My Namesake

I've always loved Black-Eyed Susans, they are perky and resilient. They thrive everywhere here in New England, with their cheerful faces turned up to the sun.

On Being A Liberal

Over at Day In The Life of Joe Republican I found this worthy rant. It kinda distills my feelings on this issue:


...there is NOTHING SHAMEFUL OR WRONG about being a LIBERAL, and the extent to which we have, as LIBERALS, caved to the Neocons use of LIBERAL as a PEJORATIVE (a pejorative is a very negative word, like Asshole, Lickspittle, or Towelhead), and the way we, as LIBERALS, have Distanced Ourselves from the word LIBERAL, is…is……SO CANDY-ASS !!!

I mean COME ON! We have GOT to stop being such CANDY-ASSES!!!! Not everyone in the world has to “like” us. We are already RIGHT. We should be saying, “FUCK YOU! That’s RIGHT I’m a GODDAM LIBERAL!!! I actually believe that sick people should get healthcare, starving people should be fed, and children should get a free (and excellent) education! I believe that War should only be a last resort, and there is NO EXCUSE for aggressively invading another country! Oh and I believe that FEMALE HUMAN BEINGS are real people, and even GAY people are HUMAN BEINGS and all should be treated EQUALLY under the law!! I believe that INDUSTRY MUST be Regulated, and that the profit motive cannot be the SOLE GOOD in our society!


Like Ryan says - Time to stop being such CANDY-ASSES!

Open Letter to NBC Nightly News

email address for NBC: nightly@NBC.com
Dear Sir or Madam,

I was horrified to see that you will be pandering two more times in the near future to that purveyor of hate speech: Ann Coulter.

You should have cut her off after her vitriolic attacks on the 9-11 widows, on Today Show with Matt Lauer. Her appearance then was truly ugly, and highlighted her terrible lack of judgement as well as her bad taste. Coulter's appearances on the July 26 editions of The Big Idea and Hardball will mark at least the sixth and seventh times NBC, or one of its cable news channels, has hosted Coulter since the publication of her book, Godless: The Church of Liberalism; and come at a time when other media outlets are dropping Coulter's syndicated column.

I'm here to say that what she's selling [slander and lies and cries for violence against fellow citizens] is beneath your high quality news organization. It's not good for America, especially right now when we are faced by such serious and grave problems. I don't tune in to network news shows to see that kind of pandering and propaganda.

Shame On You!

*SB_Gypsy*

* tip of the hat for the image to: http://www.rant.com

If ever there was a bill that cried out for veto!

"Transporting minors across state lines to bypass parental consent laws regarding abortion undermines state law and jeopardizes the lives of young women," he [President Bush] said in a statement.

~snip~

WASHINGTON - An abortion bill aimed at stopping people from helping pregnant girls skirt parental-notification laws has gained passage in both houses of Congress, but sticky political and policy disputes stand between it and President Bush's desk.

Just moments after the Senate passed its version 65-34 late Tuesday — with the support of 14 Democrats — Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., used a procedural motion to halt its progress.

Moreover, there are significant differences between the Senate bill and the House version passed last year.


Note to Chimpy McFlight Suit:

The first cause of death for pregnant women is the man who made them pregnant.

The second cause of death for women who are pregnant is the pregnancy itself.

A first trimester abortion is an office procedure, is done on an outpatient basis, and is much safer than pregnancy.


read the whole article here

1.5 Million Rally, Will They Do A Recount?

Amid allegations of election fraud that are becoming exhaustingly familiar, Mexican progressive leader Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador is calling for a recount of the recent presidential election.


MEXICO CITY — In the wake of growing public protest to force authorities to recount the vote, including a rally last week of over 1.5 million people in this city’s central square, more evidence of electoral wrongdoing during the July 2 elections continues to surface.

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, presidential candidate of the leftist coalition For the Good of All, told a rally here July 16 that they have discovered that 60 percent of “acts” (voting results of each poll) have some sort of falsification, up from 30 percent reported last week.

