First annual tele-blog

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This is based on the idea of a telethon. For an example check below;

Utah Phillips - Hallelujah I'm a Bum

The Federal Government—shut it down!

They sent in the clowns.

If they shut down the Federal government it will only give us a look at the future the Tea Party Republicans are forging out for us. Do they realize the streets, post office, parks and libraries depend on Federal funding?

But if the government does shut down, if a budget impasse between the White House and Congress isn't resolved by midnight Friday, will it really matter in the long run?

What they really want to get rid of is all entitlements. Not only welfare but unemployment benefits, which some states, as Missouri, are planning to cut while the jobless rate is still high. We are heading for the days of Herbert Hoover, where people who are out of work will end up homeless, in soup kitchen lines and dying in the streets for lack of health care. This country saw all of that in the 1930s. That is why we have such benefits as unemployment insurance. Before that people built camps with tents, to live in front of government buildings called “Hoovervilles.”

 They also want to privatize Social Security and Medicare. If that works as good as our health care system there won’t be any death panels for our grandmothers. They will just end up dead if they can’t get or afford insurance. Who will want to insure a population of people of whom about half already have expensive pre-conditions. This will mean that those who paid into social security will probably find they have paid for nothing and they will only have retirement if they bought some insurance plan when they were young, in good health and couldn’t imagine they would get old and sick.

Then there is education. This generation is being robbed of an all around education. Arts, drivers ed, and extra-curriculum activities are scheduled to be cut to balance the budget. Supposedly people don’t want to burden the next generation with a huge debt, but with this direction in education, few of our next generation will have the education needed to understand that debt. All they seem to want is enough education to put these young kids in a job so they can function with science, math and some reading and writing skills. The Republicans want our schools to produce Borg like drones. They don’t ever care if they learn any foreign language skills or social studies classes on the world around them.

So forget about delayed tax refunds, the local 18,000 federal employees in Kansas who won’t get paid, and applications for passports. If a letter or package needs to be delivered get in your car and start driving. The small postage stamp won’t get it there.
Remember that this is America’s future right now. Poor people are being thrown to the dogs. We must learn to step over the dead bodies as we all head to work. We must get used to many more smelly pan handlers that at present (and less smelly since poor people can still find shelters to wash up at) we are used to ignoring. The Republicans have sent in the clowns and they don’t think we need a federal government. They don’t think our children need to know how to drive, work together in team sports or know where the wars we fight are located.
So just shut the government down and let the people see what they voted for.
-សតិវ អតុ

Wichita Elections – same Mayor – business as usual

From

Wichita Peace and Freedom Party Examiner;

Mayor Carl Brewer won re-election as Wichita’s Mayor. The race was never close. Brewer had all the money and businesses behind him. He got 69 percent of the votes according to The Wichita Eagle;

Council winners included Michael O'Donnell, the only candidates that opposed spending the city’s money on business partnerships. The others were, Pete Meitzner, James Clendenin, and Jeff Longwell, all Brewer clones.
With this crew, Brewer and his bunch can continue what they refer to as “down town development.” That does not mean the emphasis is to restore the businesses down town that are now boarded up and closed, but to allow developers to clutter up the Arkansas River banks with new stores, mostly national chains.
This is a town that has nearly half a million people and a buss system that doesn’t even go to half the city. The buss closes at 6pm, before many workers haven’t even got of their jobs yet. Taxis are hugely expensive and for all practical purposes, mass transportation does not exist.
The turnout was low. Usually such elections draw under 30 percent of the voters and little attention is given to them by our local press and TV news. All those who won outspent their rivals, so once again it is moneyed interests that run Wichita.
Wichita is a pro-business city where the needs of wealthy business people get what they want and infrastructure is ignored to the working class neighbourhoods. The poor and working class are completely ignored. In other words, it’s business as usual.

Good by Manning Marable

I first read Manning Marable in the now defunct Guardian. I wrote a lot of articles on Africa. He has also written expensively on race history and race relationships. When it came to writing, Marable was one of the people who inspired me to write on foreign affairs. I once saw him on nightline.

His recent death leaves us without one more needed voice in this country.

More unnecessary abortion bills by the Kansas House

From

• Wichita Peace and Freedom Party Examiner;

 

Kansas Lawmakers voted 97-26 to approve a bill with more restrictions on abortion. With virtually no opposition that pass whatever they want and that is just what they are doing.
Among the new restrictions, according to The Wichita Eagle;

• require patients who undergo a chemically induced abortion to return to the clinic within 12 to 24 hours to receive additional treatment,
• establishes licensing requirements for Kansas abortion clinics,
• require at least two people, one a woman, to be in the room during a pelvic exam, or during the abortion procedure,
• surgeons also must have admitting privileges at an accredited hospital within 30 miles of the clinic.

