The Next American Revolution Has Already Begun: An Interview With Gar Alperovitz

By Gar Smith, The Berkeley Daily Planet

Gar Alperovitz, currently a Professor of Political Economy at the University of Maryland, has been writing books about wealth, democracy and national security for 48 years. In addition to serving in several government posts (including Special Assistant in the US State Department), Alperovitz is a founding principle of The Democracy Collaborative and a boardmember at the New Economics Institute.

What Then Must We Do? (his latest book and his twelfth since 1965) is a breezy, conversational read filled with somber forecasts, hopeful alternative economic strategies and lots of surprising facts and stats (Some examples: If the nation's personal wealth were divided evenly, a family of four would receive $200,000 a year. The hourly US minimum wage, adjusted for inflation, is now $2 less than it was in 1968. The US is such a large country "You can tuck Germany into Montana!")

What Then Must We Do? (the title is borrowed from Tolstoy) explores a challenging premise: "The coming painful decades may be the prehistory of the next American revolution – and an evolutionary process that transforms the American system, making it both morally meaningful and ecologically sustainable."

Daniel Ellsberg calls this book possibly "the most important movement-building book of the new century" and Juliet Schor, author of True Wealth, hails it as "the most compelling account yet of how we can move beyond the piecemeal, project–by–project transformation of our political economy to truly systemic change."

Alperovitz recently took time from his busy schedule to discuss the arguments in his new book and explore the ramifications of social and economic change in an era of pending systemic collapse.
Gar S: You point out that 400 plutocrats in the US now own more wealth than 180 million other Americans. A scale of inequality that ranks as “medieval.” Shortly before his assassination, Dr. King noted America's problems could not be solved without “undergoing a radical redistribution of economic power.”

Gar A: The concentration of wealth in this country is astonishing. 400 individuals—you could seat them all on a single airplane—own as much wealth as 60 percent of the rest of the country taken together. I was describing this distribution as “medieval” until a medieval historian set me straight: wealth was far more evenly distributed in the Middle Ages. When you ask where power lies in our system, you are asking who owns the productive assets. And that's the top 1 percent—in fact, the top 1 percent of the 1 percent. It is a feudalistic structure of extreme power. It is anathema to a democracy to have that kind of concentration of wealth. More and more people are beginning to realize the extent and reach of corporate power and the power of those who own the corporations. The Koch brothers get a lot of publicity, but it’s a much wider phenomenon.

You mentioned Martin Luther King, citing some of the quotes I included in the book. This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of his legendary “I Have a Dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial, and we will be doubtless be hearing a lot about that and Dr. King’s leadership on racial equality and civil rights. I worked with him on neighborhood ownership questions we were looking at in the Senate at the time; and then again, a few years later, when he came out against the Vietnam War. He was also questioning the distribution of wealth, citing the “triple evils” of racism, economic exploitation and militarism. At the end, right before he was assassinated, he even began to talk about changing the economic power structure, even occasionally, using the words “democratic socialism.” In this era of difficulty we would do well to remember Dr. King as a visionary who was beginning to step out beyond the cramped consensus to ask far deeper questions about the nature of America and the possibilities for a different future for this country. That is our challenge today.

Gar S: You argue that it was not politics but circumstance (the Great Depression, followed by WW II) that precipitated the New Deal's progressive change and the country’s post-war economic prosperity. I was surprised by your assessment that an economic collapse on the scale of the Great Depression is no longer likely. Could you explain?

Gar A: Despite the systemic problems a crisis collapse of the scope and scale of the Great Depression is not likely. Here are a few reasons. First, the size of ongoing government spending stabilizing the economy is much, much larger than it was at the time of the Great Depression. Government spending—the floor under the private economy, if you like—was at 11 percent in 1929, now it is roughly 30 to 35 percent of the economy (depending on the year, and whether we are in recession.) The economy may decline rapidly, but the floor is three times higher than it was during the 1930s. Second, today we have built-in economic “stabilizers”—spending that kicks in to help offset the decline when recessions begin to get underway: unemployment insurance, food stamps, and so on. Then there is the sea change in politics. The American public now holds political leaders responsible for making sure the economy works—or at least does not totally fail. There is a heavy political price for any politician who fails to deal with truly massive economic pain. Perhaps most importantly, when push comes to shove, major corporate leaders also support action to counteract truly major economic contractions. You saw it in 2008 and 2009 when business leaders demanded action—including the stimulus plan.

So massive and sustained economic collapse of the kind that opened the way for extremely unusual and far-reaching policy change in the Great Depression and New Deal era, though not impossible, is no longer likely. This is not to say great recessions, ongoing economic pain, and high unemployment may not occur for long periods of time. Indeed, that is what we face at present.

Gar S: The new word for economic performance is no longer “growth” but “stagnation.” One percent of the country controls so much wealth but—unlike the middle class and working poor—the rich don't spend a significant part of their wealth.

Gar A: This prospect of stagnation—or “punctuated stagnation,” as I write (there may be small intermittent upticks; plus oil and other commodity price explosions)—is very important to grasp. I believe (along with many observers) that we are entering an era of deepening stagnation and political stalemate. One problem is lack of demand in Keynesian terms, but I think it’s far deeper than that. We are returning to a pattern of stagnation that was common before the Depression collapse, on the one hand, and the extremely unusual conditions that prevailed during the postwar economic boom, on the other.

A short form of the argument would be this: in the first quarter of the twentieth century, up to World War I, there was decay, decline, and indeed major recession and almost depression. We don’t know what would have happened; World War I intervened, bailing out the economy. Same story with the Great Depression: World War II, not the New Deal, solved the economic problem in the second quarter of the century. In the third quarter of the century the post-war economic boom—brought about partly by savings built up during the war, partly by military spending in the Korean War, Vietnam War, and the big military budgets of the Cold War, and partly because US competitors (Germany, Japan, and many others) had been significantly destroyed—was an extremely unusual boom moment—the greatest sustained boom in our history. But thereafter the pattern of economic difficulty resumed in the final quarter of the century. Even though military budgets are high today in absolute terms, they are comparatively small as a share of GDP. And I think nuclear weapons now preclude an industrial-scale global war like World War I or World War II. We can have small horrible wars, but they don’t function economically in the way that larger wars did previously.

Now these difficulties could be resolved if you had sufficient political power to mount a traditional Keynesian solution. But what is significant—and this is the heart of the matter—is that such a solution is no longer available, politically, for a number of reasons. I could go into a lot of them, but the principal one is the decline of organized labor. Labor union membership, the muscle behind progressive politics, was at its peak of around 35 percent just after the war, but is now down to the 11 percent range (and the 6 percent range in the private sector). Liberal reform now lacks an institutional basis. So that’s a picture of decay, and there doesn’t seem to be an easy way out.

Gar S: You argue that “evolutionary reconstruction” does not flow from reform or revolution but rather “from building institutions, workplaces and cultures concerned with democratizing wealth.” How significant are cooperative enterprises in today's economy. Could you describe the current state of America's cooperative economy?

Gar A: Given that the economy is unlikely to truly collapse and provoke explosive change—for all the reasons I have indicated—and given that a “reform” solution like the New Deal is extremely difficult in the absence of a strong institutional power base for liberalism (e.g. labor unions), we face an extremely unusual political situation. I believe we are entering an extended period, a multi-decade period, in which the dominant reality is likely to be one of erratic growth, stagnation, periodic inflation, substantial political stalemate and decay.

In such a context, the prospects for near-term change are obviously not great—especially when such change is conceived in traditional terms. On the other hand, for precisely such reasons, there is likely to be an intensified process of much deeper probing, much more serious political analysis, and much more fundamental institutional exploration and development. In fact, this is already well underway. Beneath the surface level of politics-as-usual, continuing political stalemate and the exhaustion of existing approaches have begun to open up some very interesting strategic possibilities. These are best understood as neither “reforms” (policies to modify and control, but not transcend, current corporate-dominated institutions) nor “revolution” (the overthrowing of current institutions), but rather a longer-term process of “evolutionary reconstruction”—that is, institutional transformation that unfolds over time.

