Archive for July, 2009
I am very happy that President Obama has invited both Professor Gates and Cambridge Police Sargent Crowley to the White House for a beer. However while I am a Liberal Democrat I believe the President never should have opened his mouth about the incident. The Republicans could have a field day with this. Let me point out a few interesting points about this entire incident that only a NON-PC Liberal would dare to venture. By the way I find that the news media may also have done President Obama a diservice in that his remarks don’t seem as harsh in the context of the full statement he made. (See the video below).
1. Obama made a presumption about the incident and did not retract it.
President Obama said the police were “stupid” to arrest someone whom they knew was in his own home! President Obama is not only a lawyer but a law professor. Police have the right to act on “probable cause”. A call was turned in to 911 that there was a burglary in progress. The rear door was broken into. The police have the right to ask for identification. Here the two sides disagree at the time of this writing. Professor Gates says he gave the documentation while the police contend they had to force him. Further to hamper the police in their LAWFUL DUTY of investigating a possible crime is stupid and illegal even if it is your own home.
That is if Professor Gates did impede the police. I do not know, you dear reader do not know and the President does not know. Obama said his words may have caused harm. That is not correct! Obama made a presumption of the situation.
Simply because you do indeed live there is not a justification for impeding a lawful police investigation. Now we don’t know if Professor Gates did indeed obstruct the investigation. But we do know that simply owning the home is NOT justification for impeding a lawful investigation when there is “probable cause” for the investigation. President Obama seems to prejudge the allegations by both sides in favor of Professor Gates! He seems to believe that owning the home makes an arrest stupid.
Wrong “IF” Professor Gates impeded the police he was wrong regardless that he owns the house. He must comply with the investigation. Again we don’t know either way. But President Obama made a presumption here.
2. Thank God for minority recruitment into the police department!
One of the police at the scene was actually Black and he backs the White police sergeant! Yes we can argue it is a fraternal thing to back your own. But such a “presumption” then means that fraternal feelings between White and Black police officers are above racial barriers if the Black police officer sided with the White police officer! I bet Sargent Crowley was damn glad to have a Black police officer with him! Yes there can be nuances of observation as to over reaction by either side in this incident. But I still say Sargent Crowley must be very happy he had a Black police officer with him.
3. Having minority police officers makes life better for all.
The fact that a White police officer knows there are minority officers at the scene places all on their best behavior. Even if they are not on the scene they still are now members of his “Blue Fraternity”! This makes White officers answerable on new levels. It also provides an excellent Minority Relations back up in the case such as this.
4. What would happen if Professor Gates was not a Professor?
Would this have made national news? What if he were a African – American blue collar worker? Would the news media focus on him?
5. What if the police had asked for ID from a White man at his home?
Let’s assume the police not only legally asked for id but also were nasty? Would this incident make the national news?
The issue here is this! If you are not a burglar, but the police are a little bit pushy, do you have the right to impede their investigating your break-in to what turns out to be your own home? If they are pushy is that automatically a sign of “racism” or just being uptight? I believe you still must cooperate with their investigating. You can always file a claim AFTER they leave.
CONCLUSION: We will never know.
President Obama was himself the victim of police prejudice while growing up and even mentions one story about how one night he came home late to his White grandparent’s home and forgot his key. So he went in by the window and his old White Grandmother screamed a racial epithet about a Black man trying to break into the house.
The lesson to be learned is not simply Race Relations but what would happen in a similar situation to us if we are not Black or a University Professor! Both the police and the public need to be educated on the requirements if asked to provide ID to the police!
Let me tell you my gut reaction to this case and I cannot prove it but at least I admit that.
My gut reaction is that both the police and the professor were tense and needed either some liquor, coffee or sex. In that situation they were not going to get it. So the whole thing exploded. Well now at the White House they can have a beer!
OK now that we have all had a beer can we get back to Health Care?
Once again the Republicans and their fellow travelers are attempting to destroy the economic security of the American Middle Class by attacking our President! Just look at how they spin the term “freedom”! They whine and wail that “our children will not be able to pay off this “terrible burden” that Universal Health Care will impose on the national budget”! Bull!