The common defects found were: votes exceed the reported results; votes cast for Lopez Obrador were not counted, while votes for Felipe Calderon, presidential candidate of the National Action Party (PAN), were inflated; and votes cast for Lopez Obrador did not equal the number of votes cast for his running mates for the Senate and Chamber of Deputies. Lopez Obrador also said there are a million and a half more votes counted than people who actually voted.

My question is: They got One and a Half MILLION to march on Mexico City.

How many can we muster, when they try to steal yet another election here?

And what will we face if we do march?




*click on the title for the article
* Here is an update on THE FREEWAY BLOGGERS and what they are doing to open minds...

Minimum Wage Woes

There are signs that congressional leaders are feeling pressure to change their skewed priorities.[on raising the 5.15 minimum wage] After the Senate rejected an increase in June, House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, was asked whether he'd let a minimum-wage bill come to the House floor. "Probably not," he replied. Asked again last week, after 28 House Republicans sent him a letter demanding action, he changed signals.

"We are chatting about it," he said.


Nice.



*click on the title to goto the article

George Lakoff on Framing

Interesting article over at Emboldened: the Baltimore Group Blog. It's an interview with George Lakoff about framing, and how the Democratic Party could improve it's communications. Here's an exerpt:

What you need to do in this case is first admit that George Bush got something right: Three years ago when he stood on that aircraft carrier and said “Mission Accomplished” he was right because a war is a conflict between two armies over territory, and we won that war. And right after we won that war, when he was standing on that carrier, the occupation began. We have been an occupying power in Iraq for over three years. But our troops were trained not to be occupiers but to be combatants in a war. They were not trained for an occupation, they were not equipped for an occupation, they didn’t know the language, they didn’t know the culture, they didn’t have the armor, they didn’t’ have enough troops. And the result was that they were betrayed by our president and the administration, and sucked into being an occupying force which they weren’t trained to be. The result is that they’ve been cut down, they’re dying, they’re going a bit nuts killing other people. They’re under tremendous pressures and they’re not really helping.

The issue in an occupation is not winning or losing because you can’t win and occupation, you can only leave. So the question is a practical one: Are we welcome? For many Iraqis we’re not welcome. Are we helping? Well, the situation seems to be getting worse not better. There’s a civil war going on there, and that civil war was predicted by our generals if we went in this direction. They knew in advance that a civil war was a real possibility under these circumstances but they went ahead anyway. This is not a good thing, and moreover the US has pretty much given up on reconstruction. There’s not a dime in the present budget for Iraqi reconstruction. So it’s not clear that we’re helping very much at all.


That's right, George W Bush has never been able to run an organization anywhere except into the ground! Why does HE get to be the Stern Father Figure? Especially since he's been acting like a spoiled fratboy lately.

Our inside watergarden

The first winter after we installed our outside watergarden was very hard. I was suffering from watergarden withdrawl. The second summer confirmed just how great having a pond is. So, at the end of the summer when the stuff was on sale, I bought a small insert. Hubby rose to the challenge, and we have the little self contained pond that you see below.



For a couple of months, we struggled with leaks and fostered benificial bacteria. It took us the next couple of years to get the water to stay healthy year round.



Right now we seem to have come to an equilibrium, and the fish seem happy and hungry. The pale one is a shubunkin, and the other is a goldfish. There's a pure black goldfish in there somewhere too, he's hard to see.







The gold fish is a piggy, but I love to watch him strike!



*Click on the pics for a larger view

Another Fine Dragon!

This is one dragon extravaganza from Boris Vallejo at Arts Forge

File this in Hard To Believe ...

This:



Is more important to the Homeland Security Dept than This:



*hattip: Kathy over at The Green Knight

Mmm... Peach Mint Tea

Mmmmmm - click on title of post to go and see -

Ned Lamont's new Ad

Ned Lamont Has a Messy Desk

Check this one out - amusing yet to the point!


*hattip to Firedog Lake

78%

After the debate, a poll was taken on the NBC30 website, and I'm so glad to announce that of the people who went online to respond to the poll, 78% said they would now prefer Ned Lamont to be their senator.

