Day: May 2, 2016

Protests Of The Week

-And NO I am not going to write about the protests and the trouble that the slug Trump is having in California…….the protests that I am writing about occurred in that backward country that we brought democracy to after decades of authoritarian rule….Iraq.

People Power….ah the days of protests past….appears that Iraq may be the next country to do the talking from the streets, or what is left of the streets in the country…..

After months of relatively peaceful protests, anti-government demonstrations in Baghdad have turned violent.

A state of emergency was declared across the Iraqi capital following the storming of the Green Zone.

The heavily fortified area, home to government headquarters and foreign embassies, has been closed to most Iraqis for 13 years.

After more than a decade of fighting and dying…….It appears that the democracy that we brought to the country is starting to fall apart……

Hundreds of protesters climbed over the blast walls surrounding Baghdad’s highly-fortified Green Zone for the first time on Saturday and stormed into parliament, carrying Iraqi flags and chanting against the government. The breach marked a major escalation in the country’s political crisis following months of anti-government protests, sit-ins, and demonstrations by supporters of influential Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, the AP reports. The Green Zone is home to most ministries and foreign embassies and has long been the focus of al-Sadr’s criticism of the government. Earlier Saturday, al-Sadr accused Iraqi politicians of blocking political reforms aimed at combating corruption and waste.

While al-Sadr didn’t call for an escalation to the protests, shortly after his remarks his supporters began scaling the compound’s walls. A group of young men then pulled down a section of concrete blast walls to cheers from the crowd of thousands gathered in the streets outside. Cellphone video uploaded to social media showed dozens of young men running through the halls of parliament, chanting slogans in support of al-Sadr and calling for the government to disband. Hours earlier, a bombing in a market filled with Shiite civilians in Baghdad killed at least 21 people and wounded at least 42 others, according to police and hospital officials. ISIS claimed the attack, saying it used a three-ton truck bomb.

Like I said….the fragile government, a democracy, in Iraq is starting to fray along the seams……

The democratic form of government is losing some luster….

The storming of the parliament building in Baghdad by protesters chanting the name of populist Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr is a sign that the political system built up since the US invasion in 2003 is disintegrating. The Iraqi security forces stood back and did nothing as the protesters burst into the Green Zone, graphically illustrating the weakness of […]

Source: A protest that signals the demise of Iraq’s political system – The Unz Review

Is this the beginning of the end of America’s Iraqi experiment?

Let’s Be Absurd

None of us like to be told what to do by the government…..but then there are those people that will allow it as long as it does not pertain to their lives….

We are having a debate over where someone pees…..my thought is how will you determine if the person belongs there or not….the only way to do that is by becoming a peeping Tom or the person walks in with genitals a in hand and announces they are there….to me this is a silly debate to be wasting our time on…..

Then there are the people that are pissed about a gay person wanting a cake, among other services,

More than 30 ministers from around the state and nation published an open letter Monday saying the so-called “religious freedom” law goes against Christian teachings to love and respect all people. The group joins major businesses, human rights groups and legal experts in opposing the incoming law, which they say discriminates against the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

The law lets churches and some private businesses deny services to gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people because of religious beliefs. It’s similar to one vetoed by Georgia’s governor in late March. Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant signed the measure into law earlier this month.

Supporters of the law include the American Family Association and the Southern Baptist Convention. They say it protects those who decline services to people whose lifestyles violate religious beliefs that marriage should only be between a man and a woman; that sexual relations should only take place inside such marriages, and that a person’s sex is determined at birth and is unchangeable.

Another Southern state has passed another law……this one centers around therapists but I am sure that it will be expanded……

Mental health therapists and counselors in Tennessee can now turn away gay patients or others whose “goals, outcomes, or behaviors” conflict with their “sincerely held beliefs.” Republican Gov. Bill Haslam signed Bill 1556 into law on Wednesday, saying it doesn’t “address a group, issue, or belief system,” though opponents say it’s a troubling attack on gay rights, CNN reports. The bill was created in response to the American Counseling Association’s 2014 change to its ethics code, which required counselors to avoid imposing their own values on clients, the Tennessean reports.

The ACA says the Tennessee legislation, which is the only such law in the country, is an “unprecedented attack” on the profession, the AP reports. ACA spokesman Art Terrazas says the group is “extremely disappointed” that Haslam has ignored the backlash to similar “religious freedom” bills in states like Georgia “and has elected to sign this dangerous bill into law. Plain and simple, this bill codifies discrimination.” The final version of the bill removed references to religion and added requirements for therapists to treat people who are in immediate danger of harming themselves or others, and to refer rejected clients to other therapists or counselors

All this is just absurd….I mean one goes into business to sell services and make money….but yet some money is different from other money?  And then when people retaliate with a boycott these same people start whining about the loss of business.

