH AMERICNA PIPL

Broken fucking record.

The morning after the House voted to repeal the health-care law, Speaker John Boehner walked into a TV studio in the Capitol complex to announce his next act: "a ban on taxpayer funding of abortions across all federal programs."

It "reflects the will of the people," Boehner proclaimed. "It's one of our highest legislative priorities."

"First repeal health care, now this.... What about jobs?" the first questioner asked after Boehner finished his abortion rollout. "I thought that jobs was the highest priority."

"Our members feel very strongly about the sanctity of human life," Boehner answered. "We listened to the American people."

Actually, Mr. Speaker, 63 percent of voters said the economy was the most important issue, according to exit polls for the November election. Voters asked for jobs - and you're giving them a culture war.

About 30 minutes after Boehner left the studio, leaders of the Republican Study Committee, a group that claims most House Republicans as members, walked into the same room to announce its new spending bill. Among the items the group proposes to eliminate or decimate: the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, Title X birth control and family planning, AmeriCorps, the Energy Star program and work on fuel efficient cars, and the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Ostensibly, their cuts were about reducing the deficit, but their list clearly had more to do with settling old scores. Many of the items - including the renewed targeting of Big Bird and the rest of PBS - were holdovers from Newt Gingrich's '95 wish list.

But, like Boehner did earlier, Rep. Jim Jordan, chairman of the RSC, claimed he was doing what the voters "elected us to do." Never mind all that folderol about jobs.

[...]

Just about everybody agrees big cuts will be necessary to close the federal deficit, but the lawmakers left the specifics of their $2.5 trillion cuts for another day. The cuts they did spell out were relatively small - $330 billion over 10 years - but their choices left little doubt that they were trying to stir up cultural and political mischief.

Those eastern elites, in addition to losing their NPR, PBS and other cultural offerings, would have to part with their Amtrak subsidies and their money to fight beach erosion. Greens would lose funds for the National Organic Certification program. The District of Columbia would lose $210 million in annual federal payments and the capital's Metro system would be singled out to lose $150 million in annual federal funds.

Also coming in for special cuts would be labor (the bill would repeal rules requiring federal contractors to pay the prevailing wage); international relations (funds for the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development would be slashed); the poor (housing and other anti-poverty programs that fund soup kitchens and the like would take big hits); and federal workers (a halving of the federal travel budget could mean half as many food safety, mine safety and immigration inspections).

After the RSC's Jordan and his colleagues rolled out their plan, a reporter in the audience asked whether the firebrands might be able to negotiate with Democrats. "Some of these Democrat senators may have seen the light and found Jesus," Jordan replied, "and realized that they now need to cut spending in light of what the American people said last fall."

No, congressman, Americans said they want economic recovery. Instead, you're talking about finding Jesus and losing Big Bird.

So let me get this straight. The party that was elected on creating jobs is focusing on proposing a law that already exists, instead of trying to create jobs. The federal government already is unable to fund abortions, so I can't think of any reason why they would do this. Oh wait, yes I can. They're con men and they don't give a flying shit about the country.

And they want to cut programs that educate our children, but military spending is off the table? Again? I can't really blame them. The more they keep the population ignorant, they more likely the population will vote for them. It's genius. Brand education and a thirst for curiosity as somehow "liberal," and suddenly their base hates knowledge and curiosity.

I give up. I wish I wasn't drawn to politics so much. I wish there was a way I could just stop caring about this. I'm powerless to change the coming stagnation of our country anyway, so ignorant bliss would be so much easier.

Sunday Youtube Post

A Mystery: Why Can't We Walk Straight? from NPR on Vimeo.

What the fuck

Where the shit did this come from? Keith Olbermann is no longer with MSNBC. This is not "he was suspended for donating money to stuff." His contract was not renewed. Countdown is over. Tonight was the last show ever.

Congratulations, MSNBC. I don't know what Keith did to piss you off, or vice versa, but you just got rid of the man who made your channel. Rachel Maddow and Laurence O'Donnell both have their own shows because they started as commentators on Countdown. That was all Keith. Fuck you guys.