They are not worried about “our children” but their children having to pay a higher inheritance taxes! Yet the Democrats refuse to view this as CLASS WARFARE! Oh dear we don’t want to come across nasty now do we? We have witnessed upper class tax cuts by George Bush and Ronald Reagan! These tax cuts were a complete transfer of wealth from the Middle Class to the upper 2%. Inheritance and income taxes have fallen massively while the Republicans continued to spend on their vast SOCIAL ENGINEERING EXPERIMENT in IRAQ! Along with their fellow travelers that alas included some Democrats, we have seen our jobs and wealth transferred to China and overseas! All this due to the CUT AND RUN CAPITALISTS being the transfer agents! Then they insist on collecting their fee for this “service” that they provided to the society that gave them birth, incorporation and profits!
The time has come for Democrats to face some facts! When Republicans talk about “freedom” they don’t mean freedom for the individual but rather freedom for the vast multinational Corporate Collectives that want to wage war against the Individual Freedom of the Middle Class Citizen.
Just witness how some corporations today are attempting to prematurely pay back the tarp funds they received not because they want to do the right thing but because they want the “FREEDOM” to resume paying their high level executives ridiculous compensation packages! This is the “freedom” that the Republicans want to give us! Freedom to serve the agenda of our social betters! While middle class Americans fear for the loss of their jobs that not only ends their income but also their Health Care, these bleeding hearts for the parasitic rich worry about the FREEDOM of Corporate Collectivists in the Corporation to pay their upper levels while the rest lose their freedom to have a living and health care! This is their definition of “freedom”.
Democrats must stop side stepping the main issue! It is not just that Corporate CEO’s of failed companies are making millions while the President of the United States, who has far more responsibility than all of them combined only makes $400K per year, no that is not the full story! The real issue is why anyone should be making millions per year! Just what are they contributing to society! If you are middle class and you have SELF RESPECT then you must be raging mad at anyone who makes more then three or four times your salary! Their high compensations are not due to “productivity” but to “position”!
Oh dear me that would be class warfare! Well see what Rush Limbaugh has to say in the video above! This may come as a wake up call to some Americans! Wake up America class warfare is being waging against us right now! Just look at how our jobs, wealth and even military technology are being sent out from our borders! Frequently even to America’s enemies by the CUT AND RUN CAPITALISTS! But don’t worry they will be back after they have built up the military industrial complex of China and that nation becomes a threat to America. Guess who will suddenly “rediscover” their American roots? Then these CUT AND RUN CAPITALISTS will no longer term their “collectives” as Global Corporations but American Corporations when there is a buck to be made! Naturally their sons and daughters will not serve if America is attacked. That is for our children so we can serve our social betters!
The Republicans love to use the analogy of a calender with some day in May as the day when the money you earn after that is yours! The rest before being collected for taxes! Well I say every employee should be told at what date of the year his days worked that year equal just one day of the executives of the Corporation! On December 31st most will still not earn what their CEO made January 1st!
While I don’t believe we should pay African Americans compensation for the years of slavery of their ancestors, I wonder why someone like Cindy McCain should receive millions from her ancestors. What is the labor of her ancestors transferable but not the labor value of slaves to their ancestors!
No I am not against people becoming millionaires or passing on large sums of wealth! The issue is the percentage when this wealth is unearned by the recipient and the rest of us do not have economic security and have to work for a living! Our society is supposed to be a society that rewards hard work not privilege! Oh dear imagine the hardship of someone who makes millions per year having instead only a mere million per year in compensation! Yet these are the parasites that want us to cut back and who want to take away our freedom! I am not against the upper class. Some indeed are leaders of progressive causes because they remember what it was like! The time has come in this era of licentious permissiveness where corporations engage in cut and run capitalism to act with “responsibility”! Oh dear did I say a bad word?
It is not just wealth but leisure. Germans have eleven week vacations. Do you think they give a krap if that makes them “unproductive”? Maybe we should return to the seven day work week! That is the “freedom” that the Corporate Collectivists would impose on the individual!