Ned Lamont's signs are popping up like mushrooms, all over the place here in CT.



In other news, both the IAM(International Association of Machinists) and the CT Nurses Union have split with the National office of the AFLCIO to endorse Ned. When Lieberman expressed his disappointment that he would not recieve the IAM endorsement, a union member was overheard to say: "...we've been disappointed by you for the last ten years, welcome to the club..."

The National office of the AFLCIO is rumored to have decided that they will support the winner of the Democratic primary.


update: here's the latest from Jane Hamsher, over at Firedoglake about LIEberman:

...Except it isn’t just bloggers, and it isn’t just happening in New Haven. Recently at an event callled "Celebrate West Hartford" a volunteer was handing out Lieberman stickers to a child while the mother was in the food line. As soon as the mom saw the sticker plastered on her kid she jumped the food line, raced over and ripped it off the kid’s shirt and said "no way" as she tore it to pieces. How very awkward for Joe.

Then there was the guy at the Willimantic parade who was heckling Joe about the war. Joe’s pharmaceutical lobbyist wife Hadassah (side note: Lieberman is coincidentally one of the top Senatorial recipients of Big Pharma cash) tried to step in and defuse things, but another parade patron asked "how many of your kids are serving in Iraq, Mrs. Lieberman?" The couple made a quick exit before answering the question, so I guess we’ll never know.

Those wishing to witness the marvels achieved in modern follicle relocation at the Stamford event will only be culled from the LieberFaithful by RSVP.

So, I guess Lieberman is getting more and more like his master (Bushco) every day - RSVP indeed!

Direct from Ned

Ned Lamont has been sending election emails, and I thought I'd post some of his words here:

As I've campaigned across Connecticut I hear concerns from some saying, "Ned, don't jeopardize a safe seat."

I tell them, "Connecticut is a progressive state. You're not losing a senator, you're gaining a Democrat."

They tell me, "Ned, don't rock the boat."

And I tell them, "It's high time we rock the boat."

We are running for the heart and soul of the Democratic Party; we're showing the country that we can win as proud Democrats.

You may be wondering who I am. I started my own successful business from scratch that competes with big cable companies. I am a husband and proud father. I am a progressive and a Democrat.

Three years ago politicians with years of political experience rushed our troops off to war; they told us the war would be easy; we'd be greeted as liberators.

Now three years later, America is no safer, Israel is no safer, the Middle East is even less stable, and we have 130,000 valiant troops stuck in the middle of a violent civil war in the heart of Iraq.

Those who got us into this mess should be held accountable.

In Washington they give you a medal; in the business world they say: "You're fired."

I say it is time for the Iraqis to take control of their own destiny and we're just getting in the way.

The $250 million a day we are spending in Iraq is better spent on pre-school and health care, public transit and veterans benefits.

I would have led the opposition to the nomination of Judge Alito.

I believe that President George Bush's illegal wiretaps and his reckless fiscal and environmental policies are weakening America and leaving too many hardworking citizens behind.

I doubt that anybody will call me "George Bush's favorite Democrat."

I am not afraid of a challenge. I am ready to challenge business as usual, I am ready to fight for real Democratic values and I will tell the Bush administration to put their haughty arrogance in their back pocket and deal with the rest of the world with respect.

I need your support. Joe Lieberman has a well-funded campaign backed by the establishment Democrats in Washington and Connecticut.


and I say: amen!


If you feel so inclined, you can donate to his campaign here

UNSOLICITED ADVICE

In his Opinion Piece "UNSOLICITED ADVICE FOR DEMOCRATIC LOSERS" Richard Reeves starts out agressively:

NEW YORK -- Let's begin by stating the obvious: If the Democrats cannot win the 2006 congressional elections, they don't deserve to be a political party. They will survive as losers, of course, but only because American election laws are a contract between the Democratic and Republican parties to preserve each other no matter what happens.

