Prior to my recent hiatus, I had been posting a series of diaries on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq as part of the Wednesday Open Thread. I had intended to post at least one more diary in that series, and will do so as a stand alone diary later this week. Instead I am going to keep this week's Open Thread relatively light as you will read below.
Why oh why do I even get involved in these stupid debates at the place that shall not be named?
They never play the race card at that site in order to defend Obama and his fellow Democrats, right?
"Refusing to play the game is a privileged white person's conceit."
http://www.dailykos.com/comments/1387595/56449102
This is the thread:
http://www.dailykos.com/comment/1387595/56448250#c95
And irony of ironies, this Loyal Democrat pulls up the "white privilege" argument in a diary about how Obama wants to overlook slavery in Malaysia in order to advance his precious TPP:
"TPP Human Trafficking Bill Passes As Malaysia Discovers Migrant Workers Grave Sites"
by Stephen Benavides
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/05/25/1387595/-Mass-Graves-Found-in-M...
Mass graves highly thought to be those of migrant workers were found in Malaysia days after an amendment to the Trade Promotion Authority prohibiting human trafficking, child and slave labor, passed through the U.S. Senate Finance Committee despite strong opposition by President Obama and free-trade advocates.
Please, somebody, explain to me, if slavery is a "lesser" evil, then is anything a major evil?
My response:
yeah right only
"privileged white" workers are going to hurt by the TPP.
And only "privileged White" workers are in unions.
what a load of crap.
but again, nice try
The democratic party is destroying itself with working class people,
but go ahead and blame me if it makes you feel better.
This evening's music features Chicago bluesman John Primer.
I just can't, not no more, raise no, not even a whisper, of a woody, for Memorial Day.
All week I've been seeing references to this headline:
"China could announce that it holds 30,000 tons of gold to back the Yuan/Renminbi."
As a Forex trader, the story took me by surprise, even though China has been stockpiling for years, and is the world's largest gold producer. Also, it's not like China to pull this trigger so fast. However, in the South China Sea last week, the US started militarily terrorizing China with war ships and fighter jets — and China warned (in so many polite words) that the US planted the seeds of its own doom.
So, maybe that's what this is all about.
At Daily Kos at 5:00 Pacific time. Focus on Bass
Some participants: Jack Casady, Willie Dixon, Jaco Pastorius, Chrstian McBride, Ray Brown,
Rob Wasserman, Jack Bruce, Al Gare, John Clayton, Les Claypool, Buckethead, Marcus Miller, Victor Wooten,
Blog participation and the 90-9-1 rule. -OR- How I learned to quit worrying and embrace the participation inequality.
This isn't my first time for this rodeo. About 10 years ago I created and ran a blog/forum for the Home Owners Association that I lived in. I was the Association President at the time and if you've ever lived in a Association and involved in the politics then you are well aware of what I call the "big fish in a little pond" syndrome and the "I, me, mine" factor. Those darling human traits certainly were not only expressed in the politics but also spilled over into the blog/forum as well as I had to deal with an over abundance of city folks transplanted to the country life that had a hard time making that adjustment. It was then that I researched and became aware of the community participation ratio and learned to quit worrying and embrace the participation inequality.
Summary: In most online communities, 90% of users are lurkers who never contribute, 9% of users contribute a little, and 1% of users account for almost all the action.
Just thought people might be interested to see this; especially those of us trying to puzzle out the "why are we allied with, and benefitting al-qaeda types again?" question.
The link: http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/05/dia-docs-west-wants-a-salafist-pr...
(The All-Caps is copied and pasted; and not me yelling)
The debate in the Senate about extending the Patriot Act has gotten so bizarre that I suspect it is all kabuki.
Mitch McConnell's inability to muster a fillibuster-proof 60 votes for a straight extension of the controversial act has gotten most of the headlines, but there is a lot more happening underneath that we need to be aware of.
There will be a special edition of Not The Evening Blues tonight featuring Country Joe and The Fish, with News, Opinion, Commentary, Evening Greens and the like. There will be a cameo by Phil Ochs.
It won't be up to Joe's and Johnny's standards, but there will be something to fill the gap.
Y'all come.
