@RantingRooster

#3

@Steven D

#9 Regreta are on me.

@earthling1

#11 Are the numbers on the left inverted?

@RejectingThe3rdWay

#13

That was the straw that broke the camels back making me write the diary that got me kicked off of Orange State.

Hadn't thought of that in quite a while.

In case anyone is interested in the rant (and also my old name from over there, lol)

Orange is the new red (state)

..........................................

@RejectingThe3rdWay
Great rant. Comments par for the course.

#13

That was the straw that broke the camels back making me write the diary that got me kicked off of Orange State.

Hadn't thought of that in quite a while.

In case anyone is interested in the rant (and also my old name from over there, lol)

Orange is the new red (state)

..........................................

@Mark from Queens Wouldn't mind reading that.

But yeah good luck ever getting people like that to admit to anything on that list.

Like prosecuting wall street...

"Well Obama is great, he isn't perfect"
"You disagreeing is just because he is black"
"He is totally progressive, not some far left perfectionist like you guys"

So many excuses, so much money to hoard.

#21 Love how Steven shoved all those Neoliberal mantras back in their faces, such as things "cost-cutting to stay competitive" and the Grade School Napoleon's fraudulent plea for money from the minions, when he's always been paid off by deep pocketed Dem Party operatives. Fuck those people completely, as Strife says.

You hit it on the head, about that place filled with smug, elitist 10%ers who actually had the unmitigated audacity to make fun and denigrate notions of economic inequality. It was a constant thread, but a ploy kept up by a ring of Neoliberal cheerleaders such as (can barely remember their stupid names) BBB, dhonig and whatever other little douchebags that could be counted on to unwittingly run interference for the oligarchs, their corporate and banking masters. When King Doucheboy himself actually wrote "oligarchy blah, blah, blah" I resolved to both want to kick their asses and leave the place for good.

I said my piece there the week before the NY Dem Primary, and never tire of pointing to it, as being one of only two essays in the past few years to exceed 1000 rec's, and it being a pretty good summary of how I felt toward that pestilent Neoliberal cesspool and how that place no longer represented my and many other's values.

Here's some excerpts of "As Another Pissed Off Liberal, There Are Some Things I'm Not Interested In":

I’m not interested in getting the school letter to put on my DK varsity sweater, or wearing the blue Dem uniform, if it requires a Loyalty oath. Oathkeepers and their ilk make me sick. Witch hunts, whether conducted by paranoid and delusionary RW conservative Senators or intolerant religious folks in Salem or by white supremacist racists in Nazi Germany or white-hooded Confederate businessmen and cops in the South, revolt me.

I’m not interested at all in the Front Page’s insistence on shooting-Repugs-in-a-barrel ad nauseuem. I’m also not interested in fear-based motivation that lies at the heart of incrementalism as a strategy.

But there is a simple, stark truth often overlooked here of which I am very interested in.

And that is, we only exist as Americans because we stared down the Loyalists and fought our oppressors in a revolution. The greatest Democratic president in our history, F.D.R., reminded us to “remember always that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionaries.” There is only one presidential candidate who speaks of revolution today.

These are the kinds of things I’m interested in:

I’m interested in why there’s chronic dysfunction and a Revolving Door in DC.

I’m interested in why my country administers healthcare through for-profit insurance companies.

I’m interested in why my democracy requires the endless dialing-for dollars by elected officials to do the work of The People.

I'm interested in why my friends can’t afford the ever-rising rents and cost of living because we won't challenge the malignancy of an economic system in which the end game is rigged to concentrate wealth in the hands of a greedy financial and real estate cabal.

I’m interested in why the CEO of Con Edison makes $10 million a year in a sector everybody relies upon that should mandate it it collectively owned by the public as a non-profit...

I’m interested in prosecuting the Economic Terrorists of Wall St whose relentless hyper-focused pursuit of profit has destroyed the American middle class, by hijacking the economy in the 2000’s and continuing to savage it even more today with ongoing rampant ponzi schemes, institutional fraud and fine print deception. This pathology will destroy the planet and its resources.

That’s where my loyalty lies. Not to any website or political party or my own ethnicity or the college I graduated from. Whoever speaks that language clearly and unequivocally will earn my fealty. We will stand and fight together.