But, one wonders if the republicans would be so eager to take over if they faced a country as economically looted and socially traumatised as ours is now. They might be tempted to do what in billards is called "play a safety" - that is, to aim to fulfill all the conditions of a legal move, while burying the cue ball in a place that makes it close to impossible for the opposing player to play a legal turn. When the opponent is unable to make a legal shot, the billard player is then rewarded with the cue ball in hand for the next play.

Perhaps the Dems would like to let the republicans stew in the juices that they've been cookin' up for the last seven or eight years... I hope not, (for the sake of all of us citizens) but I would not blame them for being unwilling to clean up after the facists and take the blame for their policies at the same time.

The problem for the Democrats on Iraq is that they cannot or will not come up with any credible arguments about what to do next. The Republican response -- "Follow the flag! Stay the course. Support our boys and girls against the ragheads" -- will once again top Democratic mealy-mouthed confusion and political cowardice.

A campaign that focuses only on Iraq will unite Republicans and divide Democrats. Anti-war feeling is now so high among liberals that it could defeat Sen. Joseph Lieberman (news, bio, voting record), a war enthusiast, in the Connecticut Democratic primary. In the California primary last month, an underfinanced and unknown anti-war challenger won 37 percent of the Democratic vote against Rep. Jane Harman (news, bio, voting record) because of her reluctance to speak out against the war.*emphasis mine

Ok, perhaps Reeves is believing the MSM's spin about this race, but Lamont is more than a one issue candidate. In fact, he very eloquently laid out his views during the debate. Did Mr Reeves skip that part, or is he as cornfuselated as Lieberman was during the debate - continuing to wonder who Ned Lamont is even while Ned was right there not 6 feet away directly answering whatever was asked of him.

More and more Democrats are seeing Iraq as Vietnam in the desert, and they are going to do the same thing they have done in the past: struggle against each other rather than against the Republicans. Mention the name of Sen. Hillary Clinton, the obvious front-runner for the party's next presidential nomination, among liberal Democrats these days, and you get a tirade about her support of the war that more or less compares her to Dr. Strangelove.

So, politically, I would argue the war will take care of itself. People of all political persuasions already get it. Sooner or late, many Americans will see verbal attacks as anti-American diatribes. Politicians do not always do well by doing good or being right.
*emphasis mine

First off, if "People of all political persuasions already get it", then why would those same people think that politicians who are agreeing with them are being anti-American? Speaking for myself, I kinda enjoy being supported in my views.

I would also like to point out that the only people who think that Sen. Hillary Clinton is "the obvious front-runner for the party's next presidential nomination" are the republicans, for whom it's a favorite wet dream. Noone knows at this point who the Democratic Party will favor for president in two years, and I seriously doubt that it will be Hillary.

My advice, unsolicited, to Democrats would be to wage a campaign on local issues and the overall national governance of Republicans these last six years.

President Bush and the Republican Congresses came to power in an American superpower -- military, economic and moral -- with a balanced budget and what seemed unlimited future. Now, we are a debt-ridden country reviled around the world and scorned at home because of conservative positions and performance from stem cell research to New Orleans. The war in Iraq is only a symptom, not the cause, of the decline of the United States -- and that decline should be the Democratic issue of choice in 2006 and perhaps 2008 as well.

For unsolicited advice from a principled opponent, this is not bad, though I do not see the war as a symptom as much as a product of the neocon agenda, and an excuse to plunder our treasury for the enrichment of a world spanning elite. That the media continue to skew the words of progressives, and butcher the issues is a disservice to our democracy and is becoming a great danger in this post 9/11 world.

Open Letter To Barbara Boxer

Dear Barbara Boxer,

I subscribe to your Pac for Change, and I recently heard that you are supporting LIEberman for Senator from my state. I'm here to tell you that it's not just the War in Iraq, though that would be enough right there.

I would like you to review his statements for the last five to ten years and tell me how you think he's an asset for the Democratic Party. I really resent his message that we support the President's illegal behavior just because he was chosen by the SCOTUS to live in the White House.