Like reform, evolutionary reconstruction involves step-by-step nonviolent change. But like revolution, evolutionary reconstruction changes the basic institutions of ownership of the economy, so that the broad public (rather than “the one percent”) increasingly comes to own more and more of the nation’s productive assets. As the old system decays, an evolutionary reconstruction would see the foundations of a new system gradually rising and replacing failing elements of the old.

Though the press doesn’t much cover this, such processes are already observable in many parts of the current American system. Some numbers: There are now ten thousand worker-owned companies of one kind or another in the country. And they are expanding over time, and they’re becoming more democratic rather than less. There are 130 million people who are members of one or another form of cooperative. A quarter of American electricity is produced by either municipal ownership or cooperatives. Twenty-five percent of American electricity is, in other words, “socialized.” There are neighborhood corporations, land trusts, and other municipal and state strategies. One can observe such a dynamic developing in the central neighborhoods of some of the nation’s larger cities, places that have consistently suffered high levels of unemployment and poverty. In such neighborhoods, democratizing development has gone forward, paradoxically, precisely because traditional policies have been politically impossible.

All this has been building in scale and sophistication to the point that growing numbers of people now talk about a “New Economy.” It doesn’t yet compare to the giants of Wall Street and the corporate economy, of course. But it is growing to the point where challenges are also becoming possible. Move Your Money campaigns have seen billions transferred out of Wall Street banks into credit unions and local and community banks. If you add up the credit unions they are the equivalent of one of the largest US banks, knocking Goldman Sachs out of the top five.

I see this era as something akin to the decades before the New Deal, the time when experimentation
and development in the state and local “laboratories of democracy” laid down the principles and programs that became the basis for much larger national policies when the right political moment occurred.

Gar S: You clearly show that regulating Wall Street doesn’t work and breaking up large banks is unlikely to last. The conservative Chicago School of Economics, you point out, had a solution: essentially any business “too big to regulate”” should be nationalized. “Take them over; turn them into public utilities.” Could large banks really be taken over and transformed?

Gar A: The old conservative economists were right: Regulation doesn’t work; they capture the regulators. Anti-trust doesn’t work; if you break them up, they re-group. Look at Standard Oil. Look at AT&T and the telephone companies. In fact, the major banks are even bigger now than they were in 2008 when they were deemed “too big to fail.” They imperil the entire economy. So ultimately the only answer, logically, is to take them over at some point. Milton Friedman’s revered teacher, H.C. Simons, the founder of the conservative Chicago School of economics, was one of the first to point out this logic. He argued that this was necessary because it was the only way to preserve a genuinely free economy.

Can it be done? We just did it in one form: In response to the financial crisis the federal government essentially nationalized General Motors and A.I.G. and was in a position to do the same with Chrysler and several major banks because of the huge injections of public capital that were required to save them from bankruptcy. At one point, Obama frankly told the bankers that he was the only one standing between them and the pitchforks. What happens when the next financial crisis occurs (as most observers on left, right and center think inevitable)? Or the one after that?

There are also already alternative models at hand. Most people don't realize this, but the federal government currently runs 140 different government banks. They aren’t always called banks, although sometimes they are, like the Export-Import Bank and the National Cooperative Bank. But sometimes they take the form of small business loans programs or agricultural programs. Then there is the Bank of North Dakota, a public bank that has been there for ninety years. It's a state-owned bank, very popular with small business but also labor. Twenty states have introduced legislation to create public banks of their own. States have huge tax flows, which could capitalize such banks. Once you start to look more carefully, beneath the surface of media attention, it may be that far more is possible much earlier and much faster than many now imagine.

Gar S: If you don’t like corporate capitalism or state socialism, what’s left? Shouldn’t a fundamental goal be to prevent accumulations of great wealth. Once great wealth or power is attained, there is a tendency to fear the majority and seek to protect one’s fortune at all costs.

Gar A: That is a fair question, and most people don’t face it squarely: “If you don’t like corporate capitalism, where the corporations dominate the political system, and you don’t like state socialism, where the state dominates the system by virtue of its ownership, what do you want?” I think the developments reported on in the book point towards something very American, something that might be called “a community sustaining system”—one in which national structures and regional structures and local structures are all oriented to producing healthy local community economies, and thereby healthy and ecologically sustainable democratic communities.

We are at a very remarkable moment in American history: Even as we face massive economic, social and environmental challenges, more and more people are beginning to see that politics as usual doesn’t work, that the problems are fundamental to the system itself. These issues are on the table for the first time in many decades. So there needs to be an answer at some point, in terms of system design, to the question of what a system looks like that isn’t corporate capitalism and isn’t state socialism but begins with community and how we build it.

The truly central question is who gets to own the nation’s wealth? Because it’s not only an economic question, it determines politics in large part. The corporate capitalist system lodges such power in the corporations and tiny elites. An alternative system must begin at the bottom and democratize ownership from the bottom up—all the way from small co-ops and neighborhood corporations on up through city and state institutions and even, when necessary, regionally and nationally.

I think we can see the outlines of such a model already emerging in developments in the New Economy. It might be called a “Pluralist Commonwealth.” Plural forms of common wealth ownership. Worker ownership, co-ops, municipal utilities, neighborhood land trusts, state ownership of certain national firms. Plural forms. It’s not very sexy language, but it attempts to get to the idea that you must change ownership of wealth in many different ways in order to achieve democratic results and achieve cultural changes that allow us a democratic solution to the systemic problem. The key thing is that just below the surface of media attention a great deal is going on—many, many new developments that move in the direction of democratic ownership, starting at the very grass roots level, and moving up.

All of this ultimately also puts “the system question” on the table. We need a serious and wide-ranging debate around a broader menu of institutional possibilities for America’s future than the stale choices commonly discussed on both left and right.

The Deeply Embarrassing Senator of the Week Award

And now it’s time to present the Viewpoint award for the deeply embarrassing senator of the week.

Never easy to narrow it down to just one, but this week the honors go to Georgia’s own, Saxby Chambliss. Who famously ran for senate in ‘02 against Democrat Max Cleland, a guy that lost 3 limbs in Vietnam — a war Saxby supported, but got student and medical deferments to avoid serving in.

Fortunately Saxby released a TV ad showing actual war hero Cleland side by side with bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, thereby, electing Saxby in a landmark moment in American political toolery.

Lawrence O'Donnell on Rudy Giuliani's rewrite of history

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani cited his terrorism experience in criticizing security failures in the Benghazi attack. In his Rewrite segment, MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell pointed out what Giuliani did–and did not do– before 9/11.

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

Cenk Uygur's response to the NSA cell phone scandal: ‘Barack Obama is a liar.’

In light of the reports that the National Security Administration has been collecting information from American citizens’ cell phones, Cenk calls out President Obama for false campaign promises to fight terrorism while protecting our privacy and civil liberties.

“I will provide our intelligence and law enforcement agencies with the tools they need to track and take out the terrorists without undermining our Constitution and our freedom,” Obama promised in 2008. “That means no more illegal wiretapping of American citizens…that’s not who we are.”

“Well, that’s not who we’re supposed to be, but that’s exactly who Barack Obama is,” Cenk says.

“He lied. It’s not subtle. He said ‘there will be no spying on citizens who are not suspected of a crime.’ He lied. There is spying on all of us, and we are not suspected of a crime. Barack Obama is a liar.”

Letters From Republicans Seeking Health Care Money

It’s the height of hypocrisy: They call for repeal of the law but plead for its dollars on behalf of constituents.

Lee Fang

June 5, 2013   |    This article appeared in the June 24-July 1, 2013 edition of The Nation.

Even before President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law, Republicans were vowing to repeal it. It’s no wonder, because polls showed that the basic elements of the ACA were quite popular, and there was a real danger that it would become more so as people found out that the plan denounced as a “monstrosity” by the National Republican Senatorial Committee would not trample on their liberties so much as help protect their health. Desperate to avoid this, the GOP-controlled House has voted no fewer than thirty-seven times to repeal Obamacare in the three years since it was enacted.