My loyalty is to the dispossessed, the marginalized, the downtrodden, the unjustly imprisoned. My loyalty is to the great mass of people forced into the desperate shadows of un/under-employment, hunger, not being able to spend time with their children, working while sick and not able to take proper vacations. To the poor folks harassed, beaten and killed by the cops...

Bernie’s absolute domination of young voters, in many cases exceeding Obama’s historical campaign, will take this party deep into the next generation, on top of which the overwhelming numbers of Independents and sane Republicans who will vote for him means one thing very clearly: Bernie Sanders wins in a landslide of epic proportions in November.

I’m tired of seeing too many stumble and fall, then get crushed under the relentless and merciless grinder of unbridled capitalism. It has run its course. People know it too; they just haven’t heard any politician talk about it honestly, until now.

They haven’t been told how the government has been giving massive tax break to the wealthy, “subsidies” to oil companies and floating a bloated military budget, all of which leads to concentrated wealth in the hands of a few and monopoly business ownership. All that money could be used to bulk up a healthcare for all, restore broken communities and offer free higher education incentive to those who want it. That’s what taxes are supposed to be for. Again, there’s only one candidate with the courage and vision to frame it clearly and have been fighting against it with integrity for decades.

Like my gloriously rebellious American antecedents down through the ages I realize the only way to topple injustice and corruption is through revolution.

We have a chance to elect a rare human being.

It’s time to be bold. Agitate, agitate, agitate.

@Mark from Queens @Mark from Queens

Please do periodically repost that wonderful statement! We need to hear this...

And I'd like to add that the only loyalty oath I can think of which must be respected - and hasn't been - is the Oath of Office taken by politicians in order to qualify for/retain public office swearing to uphold the principles embodied in the US Constitution - which includes the Bill of Rights which some American Founders fought to have included for this reason - of democracy, law, inalienable citizen rights...

No amount of bad legal precedents or bad law passed against the Constitutional principles of democracy can overcome the overriding concepts enshrined within that Constitution, beginning with government of, by and for the people, with equal rights, treatment and opportunity for all.

Any illiterates/con-men thinking that their Constitution is 'only a piece of paper', which they can pretend to swear to uphold, have thereby self-disqualified and cannot legitimately form any part of a legitimate government. Which includes branches such as the Supreme Court and others.

None of these abuses/abusive government officials are legitimate and can only be enforced/remain in office while the people are conned into thinking that these can somehow be 'legalized' by the passage by corrupt public officials of illegal 'Simon Says' self-interest-serving 'law'. And this is why 'optics are everything' to these con-artists.

Edited to add that another confusion tactic is used by lumping such as environmentalists and independent scientists working toward/arguing for the public good together with corporate/billionaires lobbying against the public good for their own enrichment and increased power taken from the public as a single group of 'special interests', claiming that the one group of lobbyists cannot be restricted without restricting the other.

The first group represents the public interest, the second are self-interests acting against the public interest and should be specifically identified as such and kept out of public policy and government.

Semantics matter - they are the basis of PR and the tool of every con-man.

And this tactic of confusion in those working against the public interest must also be recognized when used in legalese to pervert the purpose of law in protecting the public, which also includes protecting their inalienable rights, the pursuit of happiness being specifically included in the US Constitution, making it very clear that democracy means a system designed to best benefit the public as a whole and as individuals, respecting their individual means of seeking happiness provided that the rights of others are not unduly infringed upon.

Allowing the wealthiest relative few to purchase policy/politicians/governments intended to serve the public interest is so clearly not in line with the concept of government of, by and for the people ensuring equal rights, treatment and opportunity for all that no sane/legitimate judge could accept it as such or claim it to fit with the Founders intentions.

When in doubt, we must always return to basics, to principles and mechanisms. And we must apply this to every area where self-interests have skated on propaganda. In other words, virtually everywhere.

(Also removed a double-punched 'o' - seem to be seeing single this morning, as a refreshing change, lol.)

#21 Love how Steven shoved all those Neoliberal mantras back in their faces, such as things "cost-cutting to stay competitive" and the Grade School Napoleon's fraudulent plea for money from the minions, when he's always been paid off by deep pocketed Dem Party operatives. Fuck those people completely, as Strife says.