I also resent his message to victims of rape: that if your ambulance happens to take you to St Francis Hospital rather than Hartford Hospital, then you're out of luck, and you may be driving all over town at 2 am looking for a doctor and an open pharmacy(there's not that many around in CT - we are largly a rural state). Old "Rape Gurney Joe" doesn't care if you are forced to have your rapist's baby. He cares more about the poor emergency room doctor who might be required to hand out pills that would prevent that pregnancy.

Lieberman used to have the respect of those who disagreed with him, but his blind pandering to the pukes who defend torture and war and who are fleecing the citizens of our country by frittering away all our money and influence with this forever war has turned that respect into scorn.

He cares nothing for his constituents. He cares nothing for the Democratic Party. He lobbys for Bushco and Israel while I'm paying him to attend to the serious and difficult issues that our country is facing.

Please support the candidate that the Democratic Primary voters of CT choose. If Lamont wins, I would like to see you respect the voters of CT enough that you honor their decision, and support Ned Lamont for the US Senate.

Sincerely
SB_Gypsy

* email Boxer here

Open Letter to the DSCC

Dear members of the DSCC,

I would like to introduce myself to you. I am 53 years old, I vote in every election, and I have never once voted for a republican.

My Senator at this time is Joe Lieberman, and I totally resent his lobying for Israel during his working time. When I'm paying his salary, he should be working on issues that are important to me. I am disgusted with his performance since Bush stole the office of the presidency. His actions in voting for cloture, to ensure that Alito and Robertson were stuffed onto the Supreme Court, where they can do their worst to the civil rights of the citizens of the US were reprehensible.

He would rather defend Bush's actions than my rights. He would rather send soldiers to be killed in the middle east than find solutions to our energy problems. He would rather send soldiers to be killed in the middle east than find solutions to our school crisis. He would rather send soldiers to be killed in the middle east than find solutions to our medical insurance problems. In fact, he would rather send soldiers to be killed in the middle east than find solutions to any of our many problems. He is an apologist for the flat out worst president ever, and I'm personally tired of it.

I'm very tired of the Democratic party machine putting the kibosh on any young pol who has the energy, fortitude, and ideals to bring our party forward.

I am writing in reference to the unsourced CNN report from a senior DSCC staffer that says that the DSCC will likely support the winner of the Connecticut primary. I'm here to let you know that — although it is an awfully good step, and I am happy to see you take it, I respectfully assert that it isn’t enough . Will there be an official announcement on this at some point? I will be watching for it.

Sincerely
SB_Gypsy

the fax number for the DSCC is 202-959-0354
the email addy of the DSCC is info@dscc.org


*hattip to firedoglake

Dragon Blogging on the 4th

Have a great holiday!

Lieberman announces he will run Independent, if he looses the primary

To secure a place on the ballot, Lieberman needs to collect 7,500 signatures by August 9, the day after the primary, said Dan Tapper, a spokesman for Connecticut Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz.

It was uncertain when Lieberman would begin the process but because of the time limitations it was likely he would have to begin soon.

Lieberman said he will still try to win the Democratic primary. "We look forward to August 9th, when all we have to do is celebrate our victory in the primary the day before," he said.

Lieberman has always been more conservative than the liberal wing of the Democratic Party but it was his support of the war that prompted a serious primary challenge to his re-election.

His decision drew criticism from one liberal group, MoveOn.org, which said he was holding himself above the process by which his party chooses candidates.

Public support for Bush has fallen amid waning public approval for the 3-year-old war in Iraq.

Ned Lamont, who made millions with his cable television company, waged a self-financed fight against Lieberman although he has little political experience. Recent polls have shown Lamont closing the gap.

"This hurts his chances of winning the primary. He knows that," said Kenneth Dautrich, a professor of public policy at the University of Connecticut. "He's pretty much given up on the fact that he can win this primary."


Heh heh heh- ... Go Lamont!

Bees!

My Sister's boyfriend has a beekeeper for a neighbor, and recently his hive split. The bees swarmed, settling on a tree on the boyfriend's property, and it took the neighbor a couple of afternoons to catch them and convince them to stay in the newly prepared hive. She stuck her little camera in there for this pic.