Here's his sign off.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Edit:

Freedom Comes to Tunisia

Tunisia is a small country in northern Africa with strong ties to both the west and the Arab world. It's been known to be a good, sane negotiator between Israel and Palestine. It's a very popular tourist spot for rich Europeans. 99% of its population is Muslim. Islam is the official state religion and the president is required to be Muslim, but the constitution still guarantees one's right to practice any religion. The government is oppressive. It's certainly not as bad as many other Islamic states, but human rights issues are still a matter of concern. Newly released cables show that the U.S. was aware of, and ignored, the Tunisian government's mass corruption.

Last month, Tunisian authorities confiscated the produce cart of a street vendor named Mohamed Bouazizi. Bouazizi was unable to find any other employment to support his family, so he began selling fruit and vegetables. Authorities said he lacked the required permit, but there is no law that says street vendors need one. On December 17, left with no means of making a living, Bouazizi got a gas can and set himself on fire in protest. He was 26.



Fed up with decades of unemployment, poor housing, and restrictions on various freedoms, Tunisians have since been inspired by Bouazizi's death to take to the streets. The government has been shooting protesters. One rights group is saying 35 have been killed (Correction: Wikipedia says at least 78). A video I saw a short while ago showed a dead protester in a hospital who had been shot in the head. His skull was wide open and brains were everywhere. The situation has calmed down within the last week, and the protesters have remained very peaceful. The president fled the country and went into exile a few days ago, but the protesters are refusing to go home because the new government is stacked with politicians who have traditionally been allied with him. It's not over yet, but as far as revolutions go, this one went unbelievably smooth.

This guy from the Daily Beast makes a very good point that we shouldn't ignore: Tunisia's democratic revolution was not brought about because of U.S. military power. Democracy is a very good thing, but it doesn't send a very good message when it's brought to countries at gunpoint. Historically, people who have attempted to change cultures using violence have been called tyrants.

We're likely going to be seeing a lot more unrest throughout the Middle East in the coming years, similar to what we're seeing in Iran and Tunisia. Egyptians are already in the streets celebrating Tunisia's victory, chanting "We are next, we are next!" It's mostly because of a new generation that is sick and tired of its parents' divisive and oppressive methods. But we have to remember to be vigilant, and correct history as the neocons attempt to rewrite it. Mark my words, if this unrest escalates, and the idea of democracy becomes more popular throughout the Arab world, neocons will ignore the real reasons why it's happening, and instead point at Iraq. Bush sympathizers have been telling us for years to wait for history to judge him, as if they're expecting the entire middle east to look towards Iraq and succumb to democracy on their own. They're going to go back to the Vietnam-era "domino effect", and say it's all because George W. Bush showed the poor savages what democracy is. Ignorant brown people aren't smart enough to acquire freedom on their own, which Tunisia's example shows us is clearly wrong. It will only be another excuse to invade more countries to keep the military industrial complex rolling right along. They'll continue to treat democracy as the conquistadors treated Christianity.

I suppose the reason why I'm following this so closely is because I know someone from Tunisia. I worked with her at Camp Bunn last summer as part of some foreign exchange program. She's a couple years younger than me. She knew practically no English and was extremely homesick throughout the summer (boyfriend...). I wasn't around for this, but she had somewhat of a breakdown at one point. We did what we could to make her comfortable, like watch Ghostbusters with her in French subtitles (which she was fluent in). I bought her a French-English dictionary. She seemed like a cool person who was just very lonely. Thankfully, she did manage to open up a bit by the time camp was over with (she even hugged me when we said goodbye!). She messaged me on facebook out of nowhere a few weeks ago when the protests were just starting. I asked if she and her family were alright, and she assured me that they were fine. I didn't ask if she or anyone she knew have been taking part in the protests. I'm not sure if I wanted to know. Her profile picture has since been changed to this. Judging by the fact that most of her friends are using the same picture, I'm guessing it's imagery supporting the revolution.



Here's an Al Jazeera report from six days ago, it's the most recent one I could find. Al Jazeera has an awesome section of its website dedicated to Tunisia if you want to keep up with this. Contrary to what most Americans believe, Al Jazeera is not run by terrorists, and it's an extremely respectable news organization.