Now letters produced by a Freedom of Information Act request reveal that many of these same anti-Obamacare Republicans have solicited grants from the very program they claim to despise. This is evidence not merely of shameless hypocrisy but of the fact that the ACA bestows tangible benefits that even Congress’s most extreme right-wing ideologues are hard-pressed to deny to their constituents.

As I reported here last September, Congressman Paul Ryan, who as Mitt Romney’s running mate in 2012 called for its repeal, sent a letter requesting ACA money for health clinics in his district two years earlier. The Nation has obtained documents revealing that at least twenty other Obamacare-bashing GOP lawmakers have similarly pleaded for ACA funds on behalf of constituents. Among them are Kristi Noem, a Republican lawmaker from South Dakota likely to run for the Senate next year, as well as Ohio Senator Rob Portman, who has been touted as a potential GOP presidential candidate in 2016.

In one of two letters sent by Portman to the Department of Health and Human Services, the senator requested ACA funds to help a federal health center in Cleveland, where the money could help “an additional 8,966 uninsured individuals” to receive
”essential services,” in his words. In Noem’s case, the congresswoman requested ACA funds to construct a community health center in Rapid City to provide primary services to the uninsured. Both Noem and Portman won office in 2010 campaigning vigorously against the law and have since worked to repeal it.

Though notably less transparent, the behavior of these GOP lawmakers parallels that of GOP governors like Arizona’s Jan Brewer, who blast the president’s health reform package while embracing the millions in Medicaid funds that it provides.

The letter writers include GOP rank-and-file Congress members, leaders and committee chairs, all of whom have supported the repeal effort. David Valadao, for example, a freshman representative who campaigned last year on his opposition to Obamacare, requested funds in a letter to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius two years ago for a program to improve “the general health” of the Fresno County area, which he then served as a California assemblyman. Congressman Jeff Denham, a two-term GOP lawmaker who won his seat with support from Tea Party activists, penned a letter recommending the same application for Fresno County. The county Department of Public Health won the grant. Valadao’s and Denham’s offices declined to comment.

The Affordable Care Act authorizes an array of grants to local hospitals, community health clinics and doctor training programs, as well as public health initiatives to improve health and access to care. The billions of dollars in grants are awarded on a competitive basis, and lawmakers on the state and federal levels have sent letters endorsing applicants.

Texas Senator John Cornyn, the Republican whip, wrote to the Centers for Disease Control to recommend a grant for Houston and Harris County. Congressman Michael McCaul, a Republican and the chair of the Homeland Security Committee, wrote a letter praising the same grant request, calling the effort a “crucial initiative to achieve a healthier Houston/Harris County.” Senators Johnny Isakson and Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Thad Cochran of Mississippi also recommended grant request approval for public health or health clinic funding.

House Republicans and the Senate Republican Policy Committee have trashed the ACA’s Community Transformation grants as an Obamacare “slush fund.” In the letters seeking these grants, however, GOP lawmakers have heaped praise on their potential. Cornyn writes in his letter that the grant would help “improve the health and quality of life of area residents.” Congressman Aaron Schock, a Republican from Illinois, congratulated a local nonprofit for winning a Community Transformation grant, noting that the program will give “people the tools to live healthier and longer lives.”

The National Republican Senatorial Committee warns of Obamacare that “as this awful legislation gets ever closer to going into effect, the negative consequences are only becoming increasingly clear.” But the NRSC’s chair, Jerry Moran, has hailed programs that exist because of it. In August, he attended a ceremony announcing a $4.7 million expansion of the Community Health Center of Southeast Kansas. A picture posted on Moran’s official Facebook page shows the senator in a suit with his foot on a shovel to break ground for the health clinic. “That funding—that came from the Affordable Care Act, and he voted no,” says Krista Postai, CEO of the CHC-SEK clinics. She adds that Moran had been supportive of health clinics in the past, and she was disappointed to see him vote against the law that made her clinic expansion possible. Postai noted that her clinics are already improving lives with ACA funding, and that there are thousands of uninsured and disabled people in her community who now receive coverage and preventive care thanks to the law.

Some of the letters obtained by The Nation are from lawmakers who are no longer in office, including Jerry Lewis, Bobby Schilling, Kay Bailey Hutchison and Robert Dold.

The letters of support for ACA grants are a reminder (if one is needed) that some Republican claims against the bill reflect politics rather than policy preferences. GOP Congressman Hal Rogers, who rails against healthcare reform as “socialistic,” wrote a letter asking for an Obamacare health clinic grant almost as soon as the money became available. Federal health centers provide a range of healthcare services regardless of a patient’s ability to pay. The ACA dramatically boosts spending on these centers, by about $11 billion, with the goal of reaching 1.25 million additional patients.

Congressman Bill Cassidy, a Louisiana Republican who has led efforts to repeal healthcare reform, stood next to a 6-foot stack of papers he dubbed the “Obamacare Red Tape Tower of Regulations” at a press conference in May. In October, Cassidy posed for a different type of press event, standing with school administrators in Baton Rouge, scissors in hand, at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for three school-based health centers. The ceremony was a celebration of a $500,000 grant authorized by the Affordable Care Act to expand health clinics in area schools.

Before healthcare reform made nearly every federal health program a political football, the Bush administration routinely requested greater funds for federal community health centers with little controversy. But health clinics once supported by the GOP are now on the chopping block.

Republicans, led by Congressman Michael Burgess of Texas, have attempted to roll back the ACA’s expanded clinic funding. Also, several of the repeal bills in Congress have targeted the entire law, including funds for health centers and public health initiatives. The fact that they have sought grants for those centers has not stopped Republicans from voting against them. Louisiana’s Cassidy, for instance, voted for Burgess’s bill to shut down funding for clinics.

Whether cutting a ribbon or signing a letter, no Republicans have acknowledged that the health programs they are endorsing are provided by Obamacare.

Some GOP lawmakers have balked at the charges of hypocrisy. “Sen. Chambliss voted against the Affordable Care Act, just as he did the stimulus package. But the bill passed, and if the money is available, we want Georgians to be able to compete fairly with folks from other states for it,” wrote Lauren Claffey, the senator’s press secretary, in an e-mail. Similarly, Senator Isakson’s office e-mailed a statement from the senator claiming:
”I voted against Obamacare and will continue to work to repeal it. However, one of the most important parts of my job as senator is to assist Georgia individuals, businesses and local governments in their dealings with the federal government. Any time one of my constituents has business with the federal government, I try to be as helpful as possible by supporting worthy projects.”

If these grant letters—sent since the ACA’s implementation in 2010—are any guide, GOP opposition to the law will be seriously tested when the open enrollment period for ACA exchanges begins this fall. What will these Republican lawmakers say to their uninsured constituents who want to sign up?

To the extent that the law is successful, it places its Republican critics in a bind, which is why they’re working so hard to undermine it. “The thing about reading these letters is that they’re well-drafted. If you were to read them as stand-alone, you would say, ‘Gosh, the Affordable Care Act is great,’ not ‘Let’s repeal the bill,’” says Ethan Rome, executive director of Health Care for America Now, a pro-reform advocacy group. Rome points out that Republican lawmakers are not “holding press conferences in front of a community health center saying, ‘I’m here to get this defunded.’” He adds, “Now that would be political courage.”

Read through all of the documents obtained via The Nation's Freedom of Information Act request:
Read Lee Fang's exposé of Paul Ryan’s ACA grant request here.

Is Ken Emanuelson the most honest Republican in America?

Cenk Uygur talks to “Young Turks” producers Hermela Aregawi, Logan Pollard, and Jayar Jackson about Ken Emanuelson, a Tea Party leader from Texas who has come under fire for his comments at a recent GOP event.