You hit it on the head, about that place filled with smug, elitist 10%ers who actually had the unmitigated audacity to make fun and denigrate notions of economic inequality. It was a constant thread, but a ploy kept up by a ring of Neoliberal cheerleaders such as (can barely remember their stupid names) BBB, dhonig and whatever other little douchebags that could be counted on to unwittingly run interference for the oligarchs, their corporate and banking masters. When King Doucheboy himself actually wrote "oligarchy blah, blah, blah" I resolved to both want to kick their asses and leave the place for good.

I said my piece there the week before the NY Dem Primary, and never tire of pointing to it, as being one of only two essays in the past few years to exceed 1000 rec's, and it being a pretty good summary of how I felt toward that pestilent Neoliberal cesspool and how that place no longer represented my and many other's values.

Here's some excerpts of "As Another Pissed Off Liberal, There Are Some Things I'm Not Interested In":

I’m not interested in getting the school letter to put on my DK varsity sweater, or wearing the blue Dem uniform, if it requires a Loyalty oath. Oathkeepers and their ilk make me sick. Witch hunts, whether conducted by paranoid and delusionary RW conservative Senators or intolerant religious folks in Salem or by white supremacist racists in Nazi Germany or white-hooded Confederate businessmen and cops in the South, revolt me.

I’m not interested at all in the Front Page’s insistence on shooting-Repugs-in-a-barrel ad nauseuem. I’m also not interested in fear-based motivation that lies at the heart of incrementalism as a strategy.

But there is a simple, stark truth often overlooked here of which I am very interested in.

And that is, we only exist as Americans because we stared down the Loyalists and fought our oppressors in a revolution. The greatest Democratic president in our history, F.D.R., reminded us to “remember always that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionaries.” There is only one presidential candidate who speaks of revolution today.

These are the kinds of things I’m interested in:

I’m interested in why there’s chronic dysfunction and a Revolving Door in DC.

I’m interested in why my country administers healthcare through for-profit insurance companies.

I’m interested in why my democracy requires the endless dialing-for dollars by elected officials to do the work of The People.

I'm interested in why my friends can’t afford the ever-rising rents and cost of living because we won't challenge the malignancy of an economic system in which the end game is rigged to concentrate wealth in the hands of a greedy financial and real estate cabal.

I’m interested in why the CEO of Con Edison makes $10 million a year in a sector everybody relies upon that should mandate it it collectively owned by the public as a non-profit...

I’m interested in prosecuting the Economic Terrorists of Wall St whose relentless hyper-focused pursuit of profit has destroyed the American middle class, by hijacking the economy in the 2000’s and continuing to savage it even more today with ongoing rampant ponzi schemes, institutional fraud and fine print deception. This pathology will destroy the planet and its resources.

That’s where my loyalty lies. Not to any website or political party or my own ethnicity or the college I graduated from. Whoever speaks that language clearly and unequivocally will earn my fealty. We will stand and fight together.

My loyalty is to the dispossessed, the marginalized, the downtrodden, the unjustly imprisoned. My loyalty is to the great mass of people forced into the desperate shadows of un/under-employment, hunger, not being able to spend time with their children, working while sick and not able to take proper vacations. To the poor folks harassed, beaten and killed by the cops...

Bernie’s absolute domination of young voters, in many cases exceeding Obama’s historical campaign, will take this party deep into the next generation, on top of which the overwhelming numbers of Independents and sane Republicans who will vote for him means one thing very clearly: Bernie Sanders wins in a landslide of epic proportions in November.

I’m tired of seeing too many stumble and fall, then get crushed under the relentless and merciless grinder of unbridled capitalism. It has run its course. People know it too; they just haven’t heard any politician talk about it honestly, until now.

They haven’t been told how the government has been giving massive tax break to the wealthy, “subsidies” to oil companies and floating a bloated military budget, all of which leads to concentrated wealth in the hands of a few and monopoly business ownership. All that money could be used to bulk up a healthcare for all, restore broken communities and offer free higher education incentive to those who want it. That’s what taxes are supposed to be for. Again, there’s only one candidate with the courage and vision to frame it clearly and have been fighting against it with integrity for decades.

Like my gloriously rebellious American antecedents down through the ages I realize the only way to topple injustice and corruption is through revolution.

We have a chance to elect a rare human being.

It’s time to be bold. Agitate, agitate, agitate.