"Barack Obama hates black people." -Kanye West

What better way to celebrate Martin Luther King's birthday than to ignore Martin Luther King and write about Ronald Reagan?

Here's the article.

Who was the first black president?

Two decades before the election of Barack Obama, novelist Toni Morrison dubbed Bill Clinton "our first black president." She even said that Clinton was "blacker than any actual black person who could ever be elected in our children's lifetime."

Well, I could make an even stronger case for my father, Ronald Reagan, as "our first black president."-but I won't make that claim. I don't want to diminish the justifiable pride African-Americans take in having a president who is genetically and culturally black. Our first black President is Barack Obama.

But the past two years have made one thing clear: Ronald Reagan was a far better friend to black Americans than Barack Obama has been. Just compare the Reagan and Obama records. Under Obama, black unemployment rose from 12.6 percent in January 2009 to 16.0 percent today. This means that black unemployment has increased by more than one-fourth since Obama took office.

And the Reagan record? African-American columnist Joseph Perkins has studied the effects of Reaganomics on black America. He found that, after the Reagan tax cuts gained traction, African-American unemployment fell from 19.5 percent in 1983 to 11.4 percent in 1989. Black-owned businesses saw income rise from $12.4 billion in 1982 to $18.1 billion in 1987-an annual average growth rate of 7.9 percent. The black middle class expanded by one-third during the Reagan years, from 3.6 million to 4.8 million.

Before he was elected, in speech after speech, my father said that his economic plan would improve the lives of African-Americans. In a February 1977 CPAC address, he said, "The time has come for Republicans to say to black voters: 'We offer principles that black Americans can and do support. We believe in jobs, real jobs; we believe in education that is really education; we believe in treating all Americans as individuals and not as stereotypes or voting blocs.'" (fukken looooool)

My father understood that, while African-Americans may vote Democratic, they live as conservatives. Like all Americans, black Americans want to succeed, they want to be free, and they want to maintain strong families.

Because as a liberal, I do not wish to succeed, I hate freedom, and I firmly believe that all families should be annihilated from the face of the earth.

His only argument is unemployment numbers, proving once again that money is the only thing that matters to these people, and social issues are to be ignored entirely. Does he realize that the economy crashed when George Bush was president? Does he also know that Republicans have been fighting tooth and nail to prevent this president from enacting any solutions whatsoever? Does he know that Barack Obama is half black? Does he know that Reagan opposed making Martin Luther King's birthday a federal holiday like the rest of the Republican party? Or how much he opposed affirmative action? Or of his attempt to reverse the long-standing policy of denying tax-exempt status to private schools which practiced discrimination? Does he know that the majority of America's black community does not consider Ronald Reagan a friend?

This was written by Ronald Reagan's son Michael. I wonder what his brother Ron Jr. would have to say about it. Fun fact: Ron Reagan Jr. is extremely liberal, and believes his father had alzheimer's while still in office. Fox should run an op-ed from him, being so fair and balanced.

Sunday Youtube Post

From BBC's Life. I couldn't decide which one of these I liked better, so here's both. Absolutely amazing.

Even after Obama gave a brilliant speech at the Tucson memorial service, Fox still found ways to make fun of it

My favorite part is when they make fun of the crowd itself for cheering at a memorial service (gasp!). Good thing we have the brilliant minds at Fox to tell the people of Tucson the correct way of mourning. What a bunch of idiots lol

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Jared Loughner may have had plans to shoot Giffords before the (modern) Tea Party existed

I put "modern" in there because the Tea Party has existed for a long time. It was originally run by Ron Paul libertarians, but highjacked by media corporatists after the 2008 election and transformed into what we know it to be today.

Anyway, the FBI found a letter in Loughner's home.

[T]wo law enforcement sources said that FBI agents had found a 2007 letter from Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) to the shooting suspect, with the words "Die, bitch" and "Die, cops" scrawled on it. The letter, which thanked [Jared] Loughner for attending an event of hers, was found in a safe in his Tuscon home, the sources said.

It's difficult to say if his words were written in 2007. The letter itself is from 2007, but there's still nothing to suggest he couldn't have written on it the morning he left with the gun too.

Additionally, the New York Times put together a good profile of the shooter and his family.