In response to a question regarding the Republican Party’s struggles to gain the black vote, Emanuelson replied, “Well, I’m going to be real honest with you. The Republican Party doesn’t want black people to vote if they’re going to vote 9-to-1 for Democrats.”

Emanuelson has since walked back his statements, but our panel appreciates the rare honesty from a politician. “Of course he’s right,” Cenk concludes. “I mean, the whole point of the voter ID laws was to make sure black people don’t vote.”

The IRS has silenced us, say tea party members on thousands of radio and TV shows

From the June 4, 2013, edition of “Viewpoint.”

John Fugelsang:

I’m John Fuglesang, and I’d like to appeal to all you kind Americans out there and ask you to open your hearts and lend a hand to one of the most persecuted, oppressed and voiceless groups in all of America. Of course, I’m talking about the tea party.

Recently, we learned that during the time when [the IRS] was headed by Douglas Shulman, certain midlevel bureaucrats at the IRS office in Cincinnati targeted tea party groups unfairly. Now, I know this is shocking — the idea that something interesting could ever happen in Cincinnati. But tea partyers had to face the worst thing any decent American ever faced, my friends: increased, inconvenient amounts of paperwork to prove that groups holding signs saying “Impeach Obama” shouldn’t pay taxes because they’re obviously not political.

Now, this kerfuffle caused the tea party to experience the worst human-rights abuses since the Stark family went to that wedding on “Game of Thrones.”

Becky Gerritson, my friends, president of the Wetumpka, Alaska, tea party, said, “This is not an accident. This is a willful act of intimidation intended to discourage a point of view.”

Yes, the tea party was intimidated into complete silence to such an extent that the only place she was allowed to say this was before a committee of congressmen in front of millions of viewers on CSPAN, CNN and Fox News.

Now let me ask: How would you like it if the IRS wanted to know if you’d been cheating on your taxes, when all you did was carry around a big sign that said, “Taxes are a crime against humanity”?

It’s not right, and the tea party needs your help. They need 501(c)(4) tax-exempt status so they can hide the identities of their completely nonpolitical donors. They need ink so they can keep on non-politically drawing Hitler mustaches on posters of Obama. And they need funds to buy vintage military outfits that best express the America they believe in — and they need a lot of money for that because authentic Confederate soldier uniforms can get a little pricey.

But don’t take my word for it. Please listen to Lester Derndack, a tea party member who suffered the oppression of the Obama administration firsthand. Lester?

Frank Conniff as Lester Derndack: I applied for tax-exempt status from the IRS and was subjected to all sorts of abuse. I was given extra paperwork that I was forced to sign and spend the whole better part of an afternoon working on. And look at our Muslim president — he’s allowed to serve in office with only two birth certificates. Have you seen them things? I had a nightmare of copies and triplicates that took up an entire hour. I’m telling you, I do not recognize America anymore. Benghazi!

That is very brave, Lester. You’re proof that real teabaggers don’t choke. And there are millions more — exactly, completely like him.

So won’t you please help? These tea party members have been silenced, and they now have no voice in society, as they’ve said thousands of times on the thousands of radio and cable TV shows they’ve appeared on relentlessly. These loyal patriots who only want to bring down our government and turn the country over to Wall Street oligarchs have been trying to scrimp and scrape by with only a few million-dollar contributions from billionaire, anonymous supporters like the Koch brothers.

Without your help, they might suffer the fate of Emerge America, a liberal group targeted by the IRS for being political, that was actually, really forced to disclose its donors and lose tax-exempt status, which still hasn’t happened to a single one of these tea party groups that shouldn’t pay taxes because they’re so not political.

Are you going to let the IRS get away, my friends, with breaking zero laws and ensuring people pay their taxes?

All of your contributions are tax deductible. And remember: If you care about the tea party, do everything you can to impeach the president who appointed Douglas Shulman to run the IRS.

The Dishwasher 2 hacked for PC — and the developer's mostly OK with it

By Stephanie Carmichael

Piracy is the hated scourge of the game industry, but many people — like Russian hacker Barabus — believe it’s bad and do it anyway. Sometimes they even invent crazy justifications to mask that it’s theft. Unofficially releasing a PC port of the beat-em-up The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile, for instance, isn’t “stealing.” It’s a way to give back to developer Ska Studios and its fans.

Vampire Smile, which released in 2011, is the sequel to the 2009′s The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai. Both appeared exclusively on Xbox Live Arcade. Barabus believes it was OK to pirate and modify the game without Ska Studios’ permission because the developer wouldn’t lose any profits, anyway, according to Indie Statik. After all, the developer had no plans for a PC version, and a new platform release would only help more people find the game.

The hacker even blamed Ska Studios for not thinking of it first.

“The view was expressed that, with respect to the authors, it is not very nice to publish the game on the PC,” Barabus wrote on the gamedev.ru (via Google Translate). “I have to argue that the part of the authors are not very nice to publish the game exclusively for the Xbox 360, making it impossible for PC gamers to play such a great game.”

He added, “Piracy — yes, that is bad. On the other hand, we did not steal the game for the Xbox 360; we released it for the PC port. Given that the developers ignored the PC platform, about any loss of profit for them is not out of the question. After all, if they wanted to earn money, then the game would be issued on all available platforms. If the game came out on PC officially, then this thread would not exist.”

Designer James Silva said he had mixed reactions about the port, but ultimately he was OK with it — even “flattered,” he said.

@robotvevrything I’m not even mad, I’m impressed!
— James Silva (@Jamezila) June 4, 2013

“But I’m bewildered by the cracker’s attempt to justify the morality of it,” he told Indie Statik. “He assumes a lot about why Vampire Smile’s not on PC yet, and he could have cleared up a lot of those assumptions by just emailing me. I get that piracy is a service problem, but that’s a consequence, not a justification.”

@alejandrodaj @robotvevrything Yeah, I’m fine with letting it happen, but I’m annoyed at the entitlement/revenge angle.
— James Silva (@Jamezila) June 4, 2013

GamesBeat has reached out to Silva for comment.

Silva is currently working on a new beat-em-up called Charlie Murder with Microsoft Game Studios as publisher.

GOP Outraged At Obama Plan To Stop Future Wall Street Bailouts

By Justin "Filthy Liberal Scum" Rosario

On Monday, the Financial Stability Oversight Council (created by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act) designated at least three financial institutions as “systematically important.” In other words, they are “too big to fail” and require increased oversight and regulation to keep them from dragging the entire financial sector under in a replay of the 2007-2008 collapse.

Via Bloomberg:

AIG and Prudential, in statements issued yesterday after a meeting of the Financial Stability Oversight Council, said they were notified of the proposed designations. Russell Wilkerson, a spokesman for GE Capital, said in an e-mail that his company also received a notice.

The council didn’t identify the companies it decided should be subjected to heightened Federal Reserve oversight. AIG, Prudential and GE Capital had previously said they were in the final stage of review.

The companies so labeled will have 30 days to contest the finding in court and try to have it reversed. Of course, Republicans are appalled at the idea of staving off another wide-spread collapse by identifying institutions that will drag down the entire sector should they fall:

The council’s move puts taxpayers at “greater risk of being forced to fund yet another Wall Street bailout,” Jeb Hensarling, a Texas Republican, said in a statement. “Designating any company as ‘too big to fail’ is bad policy and even worse economics.”

Actually, alerting stockholders that a financial giant is simply too large to be allowed to run unregulated is pretty damn smart. What better way to increase confidence than by knowing that these “too big to fail” institutions are going to be under increased scrutiny? Not only will this significantly reduce the kind of reckless behavior that wiped out trillions of dollars of wealth just 6 years ago, but it also means that the other banks are not in a position to take out the entire economy if one of them collapses. Republicans are always crying about how “uncertainty” is bad for the economy, aren’t they? This is one way of alleviating the dread uncertainty that your bank will implode and make all of your money disappear again.

