The Weaver's Web

The Corporate Blackmailing Of America Is Now All the Rage - Forbes

Fri, 16 Nov 2012 20:28:02 -0500

The Corporate Blackmailing Of America Is Now All the Rage - Forbes:

To drive home their blackmail efforts, the industry has launched a television and print campaign telling us what is going to happen to our jobs if we remove their subsidies.

You know what? Enough already.

How does any American avoid the reality that these are the very people who claim to despise welfare unless that welfare is corporate welfare?

Restaurant owners who whine about paying the cost of their employees’ health care are leaving it to you and I to do the job for them with every monthly health insurance premium we pay, thereby subsidizing their bottom lines whether we buy their products or not. How is that not corporate welfare? Oil companies who threaten to take their jobs and go elsewhere if we dare to cut back on their research and development subsidies, all the while pointing the finger at single mothers who get government help.

I’m sorry, but this is nuts.

It is no secret that American patriotism was, for many people, long ago replaced by something these folks consider far more important—personal and shareholder profit.

I like profits. But I also like living in a country where our commitment to the betterment of our nation and the lives of our people takes precedence over the desire to give away a few million pizza pies.

If these companies are permitted to get away with this effort to hold hostage their employees—and the American public at large—in order to get their way because they lost an election…or if they can successfully threaten to pick up their ball and take it to a different field because we might just ask them to forgo some R&D subsidy money for the national betterment…America has a problem far more dramatic than paying an extra fifteen cents for a slab of carbohydrate drenched in sugar filled tomato sauce and then covered with artery clogging meat.

I can only hope that Americans will have the good sense to show these businesses what we think of their tactics and their notion of patriotism by choosing to support businesses who believe in a more basic yet evolved sense of values.

It doesn’t require massive efforts or campaigns involving staging boycotts or creating other types of mischief. It is far simpler than that.

The next time you are taking the family out for dinner, do a quick Google check to see if your destination is a place where they are punishing their workers to make a political points as they ask you to subsidize their profits by requiring you to pay higher health insurance premiums due to the costs of emergency rooms treating their employees because they have no coverage. If you find that your planned destination is such a business, maybe you can think of another, similarly priced restaurant that your family might enjoy.

These business have made their choice and their choice is to politicize their businesses.

Fine. Now, let’s make our choices.

kathiek: This is the woman who John McCain called “not very...

Fri, 16 Nov 2012 16:03:43 -0500

kathiek:

This is the woman who John McCain called “not very bright.” And he’s certainly qualified for such a judgment, having hand picked Caribou Barbie as the most qualified person to be Vice President of the U.S.

What she said!

Ohio will let federal government run its health care exchange, Gov. John Kasich says

Fri, 16 Nov 2012 13:20:54 -0500

Ohio will let federal government run its health care exchange, Gov. John Kasich says :

Ironic isn’t it? Republicans bitch and moan and go into spasms over federal government interference and then hand over control of health care in their states to—you guessed it—the federal government.

Morons!

I just love the way all these restaraunt moguls are claiming they’re going to have to cut...

Thu, 15 Nov 2012 11:59:44 -0500

I just love the way all these restaraunt moguls are claiming they’re going to have to cut employees hours, raise prices, add a surcharge, on and on ad nauseum because—Obamacare.

I know a lot of restaraunt workers. Not surprising since in my hometown the majority of the population either works for the largest single employee in town (a hospital) or the most prolific “industry”, which around here is the restaraunt business. We may not have much else, but we’ve got eateries by the train car loads.

The thing I find most interesting about all the caterwalling from the owners of all these multi-million dollar businesses?

Of all the restaraunt employees that I know—NOT A SINGLE ONE OF THEM IS, NOR HAVE THEY EVER BEEN, A FULL TIME EMPLOYEE!

quickhits: How insane are Republicans? This insane. Mother...

Thu, 15 Nov 2012 11:23:47 -0500

quickhits:

How insane are Republicans? This insane.

Mother Jones:

President Obama is using a Cold War-era mind-control technique known as “Delphi” to coerce Americans into accepting his plan for a United Nations-run communist dictatorship in which suburbanites will be forcibly relocated to cities. That’s according to a four-hour briefing delivered to Republican state senators at the Georgia state Capitol last month.