A friend of Mr. Loughner’s also said in an interview on Tuesday that Mr. Loughner, 22, was skilled with a gun — as early as high school — and had talked about a philosophy of fostering chaos.

[...]

“He was a nihilist and loves causing chaos, and that is probably why he did the shooting, along with the fact he was sick in the head,” said Zane Gutierrez, 21, who was living in a trailer outside Tucson and met Mr. Loughner sometimes to shoot at cans for target practice.

The Loughner family released a statement on Tuesday, its first since the attacks, expressing — in a six-line document handed to reporters outside their house — sorrow for the losses experienced by the victims and their families.

“It may not make any difference, but we wish that we could change the heinous events of Saturday,” the statement said. “There are no words that can possibly express how we feel. We wish that there were, so we could make you feel better.”

The new details from Mr. Gutierrez about Mr. Loughner — including his philosophy of anarchy and his expertise with a handgun, suggest that the earliest signs of behavior that may have ultimately led to the attacks started several years ago.

Mr. Gutierrez said his friend had become obsessed with the meaning of dreams and their importance. He talked about reading Friedrich Nietzsche’s book “The Will To Power” [lol nietzsche] and embraced ideas about the corrosive, destructive effects of nihilism — a belief in nothing. And every day, his friend said, Mr. Loughner would get up and write in his dream journal, recording the world he experienced in sleep and its possible meanings.

“Jared felt nothing existed but his subconscious,” Mr. Gutierrez said. “The dream world was what was real to Jared, not the day-to-day of our lives.”

And that dream world, his friend said, could be downright strange.

“He would ask me constantly, ‘Do you see that blue tree over there?’ He would admit to seeing the sky as orange and the grass as blue,” Mr. Gutierrez said. “Normal people don’t talk about that stuff.”

He added that Mr. Loughner “used the word hollow to describe how fake the real world was to him.”

As his behavior grew more puzzling to his friends, he was getting better with a pistol. Starting in high school, Mr. Loughner honed his marksmanship with a 9-millimeter pistol, the same caliber weapon used in the attack Saturday, until he became proficient at handling the weapon and firing it quickly.

“If he had a gun pointed at me, there is nothing I could do because he would make it count,” Mr. Gutierrez said. “He was quick.”

He also said that Mr. Loughner had increasing trouble interacting in social settings — during one party, for instance, Mr. Loughner retreated upstairs alone to a room and was found reading a dictionary.

Jared Loughner’s retreat — whether into the desert with his gun, or into the recesses of his dreams — coincided with a broader retreat by the Loughner family that left them increasingly isolated from their community, neighbors said.

His father, Randy, once more of a presence in their mostly working-class neighborhood in northwest Tucson as he went off to work as a carpet-layer and pool-deck installer, became a silent and often sullen presence.

One neighbor, George Gayan, who said he had known the family for 30 years, described a kind of a gradual “pulling back” by the family.

“People do this for different reasons,” said Mr. Gayan, 82. “I don’t know why.”

Some years ago, Randy Loughner built a wall to shield the side porch of the family’s home. Because of his often bellicose attitude, neighbors sometimes kept their distance.

Leslie Cooper owns the house next door, where her son and his family live. She recounted a time when her grandchildren would not chase after a ball that landed in the Loughners’ backyard.

“They had to buy a new one,” said Ms. Cooper, who was told of the incident by her son. “I’d tell my son, those are not normal people over there — there’s a reason why they stick to themselves,” she said, adding that she had warned him to steer clear of Randy Loughner.

“I said, be careful around that guy — don’t get him angry,” she added.

Other people in the neighborhood, though, said they saw glimpses of compassion in the Loughner family, and an ability to reach out to others, sometimes unexpectedly.

Richard Mckinley, 41, whose mother lives down the street from the Loughners, said his mother appreciated how Randy and Amy Loughner were among the first people to visit when her husband died two years ago.

“They were some of the first people to pay respects,” he said.

In contrast to the reputation of his father, Jared Loughner’s mother, Amy, is considered pleasant but reserved by those who know her.