Think of it this way: you live in a building built on columns that collapsed a few years ago. The building was rebuilt with the same blueprints. This is not a cause for feeling secure. However, you are informed that only three or so of the columns are crucial to the integrity of the building. If the other columns collapse, you’ll be fine, if a little shaken, as long as the main columns are still standing. Oh, and those main columns will be inspected on a regular basis now.

It’s understandable why a bank might not want this label; it could be taken as a sign that they are unstable and opponents of the vital regulatory reform mandated by Dodd-Frank will not hesitate to paint it that way. The reality is that the designation has nothing to do with the health of the institution, simply that it is large enough to cause massive collateral damage should it fail for any reason, even one not of its own doing.

Will it keep the gamblers from taking extraordinary risks and making extraordinary profits? Probably. But those extraordinary risks (otherwise known as “unfettered greed”) are what plunged the country into the worst recession in almost a century. Keeping the economy safe by pissing off greedy market manipulators? That’s a risk worth taking.

When will Republicans stop talking about the 47%?

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Chuck Schumer Destroys Right Wing Talking Points

David Gregory bravely repeated right wing talking points, but Sen. Chuck Schumer put a stop to that nonsense and schooled the 'liberal' reporter.

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Japan Suspends U.S. Wheat Purchases After GMO Discovery

By News Desk | May 31, 2013

Japan, the largest international buyer of U.S. wheat, has canceled its tender to buy U.S. white wheat after the discovery of a test strain of Monsanto’s genetically modified wheat had been found on an Oregon wheat farmer’s land, Reuters reports.

Monsanto tested the Roundup-resistant wheat from 1998 to 2005, but it was never approved for consumption. The agriculture company abandoned the project due to international rejection of genetically modified (GM) cereals.

Japan and other Asian countries remain skeptical of GM foods, and Japan has approved only a select number of GM products for human consumption, including corn, but not wheat.

The GM wheat was discovered when an Oregon wheat farmer tried spraying an undesired patch with Monsanto’s herbicide, Roundup, but the weedkiller — to the farmer’s surprise — didn’t do the job.

The farmer then contacted Oregon State University researchers who determined the wheat contained genes from Monsanto’s abandoned wheat project. The crop otherwise consisted of natural wheat.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service is now investigating whether the GM wheat in Oregon is an isolated issue or the genes have spread to other crops. There is no scientific evidence that suggests GM wheat is unfit for consumption.

Monsanto’s strains of genetically modified corn and soybeans now dominate those two markets.

Viewpoint’s revoltingly fake Christian of the week

Tonight we are thrilled to announce a new segment on the show: Viewpoint’s ‘revoltingly fake Christian of the week.’

Congressman Stephen Fincher, a Republican from Tennessee, just took the Bible so far out of context he had to apply for a visa.

Fincher is a fierce opponent of food aid for poor Americans. You know, like Jesus. He recently fought to cut 4.1 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. If you only watch Fox, that means ‘food stamps.’ And thanks to the fine work of Fincher and his colleagues, 2 million working American families, children and seniors have already been cut off from food assistance.

So during a recent House agricultural committee debate, he decided to show how Christian it is to turn your back on unemployed suffering Americans by quoting one of the favorite Bible passages of revoltingly fake right-wing Christians—2 Thessalonians 3:10—”anyone unwilling to work should not eat.”

But here’s the thing—ya see,Thessalonians isn’t god or Jesus talking, it’s believed to have been written by Saint Paul. And in Paul’s day, many apocalyptic Christians believed Jesus was coming back really soon and the world was going to end anyway—so why work?

These early rapture-heads were hurting the local economy and threatening the functioning society of Thessalonica—and I do hope I pronounced that right. And Paul makes a good point—the “Left Behind” books may be junk theology, but Kirk Cameron still shows up at his job.

So in that context, the quote makes sense. In Congressman Fincher’s context, it’s pretty much the opposite of everything Jesus Christ ever stood for.

Now, Congressman Fincher went on to say, quoting from the book of selfish toolery, “the role of citizens, of Christians, of humanity is to take care of each other, but not for Washington to steal from those in the country and give to others in the country.” Really, congressman? Washington steals and gives to others?

Because here’s the other thing—while Fincher was passing bills to take food out of the mouths of the poor, he was supporting a proposal to expand crop insurance by $9 billion, and I’m sure the fact that he is the second most heavily subsidized farmer in Congress and one of the largest subsidy recipients in the history of Tennessee, had nothing to do with this.

Between 1999 and 2012, Fincher, opponent of poor lazy people, put out his tin cup and collected $3.5 million in government money. This guy isn’t just a welfare queen, he’s a welfare kingdom with a moat, castle and a catapult that shoots government money over the wall into his boiling cauldron of hypocrisy.

The average Tennessee farmer gets a subsidy of $1,500. In 2012 alone, Fincher was cut a government subsidy check for $75,000, which is nearly double the median household income in all of Tennessee.

So he votes to cut food stamps and expand crop insurance subsidies by $9 billion. This guy is swimming in so much dirty pork, he could single handedly unite the Muslims and the Jews.

The biggest right-wing fake Christian argument is, “yeah Jesus said help the poor but he didn’t say the government should steal from me to do it! Benghazi!”

But here’s the thing, Jesus lived under European imperial occupation. He didn’t have democracy. We do. So if you want to follow the teachings of Christ—who constantly talked about caring for the poor—then in a democracy, Christians get a chance to vote for the candidate who will most follow the teachings of Christ and care for the least among us, as he commanded in Matthew 25—that filthy hippie. ­­

But Fincher and the GOP don’t do that. They cut services for the poor and taxes for the rich. And it’s a free country. They’re allowed.

But if you don’t want your tax dollars to help the poor, then stop saying you want a country based on Christian values. Because you don’t.

And that’s why representative Fincher is our ‘revoltingly fake Christian of the week!’

All Hell Broke Loose - Why MoMA Is Exhibiting Tetris and Pac-Man

By Bo Moore

Last November, the Museum of Modern Art said that it had acquired 14 videogames, adding working copies and the source code of games like Tetris and The Sims to its collection. The collection’s curator was not prepared for what happened next.

“All hell broke loose.”

In a TED talk released yesterday, MoMA senior curator of architecture and design Paola Antonelli discussed the decision, explaining the importance of interaction design.

“I really do believe that design is the highest form of creative expression,” Antonelli said in the talk.

“I want people to understand that design is so much more than cute chairs, that it is first and foremost everything that is around us in our life.”

Antonelli began bringing examples of interaction design to MoMA several years ago with acquisitions such as Martin Wattenberg’s “Thinking Machine,” the Sugar interface from the One Laptop Per Child initiative, and Philip Worthington’s “Shadow Monsters.”

But videogames proved more controversial. Some argued that games were not art and as such should not be in the MoMA, while others said that videogames could not be art because they are something else: code.

Antonelli said she believes that is the wrong argument: “There’s this whole problem of design being often misunderstood for art,” she says, “or the idea that designers would like to be called artists. No. Designers aspire to be really great designers.”


In the MoMA, the games collection is displayed in a minimalist fashion, modeled after Philip Johnson’s 1934 exhibition “Machine Art,” in which he displayed propeller blades and other pieces of machinery on white pedestals and white walls.

“He created this strange distance, this shock, that made people realize how gorgeous formally, and also important functionally, design pieces were.” Antonelli says. “I would like to do the same with video games.”

In choosing which games to acquire, Antonelli and the MoMA worked with videogame designers and academics on four basic criteria: Behavior, Space, Aesthetics, and Time.

The team had to decide where to draw the line on violent videogames. “It’s considered that in design and in the design collection,” Antonelli said, “what you see is what you get. So when you see a gun, it’s an instrument for killing in the design collection. If it’s in the art collection, it might be a critique of the killing instrument.”

Following those principles, the team included games such as Portal, where you shoot walls to create paths, and Street Fighter II “because martial arts are good,” but excluded games such as Grand Theft Auto III.

Other games picked for the initial batch included Pac-Man, Katamari Damacy, EVE Online and Canabalt. MoMA plans to acquire more in the coming years.