Yes freedom to serve our social betters! Well that is not “freedom” in my book!
Our society depends on banks, air traffic control computers, electrical grids and computer controlled communications! Our military is heavily dependent on computers! If our banks and financial institutions lost their computer capabilities our economy could collapse! I believe this attack should be responded to by our military computer experts even if covertly! Yes I am a European style Social Democrat. But I am sick of our nation being indecisive in the face of North Korea and Iran. Indeed my opposition to the Iraqi War is that it side tracked our nation from our own National Security Interest to focus instead on a vast Republican Social Engineering Experiment.
What the Republicans just don’t seem to understand is this basic maxim:
Petty two bit Dictators are NOT afraid of being overthrown and replaced by Democracies! They are simply afraid of being overthrown! When our nation changed it’s goals in Iraq from the mere overthrow of Sadam Hussein to a vast Republican Social Engineering Experiment we completely lost our Military Deterrence with Iran and North Korea! Both Iran and North Korea realized that instead of presenting a demonstration of our “Shock and Awe Technology” we were shifting to a masochistic “bleed and procrastinate” military strategy of engagement! Iraq made us procrastinate against Iran and North Korea not to mention Al Qaeda on the Afganistan – Pakistan border.
We were no longer a threat to Iran and North Korea! Indeed the very fact that we are going to build a Star Wars Anti-Missile System in Europe to protect Eurpope from rogue nations means we are not serious about stopping nuclear proliferation in the first place!
The very premise of such a system is predicated on the fact that we will allow Iran to have nukes! Now this cock roach of a nation, North Korea is playing games with our computers! These nations must be stopped not simply by economic means but by blatant high tech military force if needed.
But Democrats must realize we cannot allow another nation to rival us in military technology. Since we do not want to shed the blood of our military we must keep the image of Technological Leader. These Cyber attacks are a threat to our military deterence!
Our strength is not in occupations, except when really needed, but in our “Shock and Awe Military Technology”! (Oh my God a Liberal quoting Rumsfeld). I support Star Wars Technology. I just don’t believe it serves our national interests to place it in Eastern Europe which only alienates Russia and sends the wrong message to Iran! It makes me proud as an American to hear that the tests of our Star Wars Technology are running very well! Yes one can be both a liberal and for defending vigorously American interests! We do not have to even cause loss of life in North Korea. We could use EMP Bombs. See video below.
This blog is not your standard liberal blog. Yes I am a rabid Social Democrat and believe in the roll back of not only the Bush but the Reagan tax cuts as well! But I also believe we must be forceful in the defense of our nation. Bush squandered our resources in Iraq. My fellow liberals must understand something very fundamental about the American electorate!
Americans love action figures!
We got attacked on 9-11. Bush used forceful action! He jumped in the polls. He dropped when his “action” turned out to be a loss. We had an economic crises! The Republicans advocated laisse-faire! Obama advocated ACTION! Obama then won! Americans love ACTION FIGURES!
If we expect economic sanctions to work against both Iran and North Korea then we are fools! We will see a mushroom cloud over our cities in that case. This cyber-attack must be met with a counter attack against North Korea’s computers! Even if they did not launch the attack they are a cock roach of a nation that deserves punishment for their nuclear testing! If we Democrats do not act FORCEFULLY then we will loose the elections.
Americans love action figures! The time has come to take action and unlike George Bush, we must take focused action using our advanced technology rather than mere infantry and occupations!
My God today I saw even FOX NEWS doing full coverage of Michael Jackson’s Memorial Service! Well I am fed up of this constant coverage! Does anyone realize North Korea is making nukes and shooting missiles over the Pacific? ENOUGH OF MICHAEL JACKSON – GOD DAMN IT!
As one person said, why don’t we cover the funerals of great men like Jonas Salk who invented the Polio vaccine and saved not only countless lives but also spared people from becoming invalids as my poor recently departed cousin. She was one of the last people to be crippled by polio.