On October 11, at a closed-door meeting of the Republican caucus convened by the body’s majority leader, Chip Rogers, a tea party activist told Republican lawmakers that Obama was mounting this most diabolical conspiracy. The event—captured on tape by a member of the Athens-based watchdog Better Georgia (who was removed from the room after 52 minutes)—had been billed as an information session on Agenda 21, a nonbinding UN agreement that commits member nations to promote sustainable development. In the eyes of conservative activists, Agenda 21 is a nefarious plot that includes forcibly relocating non-urban-dwellers and prescribing mandatory contraception as a means of curbing population growth. The invitation to the Georgia state Senate event noted the presentation would explain: “How pleasant sounding names are fostering a Socialist plan to change the way we live, eat, learn, and communicate to ‘save the earth.’”

[…]

The meeting consisted of a PowerPoint presentation followed by a 90-minute screening of the anti-Agenda 21 documentary, Agenda: Grinding America Down. It was emceed by Field Searcy, a local conservative activist who was forced out of the Georgia Tea Party in April due to his endorsement of conspiracy theories about the president’s birth certificate and the collapse of World Trade Center Tower 7. The presentation also featured a special video cameo from conservative talking-head Dick Morris in which the former Clinton aide warns that Obama “wants to force everyone into the cities from whence our ancestors fled.”

“Obama, of course, has taken no steps to bring the United States under the control of a United Nations sustainable-development-themed dictatorship,” MJ reports. I guess you have to say that.

Rogers is, in fact, the Georgia Senate majority leader — meaning he is the Republican mainstream in Georgia. If you doubt that, then ask yourself why most of the people at the meeting didn’t shout, “This is fucking insane!” before rushing out.

And it’s not just Georgia:

…In May, the Kansas Legislature approved a resolution blocking Agenda 21 from being implemented in its state, following in the footsteps of Tennessee. Rogers, the Georgia Senate majority leader, introduced legislation in January that would have blocked the nonbinding UN resolution from being applied to his state. Among other things, the resolution noted that, “according to the United Nations Agenda 21 policy, social justice is described as the right and opportunity of all people to benefit equally from the resources afforded by society and the environment which would be accomplished by socialists and communist redistribution of wealth.”

If it seems as if Rogers is just repeating John Birch Society conspiracies, he is—literally. As in Tennessee, large portions of his 2012 bill, SR 270, were lifted word-for-word from draft legislation prepared by the Birchers.

This should be less shocking than a lot of people will think. After all, it’s no more or less insane than the idea that the US is on the verge of being ruled by sharia law — the last global conspiracy theory fad from the GOP’s local yokels. It’s fun to point and laugh — and by all means do — but also be warned that a significant chunk of actual elected Republicans are completely unhinged basket cases.

You know how GOP leadership are trying to tell their base to stop being so freakin’ nuts? Yeah, good luck with that. Saying “knock it off” is not the cure for mental illness.

Renounciation

Thu, 15 Nov 2012 09:31:10 -0500

So, it seems miniscule numbers of citizens in various states have signed online petitions to snatch their place of abode from the union. A few have even garnered high enough numbers to force a response from the administration.

Each and every signatory knows the answer they will receive will be, “sorry about that, but, no,” but that is neither here nor there.

Personally I think the administration should do more to help these disenchanted folks than just a flat out “no”.

Since they are saying that they no longer wish to be citizens of the United States , I think the government should help them reach their goal.

Why not give them a helping hand and post a printable version of the paperwork necessary to formally renounce their American citizenship?

mprnews: Could you eat on a food stamp budget? About a dozen...

Thu, 15 Nov 2012 07:58:26 -0500

Rabbi Harold Kravitz and Zafar Siddiqui, from the Islamic Resource Group, with his son Shoaib Siddiqui get ready to do their grocery shopping for the week with a $31.50 budget.Photo: Jennifer Simonson

A "food stamp challenge" participant's cart is nearly empty while shopping for a week's worth of groceries with $31.50 at Cub Foods in Minneapolis. (MPR Photo/Jennifer Simonson)

mprnews:

Could you eat on a food stamp budget?

About a dozen Jewish, Christian, and Muslim leaders in Minnesota are joining others across the country this week to find out by spending $31.50 a week on food, the average food stamp benefit in the United States.

By participating in the “food stamp challenge,” the religious leaders hope to increase awareness about hunger in the state and encourage Minnesotans to support local food shelves and advocate for government food assistance programs, including food stamps.

Read more from reporter Julie Siple

(MPR Photos/Jennifer Simonson)

Walking in another’s shoes. They are doing it right.

thepoliticalfreakshow: mylifewithsocialanxiety: alittlecoconutt...

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 15:21:27 -0500

thepoliticalfreakshow:

mylifewithsocialanxiety:

alittlecoconuttart:

Ohhhhh.

LMAO

And this ding-dong is bright? Hello? Earth to McCain? Is this thing on?

"Guys, I get it: providing healthcare benefits to employees cost money. And, as a group, you tend to..."