Antonelli likens the process of acquiring a videogame to her aspiration to acquire a Boeing 747 that would at the same time be a part of the MoMA collection while continuing to fly, or the recent acquisition of the @ symbol, which is both in the museum while remaining public domain.

The end goal is to acquire the game’s original source code, which can be quite difficult to pry away from secretive gamemakers. If that’s not possible at first, Antonelli at least wants to wedge her foot in the door.

“We’re going to stay with them forever,” she said. “They’re not going to get rid of us. And one day, we’ll get that code.”

Chris Hayes Delivers MSNBC's Lowest 8 PM Ratings Since 2006

By Jason Easley


MSNBC’s great experiment of putting Chris Hayes at 8 PM has turned into a total disaster as All In is delivering the network’s lowest ratings since 2006.

Chris Hayes’ second full month in prime time since taking over for Ed Schultz saw total viewership drop by 32%, and viewership among those age 25-54 decline by 13%. All In’s bad ratings caused The Rachel Maddow Show to deliver its worst ratings month since 2008.

Maddow’s ratings are down 21% in terms of total viewers, and 22% with viewers age 25-54. The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell had the smallest decline in total viewers at 18%, but suffered a 33% decline with viewers age 25-54.

Chris Hayes is going to take a lot of heat for these ratings, but it isn’t all his fault. Phil Griffin and the other “geniuses” running MSNBC tossed Ed Schultz out of weeknights because they thought they could remake the network as wonk TV, and attract more younger viewers with Chris Hayes.

They couldn’t have been more wrong.

The problem has been that Chris Hayes isn’t well suited for primetime. He was a fine weekend morning host, but his EmoProg Obama bashing style is the complete opposite of who MSNBC’s audience was.

MSNBC primetime is still the audience that Olbermann built, and the audience in general reflects the Obama coalition. The Obama coalition is the majority on the left. The problem is that Chris Hayes doesn’t speak to the majority of the left. Instead of embracing who their audience is (mainly Obama supporters), MSNBC tried to program their primetime around who they wanted their audience to be. The result has been an epic failure that has seen Fox News, CNN, and Headline News all gain viewers while MSNBC has declined.

By moving Chris Hayes into a spot that he never should have been in, MSNBC has alienated their viewers and wrecked their ratings.

The bad news for MSNBC is that they may not be able to fix this. Ed Schultz may not want to go back to primetime, at least not without a sizable raise. MSNBC has hired a lot of wonkish types over the last few years. They don’t have the kind of liberal firebrand on the bench that could immediately revive 8 PM. The network could always move Chris Hayes back to Up, and take a shot with Joy Reid or Melissa Harris-Perry but that is unlikely since the network bypassed them when they promoted Hayes. The most likely outcome would be somebody like Ezra Klein moving into primetime.

There is one man out there who could immediately step back into the 8 PM anchor chair and deliver a million viewers, but pigs will fly before Phil Griffin and Keith Olbermann ever work together again.

It is clear that MSNBC has to do something soon. (Just asking MSNBC viewers about Chris Hayes and his show provoked strong negative reactions on Twitter. Generally speaking viewers tend not to like Hayes’ politics, and they are bored by his program.)

It looks MSNBC may end up going bust, because they made a bad bet by going all in with Chris Hayes.

Tea Party leader surrenders

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Michele Bachmann's greatest hits

By Evan Puschak

The Last Word

Rep. Michele Bachmann has announced that she will not be seeking reelection in Minnesota, and The Last Word has put together a compilation of her greatest hits of her political career.

In honor of Rep. Michele Bachmann’s announcement that she will not be seeking reelection in Minnesota, we’ve compiled a few of the congresswoman’s most bat-crap crazy soundbites over the last few years. Check it out!

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Two Weeks After Calling for Obama Impeachment, Michele Bachmann Quits Due to Ethics Scandal

By LeftandLeft

This completely unqualified political shit stain is a damning indictment of the fucked up tea-bagging voters in her Minnesota district.

Here's hoping she and her equally repulsive self loathing sissy husband end up in cellblock.

By T. Steelman

With the news of Michele Bachmann’s retirement, we must acknowledge that we have lost a great one… for mining comedic gold. I can hear the moans of pain from Letterman and Leno, Fallon and Ferguson; Kimmel, Conan and Maher. There will certainly be other politicians who will provide fodder for the late night comic crowd – there always are – but our ‘Shelley’ had a certain je ne se qua, a middle-American quality that set her apart.

With her first big moment on Hardball With Chris Matthews, we knew she would be entertaining. With one statement, she flew to the top of our Most Crazy list. Just watch Chris’ expression as Michelle calls for investigating Congress…. here’s the video:

When Obama was elected, Bachmann had some things she could sink her teeth into, lying through them as she went:

“I want people in Minnesota armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax because we need to fight back.” (Source)

“One. That’s the number of new drilling permits under the Obama administration.” (Source)

“This (the 2009 stimulus bill) is a pork buffet, and the American people caught on when they saw all the political payoffs in the bill, and they rejected it.” (Source)

Her hatred of the Affordable Care Act, dubbed “Obamacare” by the right, moved her to propose bills and vote to repeal it 37 times. What’s the definition of insanity? Her last desperate attempt to repeal the ACA she left in God’s hands. Looks like God likes Obamacare.

Global warming? Michele isn’t a believer:

“The big thing we are working on now is the global warming hoax. It’s all Voodoo, nonsense, hokum, a hoax.” And “Carbon dioxide, Mister Speaker, is a natural byproduct of nature. Carbon dioxide is natural.”

But the pinnacle of Bachmann’s career was undoubtedly her run for president in 2012. She geared up for that early on, spending much of 2010 and 2011 campaigning. Some of her best gaffes occurred during that period.

In New Hampshire, she spoke about how the opening shots of the Revolutionary War were fired there.

She wanted South Carolinians to join her in wishing Elvis a happy birthday… on the anniversary of his death.

According to Bachmann, not only was John Quincy Adams one of the Founding Fathers, but he, and they, fought hard to destroy slavery. Wrong again.

And her stop in Waterloo, Iowa was the occasion of her mistaking John Wayne Gacy, the serial killer, with John Wayne, the American icon. Watch this great bit of oops… here’s the video:

When allegations about her accepting subsidies for her family farm came up, as she railed against other folks getting government help, she lied:

“The farm is my father-in-law’s farm. It’s not my husband’s and my farm. It’s my father-in-law’s farm and my husband and I have never gotten a penny of money from the farm.”

Her campaign was full of gaffes and outright lies and it was a blow to all of us (okay, just us political writers) when she dropped out of the presidential race in January of 2012. Politifact had kept track of her statements and there were an unsurprising number of false and pants-on-fire ratings there for her.

But that didn’t faze Shelley. After one particularly egregious batch of falsehoods in a primary debate, she actually said that Politifact confirmed “that everything I said was true.” Only they didn’t.

And who can forget her response on behalf of the Tea Party to Obama’s State Of The Union Address in January of 2011? Here’s the video:

Her opposition to marriage equality didn’t save her state from joining the rest of us in realizing that equal means equal, no exceptions. Michele was butthurt:

“This will change our state forever. Because the immediate consequence, if gay marriage goes through, is that K-12 little children will be forced to learn that homosexuality is normal, natural and perhaps they should try it.”

And her views on the minimum wage left us facepalming:

“If we took away the minimum wage — if, conceivably, it was gone — we could virtually wipe out unemployment completely because we would be able to offer jobs at whatever level.”

Here at Addicting Info, we have covered many of Bachmann’s gaffes and scandals. We reported on her being investigated for various campaign ethics violations such as not paying her staff, claims of a creepy relationship with her debate coach, a stolen email list, and other ethics violations.

We followed her comments about President Obama being wrapped up in the “Islamist agenda.” Her obsession with Benghazi is legendary and didn’t escape us, though Shelley tried to escape a reporter asking her about comments she’d made about the subject.