The licensing requirements are clearly designed to close down three clinics which now operate in Kansas. The new Republican House, Senate and Governor want to do all they can to close the clinics down. Women’s organizations are trying to fight these new laws but so far they have had a hard time. The organization Trust Women released this statement;

The legislatures in Kansas and Oklahoma have heard on measures that will prohibit abortions after 20 weeks.  This legislation cites that a fetus supposedly can feel pain after 20 weeks, and only in cases where the mother's life is in jeopardy will late-term abortions be allowed. The country's two most reputable medical organizations, the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, do not support the theory that a fetus can feel pain at 20 weeks.  Additionally, there are a number of reasons why families and their physicians decide why they decide a late-term abortion is necessary.  Each pregnancyis unique and a case by case situation.  It is completely outrageous for the legislatures to make decisions for women.  In the Kansas House, they voted and passed HB 2218, the pre-viability ban that would restrict abortions after 22 weeks, and HB 2035, which an omnibus anti-abortion bill that clearly violates privacy issues.  Governor Brownback needs to hear from you; please contact him and encourage him not to sign these bills.  

Edie Brickell - A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall

News from Peru

From

http://www.groups.yahoo.com/group/MAOIST_REVOLUTION

The following is a Google translation;

Lima 4/2/2011

The press reports of assault on a base of support in Parwamayo PCP (Huanta), by the government army units.
According to military sources among the detainees, mostly women and children, is the command of PCP, Comrade Cesar, (56) responsible for indoctrination in the Regional Committee headed by Comrade Joseph.
They had also been arrested three women from ethnic Ashaninka who are accused of party cadres as well as medicines, books and a FAL assault rifle.
After repeated setbacks suffered by the force of the Joint Chiefs of VRAE, the bourgeois press with joy these arrests celabrated.

This is the original;

Lima,02.04.11

La prensa informa del asalto a una base de apoyo del PCP en Parwamayo (Huanta),por parte de unidades del ejercito gubernamental.

Ségún fuentes militares entre los detenidos, en su mayoria mujeres y niños, se encuentra el mando del PCP, camarada Cesar, (56) responsable de adoctrinamiento en la Comité Regional que preside el camarada José.

Tambien habrian sido detenidas tres mujeres de etnia ashaninka a las que se acusa de cuadros partidarios asi como medicinas, libros y un fusil de asalto FAL.

Despues de los reiterados reveses sufridos por las fuerza del Comando Conjunto del VRAE, la prensa burguesa celabra con jubilo estas detenciones

 

correovermello noticias 

Información de la Revolucion Proletaria Mundial 

saudos vermellos / saludos rojos

US imperialism will never free Libya

It get’s tiresome to see a number of self proclaimed liberals and some people who believe they are socialists or leftists supporting the US/NATO attack on Muammar Gaddafi. The arguments in favor of this blatantly imperialist action is supported by such liberals as Ed Schultz and Rachel Maddow.

They are Obama supporters so that explains their support to some extent, but there are people who say they are leftist and that we should support this rebellion. That would mean overlooking the imperialist will take control of Libya when the rebels get control.

The US Empire has even surpassed the Roman Empire. Laurence M. Vance writes;

“Nothing, however, compares to the U.S. global empire. What makes U.S. hegemony unique is that it consists, not of control over great land masses or population centers, but of a global presence unlike that of any other country in history.”

So I don’t understand those who claim that Libya is just as imperialistic as the US. Are they kidding? What empires do Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez, Kim Jong Il, Robert Mugabe or Gaddafi have to give them the label of imperialist. They may not be very democratic and they may have their faults, but there is one and only one real empire in the world and I live in it, the United States of America. NATO is an extension of the US Empire. To claim there is a coalition of world governments acting on humanitarian reasons is a joke. It is not a funny joke and it is a smoke screen for the developed world to gain access to oil and other resources.

The only real Empire in the world today is the US and its so called allies. There are many counties the US has labeled as evil enemies, terrorist sponsors and a number of other names. Gaddafi may kill some of his people, but killing opponents for the empire is routine business for the US and its coalition of the willing.

VI Lenin wrote Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism. Anti-imperialism has been a hallmark policy of almost all Marxist-Leninist parties. If you prefer to look at countries as Libya individually and without taking in the big picture, you’re a liberal and not a Marxist-Leninist. It is hard to be a leftist and support imperialism. I hope to smash and destroy the empire I live under and will do all I can to bring it down. That is priority no.1 and if some liberal leftist, sees me as a dogmatic Stalinist (although I’m not a big Stalin fan) I prefer that over being labeled an apologist for imperialism.

April 1 Day of the fool

There are many fools in our government. Feel free to leave message as to who you think belongs on a joker or a fool card.