Wed, 14 Nov 2012 08:28:38 -0500

“

Guys, I get it: providing healthcare benefits to employees cost money. And, as a group, you tend to prefer things that do not cost that — I watch Undercover Boss. But own your layoffs and your policies. Let’s stop pretending that suddenly, with this election, bosses have been transformed into reluctant assholes.

Obamacare is just the latest excuse to wriggle out of the social contract. For many years now, full-time benefits like sick days, maternity leave, pensions, lunch hours, chairs — have disappeared by magically transforming full-time employees into ‘independent contractors’ or ‘part-time-20-year temp help.’ Wanna avoid paying half of your employees’ Social Security tax? Reclassify them as ‘independent contractors’ so they pay it all themselves! Make them fill out a 1099! ‘That’s not a full-time busboy — that’s Juan Co., LLC!’

…So let’s cut the ‘I’d loooove to be able to give employees healthcare — I just can’t!’ Let’s face the facts: pizza and coal companies are just unlucky enough to have a labor force that can’t be outsourced — you happen to be among the few industries that still has to hire Americans! I’m sure that if you could outsource your pizza-making to China, I’m sure that ‘Papa John’s’ would become Papa San’s. Which is actually (Japanese), but, you know, for the joke. You understand.

…So maybe next time, take all the millions you donated for partisan political purposes and pump it back into the type of healthcare advances that may ultimately increase business productivity! And then, we can just keep pizza out of politics.

”

- JON STEWART, responding to business owners like Papa John’s CEO John Schnatter threatening to fire employees because of the implementation of Obamacare, on The Daily Show (via inothernews)

So fucking relevant to basically fucking everybody.

(via foulmouthedliberty)

THIS! This is the essence of Christianity.

Sat, 10 Nov 2012 21:23:56 -0500

THIS! This is the essence of Christianity.:

undercovernun:

Occupy Wall Street campaigners buy up debt to abolish it

A group of campaigners linked to the Occupy Wall Street movement is buying-up distressed loans for pennies in the pound and cancelling them to “liberate debtors at random”.

The Rolling Jubilee project is seeking donations to help it buy-up distressed debts, including student loans and outstanding medical bills, and then wipe the slate clean by writing them off.

Individuals or companies can buy distressed debt from lenders at knock-down prices if it the borrower is in default or behind with payments and are then free to do with it as they see fit, including cancelling it free of charge.

…

Jesus said only one new thing, only one thing that isn’t expressed in Hebrew Scripture.

I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.

The new part is only five words: as I have loved you. And if we’re honest with ourselves, we know we don’t love one another as Jesus has loved us. After all, when was the last time we let ourselves be arrested, tortured, and executed?

Jesus continues by saying that his followers will be recognized by the love they have for one another. If we’re honest with ourselves, we know we don’t act more loving than anyone else around. We’re selfish and self-centered, impatient and discourteous, and poisoned by the idea that the idea of value or worth is exclusively measured in dollars.

Can we maybe try to live up to this new commandment of Jesus? Can we maybe try to be honest when we say “forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors”? Can we show the kind of love that makes people say, “Wow! Look how much they love each other! That’s amazing!”?

REBLOG IF YOU'RE OVER THE AGE OF 21 ON TUMBLR.

Sat, 10 Nov 2012 21:01:00 -0500

sarahlee310:

silas216:

eyan-j:

bigmisterc:

cartoongoblin:

tmtrx:

better yet, let’s see a show of hands for over 30

How about over 40?

I’m over 21 twice…

30+ club

40.

Tumblr Ancient here. A couple of decades over 40.

A couple of decades over 40 + a few years here.

All sorts of news on the wires about conservative business moguls (large and small) throwing temper...

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 11:43:21 -0500

All sorts of news on the wires about conservative business moguls (large and small) throwing temper tantrums by laying off workers or cutting employees to part time hours “to prepare” for the disasterous future in store now that AFC won’t be repealed.

Belive it folks. Over night the whole world changed…financial Armagedon for business owners is at hand! They will all be out of business tomorrow if they don’t act today!

Business owners giving the proles an unmistakable message, “If America doesn’t vote for MY bests interests you will be made to suffer.”

Pathetic bastards with pathetic morals punishing the peons who got them where they are today for no other reason than to prove their own importance.

Wal-Mart will start the first of three Black Friday sales at 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 17:22:07 -0500

Sears is opening its stores at 8 p.m. on Thanksgiving, too.

Kmart stores will be open on Thanksgiving Day from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m., then will close and reopen from 8 p.m. to 3 a.m. They will reopen for a second time at 5 a.m. on Black Friday.