Bachmann’s presence on the House Intelligence Committee was covered. Her latest appearance at CPAC and her hilarious ideas about curing Alzheimers were highlights in March. Heck, one of my first pieces was on Bachmann’s tenuous grasp on reality when it came to the UN and Obama.

There’s no denying that Michele Bachmann made a great target. Her craziness, her lack of a filter, her revisionist history and her complete and utter indifference to her gaffes and lies… these are what we will remember about Michele Bachmann.

As she bows out of her Congressional tenure, we wish her well. I suspect that she will be availing herself of “wingnut welfare,” winding up in a think tank, working for a huge corporation or as a “pundit” on Fox News. Whichever way she goes, I’m sure we have not heard the last batshit crazy remark from her. See ya around, Shelly!

United Nations Tells Ron Paul To Shove His Lawsuit Right Up His Ass

By Max Rivlin-Nadler  

Last we checked, Ron Paul had filed a lawsuit with the World Intellectual Property Organization (an agency of the UN, which he HATES) in an attempt to expropriate both RonPaul.com and RonPaul.org from his supporters. So how'd that all turn out for Paul? Not so well.

Both of the domain name disputes were dismissed because Paul still took his supporters to court, even though they offered to give him the sites for free (they only requested compensation for their very sizable mailing lists).

Not only did Paul lose both domain name disputes, but he was also found guilty of "reverse domain name hijacking," which is essentially being found guilty of wasting the court's time.

The court wrote:

Respondent has requested, based on the evidence presented, that the Panel make a finding of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking. In view of the unique facts of this case, in which the evidence demonstrates that Respondent offered to give the Domain Name ronpaul.org to Complainant for no charge, with no strings attached, the Panel is inclined to agree. Instead of accepting the Domain Name, Complainant brought this proceeding. A finding of Reverse Domain Name Hijacking seems to this Panel to be appropriate in the circumstances.

Lesson: Don't ask the United Nations for help after you've spent a lifetime bad-mouthing them, and also don't waste their time with your frivolous lawsuits. In addition, don't alienate your supporters by appealing to an international governmental organization (which they HATE) in an attempt to screw them.

"Reverse domain name hijacking" carries no penalty, but it just sounds painful.

Republicans have a bridge that they want to sell you

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Two Million People Worldwide Protest Against Monsanto

By Abby Miller

On May 25th, millions of people gathered in cities all over the world to “March Against Monsanto,” protesting both the genetically modified crops they create as well as their unethical business practices. The media barely noticed.

Just a few short months ago, a Facebook page popped up which made a simple plea:

I’m tired of the poisoning of our food supply. Will you help me organize a rally in your area? May 25th, 2013. Spread the word, Please!!

March Against Monsanto Facebook page. Despite the large turnout all over the world, very little of substance is being reported through the mainstream media. Las Vegas resident Andrew Garcia, who attended yesterday’s march in the heart of Sin City joined by his girlfriend and her sister, noted that he didn’t see a single reporter or news truck at the event.

There were at least 2,500 people there, and not one of them was a reporter. To actually see with my own eyes how much they are trying to cover up makes me sick.

Many media accounts that are available are based largely on one Associated Press article. The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, USA Today, and others all report on the marches with the same AP article, adding little to no actual reporting. ABC News didn’t even bother with the entire article, but just small snippets of it. One has to wonder at the reasons for not properly covering an event this widespread. Further, the article makes Monsanto sound like a saint of a company, saving the world one genetically modified crop at a time, eradicating hunger in the face of constant adversity from lunatic activists who are making a big deal out of nothing.

So what exactly is the purpose of protesting Monsanto?

Garcia says that what brought Monsanto to his attention was the 2003 documentary “The Corporation,” which tells the story of Jane Akre and Steve Wilson, reporters for a Fox news station in Tampa, Florida. In the late 1990s, Akre and Wilson began work on a story investigating Monsanto’s use of recombinant bovine human growth hormone (or rBGH), an additive that increases a cow’s milk supply. There had been controversy surrounding rBGH, and the two reporters found that despite the FDA approval, the technology was believed to be the cause of various health concerns in both cows and humans. ”The reporters were silenced by Monsanto, forced out of business and their image destroyed,” said Garcia.

On top of that, he says, the treatment of small farmers by Monsanto has left behind a vile taste, referring to the lawsuits Monsanto has filed against small farmers for theft of intellectual property; that is, their seeds. Each Monsanto seed is encoded with patented gene technology that makes it resistant to their pesticides, for which Monsanto charges a royalty. Their dominance of the market makes it practically impossible to find seeds that haven’t been affected by such a gene. If a farmer doesn’t pay the royalty, even if it was used by no intention of their own, such as in the case of pollination, Monsanto takes them to court. Often, the court costs alone put the small farmer out of business, regardless of whether or not they win their case.

As good a reason as all the above is to protest against Monsanto, many people cite the harm created by genetically modified crops as their main motivation for bringing awareness to the issue. On the March Against Monsanto website, the group gives the following reasons under the title “Why do we march?”:

• Research studies have shown that Monsanto’s genetically-modified foods can lead to serious health conditions such as the development of cancer tumors, infertility and birth defects.
• Monsanto’s GM seeds are harmful to the environment; for example, scientists have indicated they have contributed to Colony Collapse Disorder among the world’s bee population.
• For too long, Monsanto has been the benefactor of corporate subsidies and political favoritism. Organic and small farmers suffer losses while Monsanto continues to forge its monopoly over the world’s food supply, including exclusive patenting rights over seeds and genetic makeup.

On their Facebook page, March Against Monsanto estimates that two million people in fifty-five countries joined in the protest, and it is certain that many others would have joined but were, for whatever reason, unable. But, what now, after the march has passed? The protest doesn’t end, say the group organizers, just because the march has.

 Taking care to look at what you eat, demanding local food, and growing a garden are all wonderful ways of keeping the fight against Monsanto alive. And for those of you who are so technologically inclined, don’t forget about that ‘Buycott’ app.

How to not get your ass kicked by the police

Really funny video from the Chris Rock show on how to not get your ass kicked by the police.

Tax Attacks

What kind of person would name their child Reinhold Reince Priebus? dlevere.

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Remember When Rush Limbaugh Got Punked By A Liberal On His Show?

By Leslie Salzillo

This is classic. It’s a classic video, and even more, a delightful earful of classic Rush Limbaugh getting punked – by a liberal. As Limbaugh is stumped, he phooeys, fumbles, snorts and sniggers, searching for answer, or some kind of reason. I LOVE IT!

Now, when I say classic, I also mean in age. The video was uploaded to YouTube in 2011, yet ironically, much of the conversation is still relevant today. Majority Report host, Sam Seder, guides us through the fun-filled audio of ‘Limbaugh v. Liberal.’

In the video, caller Mike Stark, grills Limbaugh on Reaganomics, Social Security, Guantanamo, The Greenspan Commission, Iran… and Limbaugh is flailing. Somehow the screening process of callers must have failed the producers and Limbaugh was caught off guard and busted. These days, Rush takes no such chances. You will rarely hear a caller argue with him about anything, unless it’s a Limbaugh ‘plant’ to help him with one of his fabrications. Most of the time Limbaugh is ‘his own show’ with no one to challenge or ague his lies, and right-wing propaganda.

For me, the very best part about this audio/video is listening to Limbaugh try to bullshit his way out the entire conversation. And I enjoy watching Sam Seder do his impressions of Limbaugh as he gleefully interprets the discourse between Stark and Limbaugh.

Towards the end of the video, it’s obvious that Limbaugh/his producers have muted our lovable liberal. Limbaugh then rambles on, into a place called nowhere, as he awaits pertinent information from his producers in order to debate Stark. You can almost hear when that information is given to Rush. Meanwhile, the audience is led to believe Stark is still on the line listening to Limbaugh’s pearls of renewed wisdom – without objection.