She commuted about an hour each day to her job managing Agua Caliente Park, an area of spring-fed ponds surrounded by giant palm trees in the desert on the outskirts of Tucson. The impeccably maintained park was quiet Tuesday, but for the chirping of the dozens of species of birds that call it home and the occasional crunch of a birder’s hiking boots along the trails.

Donna DeHaan, a former board member of the nonprofit group that helps support the park, said Ms. Loughner was a reliable manager with a good background in environmental issues. Ms. DeHaan said she never spoke about her family but was always pleasant, if a tad quiet and shy.

Mr. Gutierrez said he sensed very little communication within the family when he was among them.

“Every time I met his parents they were kind of quiet and estranged,” he said. Jared Loughner did not complain about his parents, Mr. Gutierrez said, and seemed to simply accept the lack of interaction as a fact of life.

“Jared really did not talk to his parents or talk about them,” Mr. Gutierrez said. “I felt they were not really good reaching out and he was not good at reaching out to his parents.”

After his arrest for possession of drug paraphernalia in 2007, Mr. Loughner was ordered to attend a diversion program run by the county attorney’s office. The chief deputy county attorney, Amelia Craig Cramer, said the program is intended for first-time offenders who have no history of violence or serious mental illness.

Mr. Loughner was referred to an approved drug education program, and completed the required sessions in 30 days.

But the program is primarily educational, Ms. Cramer said, focused on “the dangers of drugs and the dangers of substance abuse,” rather than the kind of in-depth counseling that friends, including Mr. Gutierrez, strongly felt that Mr. Loughner needed.

“It got worse over time,” Mr. Gutierrez said. He said he stopped talking to Mr. Loughner last March, when their interactions grew increasingly unpredictable and troubling.

“He would call me at 2 a.m. and asked, ‘Are you hanging out in front of my house, stalking me?’ He started to get really paranoid, and said he did not want to see us anymore and did not trust us,” Mr. Gutierrez said, referring to himself and another friend. “He thought we were plotting to kill him or steal his car.”

Nothing we've heard so far suggests he was motivated by politics. It sounds a lot like schizophrenia to me. Rand Paul thought so too - "...from a medical point of view there's a lot to suggest paranoid schizophrenia..." - but this liberal website decides to make fun of him without bothering to read anything about schizophrenia. Stop being such a bandwagon, you fucking idiots.

I think we're missing a huge discussion here. Jared Loughner bought his gun legally. He was deemed mentally fit to own a firearm. I like guns. I don't own any and I don't think I want to, but that doesn't prevent me from supporting the second amendment, and every person's right to protect himself if he needs to. But when schizophrenics can legally purchase guns, something needs to change.

DEMOCRACY!!!!!!!

Jon Stewart's Reaction to the Arizona Shooting

The entry venting all of my initial reactions to the shooting on Saturday was written as it was all happening. Everyone was getting information for the first time, and seeing so much of it in such a short amount of time made me really fucking angry. It's interesting reading it again. I've had time to calm down and process things since then, and I don't necessarily agree with all of it anymore. I really make an effort not to do that, but with emotions running so high, I'm not the least bit surprised by the things I said. As always, however, the voices of logic are right. It doesn't matter how much we're annoyed by the right wing unknowingly egging on potential maniacs, we still have no idea what this guy's motives were. And thank god he was caught alive, or else we'd be speculating forever.

But I'm not going to apologize for anything I said. I will not stop ridiculing people like Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck for potentially sparking things like this, because we should've put this much ferocity into ridiculing their violent language years ago. And while we may not know what the motives are yet for this particular attack, we do know that there has been instances in the past where the language used by Republicans and Tea Partiers have sparked maniacs into acting maniacal. Here, read the top post if you want a list.

Liberals might be acting a little over the top right now, but we need to understand why. We didn't jump to such dramatic conclusions for no reason. We have been expecting something like this to happen for a very long time, and it is extremely important to realize that. When you make maps that use gun sights to pinpoint the locations of Democrats, don't be surprised if we freak out when a Democratic politician is fucking shot.

Jon Stewart was good tonight.