We got rid of one form of segregation (sort of) and replaced it with another…..where will this type of pure CRAP end?

Maybe this cartoon will show you…….the path of absurdity.

Oh wait there is even more of this conservative absurdities.

Being a single mom in Springfield, Illinois could get a little more difficult if certain GOP lawmakers get their way.

According to the proposed bill HB6064 filed last week by Reps John D. Cavaletto and Keith Wheeler, if a father is not listed on a newborn child’s birth certificate, the birth certificate will not be issued for the child and any future financial assistance will be denied.

Where do these mental midgets draw the line?

What the Hell will be next for the slugs of the American political system?

Daniel Berrigan–R.I.P.

Who?  That will be the reaction from the society we have today…..a voice from a turbulent time……

As an aging “hippie” there are a few people that stand out in my past…..Abby Hoffman, Daniel Ellsberg, Joan Baez (not one of my faves) and Daniel Berrigan……..as an staunch anti-war protesters these people are in the Hall of Heroes…..voices from the “Movement”……

Over the weekend a “Hero” has passed away…..Daniel Berrigan….

His defiant protests helped shape Americans’ opposition to the Vietnam War—and they landed the Rev. Daniel Berrigan behind bars. The Roman Catholic priest, writer, and poet, who became a household name in the US in the 1960s after being imprisoned for burning draft files in a protest against the war, died Saturday. He was 94. Berrigan died “peacefully” after a “long illness” at Murray-Weigel Hall, a Jesuit health care community in New York City, according to a spokesman for the Jesuits USA Northeast Province. Berrigan and his younger brother, the Rev. Philip Berrigan, entered a draft board in Catonsville, Maryland, on May 17, 1968, with seven other activists and removed records of young men about to be shipped off to Vietnam. The group took the files outside and burned them in garbage cans.

The “Catonsville Nine” were convicted on federal charges accusing them of destroying US property and interfering with the Selective Service Act of 1967. All were sentenced on Nov. 9, 1968, to prison terms ranging from two to 3.5 years. After the case had been unsuccessfully appealed, the Berrigan brothers and three of their co-defendants went underground. Philip Berrigan turned himself in to authorities in April 1969 at a Manhattan church. Four months later, the FBI arrested Daniel Berrigan at the Rhode Island home of theologian William Stringfellow. Berrigan said in an interview that he became a fugitive to draw more attention to the anti-war movement. He served about two years at the federal prison in Danbury, Connecticut. When asked in 2009 whether he had any regrets, Berrigan replied: “I could have done sooner the things I did, like Catonsville.”

Source: Father Daniel Berrigan, S.J. May 9, 1921 to April 30, 2016 – LA Progressive

To realize his importance you had to be there……some of us will never forget his contribution…..or his voice…….a person that will stand by their convictions is an odd thing these days…..

Source: The Life and Death of Daniel Berrigan | Common Dreams | Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community

He was a friend and his voice will be missed…..

Rest In Peace…..my friend.

Quote Of The Day

I truly hope all had a great weekend and are ready for the week ahead….so much stuff…so little time……

One of my favorite quotes is “Stupidity Is The Deliberate Cultivation Of Ignorance”…..not sure who is credited with it…but it is a very good quote.

MLK had one along the same lines……(see below)…..

 

AMEN!

There is too much of both these days….and Americans are embracing their ignorance and their stupidity as if it were a badge of honor.

So sad!

American democracy is rigged

This election year there are opinions about everything you could possibly imagine.

Some say that the elections are rigged……the way they have been going in the last 25 years I tend to agree.  All we have to do is take an objective look at the past elections (that will be difficult because most Americans cannot be objective)…..I read a piece about our democracy and it made some excellent points….some will jpt appreciate the source….but the source has hired some of the best analysis in the industry….

The Republican and Democratic parties are functioning like two identical but competing Orwellian Ministries of Truth.

Although any US citizen can join these two parties – or any other political party – millions of eligible voters have not, and consider themselves “independent”.

These independent voters get to vote in the general elections like anyone else, but by the time we get to that general election in November, the two dominant political parties have already elected their nominee, and, therefore, US citizens at large have to vote for one of these preselected nominees if they want their vote to have a role in who their next president will be.

Source: American democracy is rigged – Al Jazeera English

I too have a difficult time with the term “independent”…..it is a con job perpetrated by the media to the point that the voter has come to believe the label…..(I will be writing more about this later as the general approaches)….