Sit back and enjoy… here is the video:

This is one instance when I can handle listening to Limbaugh. His voice rings high on the cringe-factor scale for me much like the voices Beck, Hannity, Gingrich, and George W. Okay, let’s add Palin, Ryan, Bachmann, Paul, McConnell and Boehner… you know what I mean. For several months last year, after Rush Limbaugh’s verbal attack on Sandra Fluke where he called her a ‘slut’ and ‘prostitute,’ I had to listen to his show three hours a day, five days a week. Why would I do that? Why would anyone do that? As it turns out a good many liberal volunteers did the same. We were tracking ads/sponsors, helping to create the Limbaugh boycotts that do thrive today.

The video above is lightweight and amusing. To truly appreciate it, one would have to be aware of Limbaugh’s continuous and blatant sexism, racism, and gay-hating bigotry. The protests against his smut are massive. Consumers, activists and every-day people have joined and are contacting his sponsors to let them know they will no longer buy from companies that support Rush Limbaugh. And it’s working.

Women’s rights organizations like NOW and UniteWomen.org, as well as other large groups like AddictingInfo.org, Daily Kos, Being Liberal, and Media Matters have been fully supportive and contributed much to the movement. 95% of Cumulus Radio Network advertisers are requesting No-Rush clauses when buying airtime. Power to the people.

To become involved: 

Check Out/Sign This: Petition To Clear Channel and 40 Limbaugh Sponsors
Join: Boycott-Rush-Limbaughs-Sponsors-to-SHUT-HIM-DOWN
Visit: The StopRush Database

Meanwhile, I’m wondering what kind of rating Rotten Tomatoes would give this film. Bye, bye, Rush.

(The author, Leslie Salzillo, is an activist, political commentator, diarist and visual artist. Salzillo often writes diaries in Daily Kos, and began contributing to AddictingInfo.org in March 2013.)

The Elder Scrolls Told of Their Return

Winner of more than 200 Game of the Year awards, experience the complete Skyrim collection with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim^® Legendary Edition. The Legendary Edition includes the original critically-acclaimed game, official add-ons – Dawnguard^™, Hearthfire^™, and Dragonborn^™ – and added features like combat cameras, mounted combat, Legendary difficulty mode for hardcore players, and Legendary skills – enabling you to master every perk and level up your skills infinitely.

• Live Another Life, In Another World - Play any type of character you can imagine, and do whatever you want; the freedom of choice, storytelling, and adventure of The Elder Scrolls comes to life in one legendary experience complete with added weapons, armor, spells, and shouts from all three official add-ons.

• Dawnguard - The Vampire Lord Harkon has returned to power. By using the Elder Scrolls, he seeks to do the unthinkable - to end the sun itself. Will you join the ancient order of the Dawnguard and stop him? Or will you become a Vampire Lord? In Dawnguard, the ultimate choice will be yours.

• Hearthfire - Purchase land and build your own home from the ground up - from a simple one-room cottage to a sprawling compound complete with an armory, alchemy laboratory, and more. Use all-new tools like the drafting table and carpenter’s workbench to turn stone, clay, and sawn logs into structures and furnishings. Even transform your house into a home by adopting children.

• Dragonborn - Journey off the coast of Morrowind, to the vast island of Solstheim.Traverse the ash wastes and glacial valleys of this new land as you become more powerful with shouts that bend the will of your enemies and even tame dragons. Your fate, and the fate of Solstheim, hangs in the balance as you face off against your deadliest adversary – the first Dragonborn.

 Available 06.04.2013 on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC

 

Alex Jones Claims Tragedy In Oklahoma Caused By Tornado Created By Super Villain Obama

By Nathaniel Downes

Alex Jones and reality have not been on speaking terms for years. This time, the right-wing whackadoodle who earlier claimed the Boston marathon bombing was a false-flag operation until it was revealed that the bomber was a fan, has come out and claimed that Obama is a super villain, with the power to control the weather! And to demonstrate his power, the president decided on using it on poor, helpless Oklahoma:

Now, this is not the first time that Alex Jones and other conspiracy theorists have claimed that the government has the ability to create weather. We can all recall a similar claim made last year, that Obama created a hurricane to disrupt the Republican National Convention. Now it is that Obama, and the “evil government” are out to destroy random citizens in Oklahoma. This is a plot right out of a super villain handbook.

At least with the hurricane, it actually had a purpose, to these conspiracy theorists. This time, it is pure villany. No reason is given, no logic behind the operation, it is being done just for pure evils sake. But for Alex Jones and his audience, it is the proof of their idea that the government is evil.

Proof, who needs proof? They know it has to be the government, because who else would be so evil?

What do you mean that tornado’s happen? This one hurt people, that has to be the government, you understand! They are super villains, out to destroy “the American way of life” by doing… something? The leap of logic Alex Jones needs to make this claim is so vast, it dwarfs the imagination even contemplating it.

It is a tragedy, and it is of no surprise that Alex Jones is seeking to exploit it in order to fill his own coffers. Now he will seek to exploit this tragedy to push his latest books, podcasts, feeding the paranoia of those like Tamerlan Tsarnaev who then act out as lone wolves, carrying out terrorist attacks against the very government which Alex Jones is wishing to bring down.

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Nathaniel Downes is the son of a former state representative of New Hampshire, now living in Seattle Washington.

Feel free to follow Nathaniel Downes on Facebook.

Oklahoma should fire its senators for voting against federal disaster relief

Cenk Uygur, political reporter Joe Williams, and Mediaite's Noah Rothman debate whether Oklahoma should receive federal disaster relief funding when the Republican senators for Oklahoma, Tom Coburn and Jim Inhofe, have historically voted against aid for other states.

Cenk says they shouldn’t be given funds but will be because Democrats are nicer. Williams says, “That’s the issue, isn’t it? Government is always your enemy until you need a friend.”

Rand Paul outraged, but not entirely sure why

By Hunter

The Republican Party needs to pour themselves a stiff drink and contemplate how it came to be that Rand Paul, unaccomplished scion of a man the old party hands tried their level best to ignore, became one of the big party names, and a leader of whatever-the-hell-passes-for-a-movement-these-days.

I know this much about what I'm talking about.

CNN:

Sen. Rand Paul claimed Sunday there was a "written policy" floating around the agency that said IRS officials were "targeting people who were opposed to the president." "And when that comes forward, we need to know who wrote the policy and who approved the policy," the Republican senator from Kentucky said on CNN's "State of the Union."

Except that he apparently pulled this particular memo from deep inside his own colon, because he doesn't actually know if the "written policy" he's talking about really even exists:

Pressed for more precise details about the memo he was referring to, Paul said he hasn't seen such a policy statement but has heard about it.

"Well, we keep hearing the reports and we have several specifically worded items saying who was being targeted. In fact, one of the bullet points says those who are critical of the president. So I don't know if that comes from a policy, but that's what's being reported in the press and reported orally," he told CNN's chief political correspondent Candy Crowley. "I haven't seen a policy statement, but I think we need to see that."

Unless Paul is privy to a Magic Memo that the rest of us haven't seen (and he says he himself hasn't seen, thus complicating things further), he seems to be misrepresenting things at best: What bullet point we do know of was to focus on nonprofit applications critical of the government, not the president—and again, the apparent goal was to filter out primarily political groups in an application process that was supposed to specifically disqualify, by law, political groups. The "scandal" part of the "scandal" would be that certain groups were targeted by name, e.g. "Tea Party", which would focus on one certain narrow part of the political spectrum.

That apparently political groups were targeted for extra scrutiny when seeking nonprofit status, however, is exactly what was supposed to happen—or what was supposed to happen if we still had any pretense that our election law wasn't caught somewhere between ineptitude and outright crookedness.

Part of the problem Republicans have in their efforts to tar the administration with various scandals is that they're such shameless fabricators they can't even hold together their own narratives. By the time they've gone through their various iterations of the old "telephone" game, nobody can quite figure out what they're going on about, much less how much of it is real and how much of it is people like Darrell Issa and Rand Paul and Peggy Noonan just making things up.