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Sunday Youtube Post

Here's a classic. Parts 1 and 2 of "The Second Renaissance" from the Animatrix. I can't tell you how many times I watched this when it first came out. This short was my favorite, by far. I always loved it because it was a good enough story on its own even without being in the Matrix universe. It's a friendly reminder that the farther our science and technology advances, the more necessary it will become for us to develop a sense of responsibility towards it. These were really hard to find.

Video Games | | Animatrix-Second Renaissance Part2

XBox 360 | Playstation 3 | Nintendo Wii

Keith Olbermann's Special Comment on today's events

Edit: Embedded the wrong video. This is the right one.

Gabrielle Giffords last year discussing the violent rhetoric of the right wing

God damn it, Reason.

The Republican party sparks more terrorism

This is Gabrielle Giffords. She recently won an extremely close race in Arizona against Tea Party candidate Jesse Kelly. She's married to a U.S. Navy captain and astronaut. She ran a tire business before getting into politics. She loves to read, and has been featured on NPR's Weekend Edition. Today, she was shot in the head at point blank. At least five people lost their lives, and at least eighteen others are wounded. A nine year old girl is dead. After some rumors that Giffords was killed, it's now confirmed that she's still alive, but in extremely critical condition. The surgeon is as optimistic "as he can be" in a situation like this. She's forty years old. The shooter is a twenty-two year old male. He's in custody.

This is a surprise to everyone except progressives. We've been warning against the consequences of right wing rhetoric for three years, but I guess it takes a god damn massacre for people to start paying attention.

Her opponent Jesse Kelly held target shooting events to "help remove Gabrielle Giffords from office."



A progressive reporter was assaulted by a mob

Sharron Angle thinks that if Republicans don't win, we should start shooting Democrats

Stephen Broden believes violent revolution is "on the table" if Republicans don't win

This Republican politician dresses up like a Nazi in his free time

Democrat Anthony Weiner was mailed some white powder with a letter telling him to "drop dead."

The right wing is calling for the deaths of gays and lesbians

Claiming in his own words to be inspired by Glenn Beck, a man got into a shootout with the cops on his way to California so he could murder members of Tides Foundation and the ACLU

Here's a letter from the Tea Party called "Why liberalism must be destroyed," which claims that "liberalism is the antithesis of freedom," and that "liberals do not want something like the will of the people interfering with their plans, so they have to make sure elections are in fact rigged."



Here's something that in retrospect can be considered nothing less than a hit list, which Sarah Palin put up on her website. The targets are pointing at Democratic politicians. One of the crosshairs on Arizona is pointing at Giffords.



Here's Palin's twitter



And here she is being a complete sociopath



Can you imagine what the reaction would be if this happened to a Republican politician during a Republican presidency? The entire Democratic party would probably be outlawed as a terrorist organization. The media is going to downplay the right wing's role in this. They'll be wrong. A nine year old girl was shot to death because of the actions and words of the Republican party.

"The Dum-Dum Doodie Head Democrats Who Have Smelly Faces Act of 2011"

I just learned something. It's a very small bit of information, not normally worthy of an entire blog post, but I find it so god damn hilarious that I think everyone needs to know about it immediately. The Republican bill to repeal the healthcare reform law is called the "Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act." That's it, that's the joke.

Bill O'Reilly proves God. Stephen Colbert concurs.

With special guest star (and my personal hero) Neil deGrasse Tyson. Go buy his book, it's good.

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The End of New Deal Liberalism

The post-war reconstruction era was the most corrupt and disgusting era in America's entire political history. We were effectively an established plutocracy run by corporations, and it wasn't until the 20th century when a certain man named Theodore Roosevelt came along, that we finally started knocking heads. Corporations became regulated. It became illegal for products to kill their consumers. All seemed well. When the economy imploded after World War I, liberals saw it as further proof that more regulation was needed. And so the greatest president of the 20th century enacted a New Deal. The idea was that if money was pumped into just the right key sectors of the economy, then it will cause a chain reaction and get everything moving again. And it worked. It got the United States out of the Great Depression.