Yes I realize Michael Jackson made a great contribution to music and as Carl Jung said all people have a “Shadow”. Michael Jackson showed us you can be rich and successful but still haunted by trouble! I am not writing this post against him but rather the overdone coverage of his death. My God this nation is going to pay it’s “Karma” for our obsession with celebrities as we will be subject to every whim and detail of the coming lawsuits concerning his estate! No I don’t want to hear anymore! Especially the extensive coverage!
One exception I will take with his critics is from Rush Limbaugh.
You know the head of the Republican Party! Well the leader of the Republican Party “prescribed” (oops bad word) a solution to the over coverage of Michael Jackson’s funeral. He said why don’t we cover the fallen heroes of the Iraq War?
Well maybe if Rush Limbaugh were to pay attention he would realize that former President Bush ordered that there was to be no such coverage of the arrival of the remains of fallen Iraqi Veterans!
Cannot we just get back to solving the world’s problems and turn the dial away from Michael Jackson? Really I am a European style Social Democrat not a Conservative. But I have had it with being “politically correct”! I have had ENOUGH of the constant coverage of Michael Jackson!
Oh poor baby Sarah Palin. Did that nasty liberal biased news media finally become too much for the “Pit bull Hockey Mummy” from Alaska? What drives me crazy about Sarah Palin is the way the news media where too scared to pursue her ties with the Alaskan independence Party and her ties with a witch hunting pastor who gave her the laying on of hands. Please note that while I am an Episcopalian I am not making fun of Pentecostals! I understand most of you reading this are not aware of Sarah Palin being a “PAL of Witch-hunters and Alaskan Secessionists”!
But then again the news media never had the guts to do follow ups on her relationship to the Alaskan Independence Party! With the exception of a few Journalists on CNN and MSNBC, Sarah Palin got a free ride with the news media. Below Keith Olbermann talks about Sarah Palin’s hypocrisy and her relation to both the Alaskan Independence Party and her witchdoctor hunting pastor! (Keith gets into this fully about four minutes into the video but I recommend you watch it in full.
Concerning Sarah Palin’s being a pal of Secessionists, she was wrongly accused of being a “formal member” of the AIP (Alaskan Independence Party). That she was not a formal member, as it was originally alleged by some, has been taken to dismiss the entire issue of her ties to the Alaskan independence Party! Well not so fast! You see her husband was a member for seven years and she even sent a video address to their convention last year just a few months before she became the Republican nominee for Vice President. You can view it on the Alaskan Independence Party website below.
http://www.akip.org/conv08.html
The AIP Goal is secessionist from America. Their own website states this as their ultimate goal.
http://www.akip.org/grege.html
Their founder Joe Vogler did not want to be called an “American” but an “Alaskan”. See the video below.
Oh poor Sarah Palin, such a martyr for the Conservative Cause! Those nasty people in the news media even asked her a question about the “Bush Doctrine”! Being the great foreign policy expert that John McCain said she is, why is such a question considered to be biased?
Yes this is Sarah Palin the one who constantly accused Barrack Obama of being a “pal of terrorists”. Yet to criticize her would result in accusations that the news media is biased! Hell this woman got a free ride! The news media never questioned her about her ties to the Alaskan Independence Party.
God imagine if Barrack Obama’s wife where a member of the Black Panthers? Imagine if Barrack Obama addressed a convention of Black separatists? The news media went on and on about the nutty Rev Wright but barely mentioned John McCain’s ties to Rev. Hagee or Rev. Parsley! But even worse was Sarah Palin and her love of a minister who conducted witch hunting in Africa! (See top video). Yet you never heard about him in the news media!
Well let me close this post with a little humor! The “Ballard of Sarah Palin” see above! These effete snobs of the Republican Party accused Barrack Obama of being a “elitist”! Yet now they wail and whine like babies that the upper 2% is going to have to pay more taxes. They call these people the “producers”! Hey what do these parasites do to earn more money then the President of the United States? Do they have more responsibilities than the President of the United States! The time has come for America’s producers, our great Middle Class to stop being a Silent Majority but a vocal one! Let’s take back our nation from these effete snobs of privilege!
Good night Sarah and good riddance!