Keynesian economics lost steam over the next few decades, but with the recession at the end of Carter's administration, Americans became disillusioned, and were willing to grasp onto anything. Enter Reagan. Dubbed 'Reaganomics,' his embarrassingly juvenile economic theory claimed that if the richest Americans were taxed less, then all the wealth would "trickle down" to the poor and middleclass. Redistribute the wealth to the rich, and the magical capitalism gods will make sure everyone gets what they deserve! This is the economic theory that the United States has predominantly been using for the past thirty years. What do we have to show for it? For one thing, the world has lost 40% of its entire accumulation of wealth thanks to the economic depression that America sparked. And for another, the top 1% richest Americans own nearly half the currency of the wealthiest nation on the planet, and 47.8 million Americans are living in poverty. For some reason, we have to relearn that the economic policies that caused the Great Depression cause depressions and unacceptable economic disparity.

Except we're not relearning it. The policies of the New Deal that were put into place to prevent another Great Depression from happening have been almost entirely dismantled, and corporate propaganda has convinced the majority of Americans that this is somehow good.

The new Speaker of the House John Boehner is the embodiment of everything that has led us to this point. As Matt Taibbi explains in his great new piece:

Look back over almost every controversial episode in the recent history of the U.S. Congress and you will find Boehner's face appearing, Zelig-like, somewhere in the foreground. He was a key figure in the historic waste of time that was his and Newt Gingrich's witch-hunting effort to get Bill Clinton impeached for lying about a blow job. He crossed the aisle to co-author the No Child Left Behind Act, a grotesque and grotesquely expensive expansion of federal power that helped jack up the federal education budget by an astounding 80 percent in the first five years of Bush's presidency, then voted for the obscene Medicare Part D, a staggering $550 billion handout to the pharmaceutical industry — two portentous initiatives that helped turn the Republicans into the new party of big government.

Then, in the middle of the Bush years, the man who got into office thanks to Buz Lukens' child-groping was enmeshed in his own sex scandal involving minors. When the news broke in September 2006 that Rep. Mark Foley, a Republican from Florida, had been sending sexually suggestive e-mails to a 16-year-old male page, it turned out that Boehner had been sitting on the information for months. Nancy Pelosi called for an immediate investigation into the Foley scandal, but Boehner blocked the resolution. Boehner later claimed that he had told then-Speaker Dennis Hastert about the Foley incident as soon as he found out — and promptly retracted his own alibi. The ensuing scandal nearly toppled Hastert, but Boehner survived mostly unscathed.

[...]

But beyond all of that, Boehner just represents a certain type of hollowly driven, two-faced personality unique to the Beltway. It's not so much that he's likely at any moment to start pounding his fist in favor of something that only yesterday he was denouncing as a threat to the American way of life (when benchmarks in Iraq were a Democratic idea, Boehner said they would ensure failure; when George Bush came out for them, he said they were "very important"). Nor is it so much that he's prone to descending into hysterical hyperbole when the well-being of his campaign donors is threatened in even the vaguest way (he called the watered-down Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill "killing an ant with a nuclear weapon," with the ant in question being a financial crisis that wiped out over 40 percent of the world's wealth). It's more that . . . well, you have to spend a lot of time in Washington to know the type, but he's the kind of guy who would step over his mother to score a political point.

Taibbi goes on to explain, in excruciating detail, just how much corporate interests control him. He's a lazy fuck who was dropped into his position almost entirely due to a hapless series of accidents. This man is third in line to be President of the United States. He's leading the charge back to the regressive Bush-Era clusterfuck that used "Reagan" as a brand name to promote the corporate interests they answer to. If any of these people are ever caught in an actual debate about policies, they never stand a chance. That's why they avoid policies altogether.

What does Senator Mitch McConnell say is the chief goal of the Republican party? Fixing the economy? Making sure the poor have food they can eat? Of course not. It's to make Obama a "one-term president." That's what's important. Asked to name a specific program that could be cut to save spending, John Boehner, the leader of the party that's "fiscally responsible," was unable to name a single fucking thing. I'm usually the first to dismiss 1984 comparisons as pure bullshit, but when corporate media is used to control opinions, digital information is regulated, unwarranted wiretapping is perfectly legal, and we fight never-ending wars for decades at a time, shouldn't we be a little more vigilant than we normally would? If you still think these manipulative bags of shit have us in their best interests, then you are responsible for transforming America into everything our revolution was fought against.