I hope no one minds if I say

WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE? (OK I admit, that was a scream.)

I don’t apologize for screaming. As usual, the low-paid, no benefits, mostly part-time workers are being used so the corporations can rake in the $$.

"The Republican Party thought it could disrespect women, gays, Latinos, black people, union workers,..."

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 14:43:00 -0500

“The Republican Party thought it could disrespect women, gays, Latinos, black people, union workers, single moms, minorities of all backgrounds and young people and yet somehow win an election. Do sane evangelicals and Roman Catholics of a reasonable disposition – and there are many – want to make the same mistake? Do we Christians really want the future of American Christianity permanently hijacked by the most putrid collection of reactionary delusional bigots since Jim Crow? The circle-the-wagons mentality of paranoia tinged with racism that has typified the – NOW FAILED — anti-President Obama crusade has so infected large swathes of American religion that it’s an open question whether the hate-your-brother-mongers have permanently discredited religion. This is the time for religious leaders in America to humble themselves and to become once again part of our democracy rather than reacting to it while crying doom. The Republican Party may or may not rise to the occasion and change. But there’s no reason that Christians can’t distance ourselves from a political movement dedicated to willful ignorance. It’s time to put following Jesus ahead of denying other people their basic human rights, their basic humanity and trying to win elections even when it costs your soul.”

- Do Christians Have Something Better To Do Than Spending the Next 4 Years Hating and Lying About President Obama The Way They Did For The Last 4 Years? (via azspot)

Truth, Justice and the American Way

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 14:10:15 -0500

The comic book slogan that made us believe in ourselves like no other. You didn’t have to be a kid to feel your chest swell with pride at the sound of that immortal phrase.

Superman may have been a fictional character, but America was not. America was truth and justice incarnate.

At least that’s what we told ourselves.

We became a super power both militarily and economically. The most powerful and infuential nation in the world. We got very good at insisting that everyone else should listen to what we say and ignore what we do.

While crosses burned, whites only signs hung in shop windows, no Jews allowed placards appeared on doors in country clubs and Ivy League schools, we claimed our right—nay, our duty—to instruct the rest of the world on how to properly administer a just society.

Yes, we have removed the signs and placards in public places. Yet we still have “leaders”, both political and religious, who promote injustice by word and deed.

In seeking that “one more vote” or “one more body in the pew” they are more than willing to pander to our fears and frustrations rather than remind us that as a nation, and as humans on this planet. we are dependent on each other. That we are in this thing called life together no matter the color of our skin, the religion we profess, our sexual orientation, or our politics.

The American Way is democracy. Democracy is inclusive. And that is the truth we need to remember. The truth we need to teach.

Counting the Bible's words doesn't yield a Republican Jesus

Thu, 08 Nov 2012 08:51:11 -0500

Counting the Bible's words doesn't yield a Republican Jesus:

In my book “American Jesus,” I demonstrated how American views of Jesus, rather than adhering strictly to the unchanging biblical witness, have shifted with the cultural and political winds. Over the course of U.S. history Jesus has been a socialist and a capitalist, a pacifist and a warrior.

In other words, he has been used, by both the left and the right. Or, as I put it, “The American Jesus is more a pawn than a king, pushed around in a complex game of cultural (and countercultural) chess, sacrificed here for this cause and there for another.”

This problem of mistaking your God for the God – the problem, that is, of idolatry – was captured beautifully by Albert Schweitzer, who suggested that scholars on a quest for the “historical Jesus” were looking down into a deep well and seeing not the real Jesus but reflections of themselves.

This is what is happening, in my view, to my angry evangelical readers. In this case, however, they are looking down the well and seeing some mashup of Ronald Reagan and Romney. Instead of the biblical Christ, they are seeing the Republican Jesus.

There are many ways to support my argument that the preoccupations of the Christian Right today are not the preoccupations of the Bible.

One is to point out that abortion is never even mentioned in the Bible. (Yes, Jeremiah 1:5 reads, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,” but when did that formation happen? At conception? At quickening? At birth?)

Another is to point out that American evangelicals didn’t care about the abortion question until the GOP taught them to care.

As Jonathan Dudley observes in a recent Belief Blog post, U.S. Catholic leaders began to take on abortion right after Roe v. Wade legalized it in 1973, but American evangelical leaders continued to teach that life begins at birth until the late 1970s and early 1980s. If the Bible clearly teaches us that our politics should center on the abortion question, why did it take nearly 2,000 years for Bible believers to figure this out?

Here is my basic proposition: Bible-believing Christians who want to base their politics on the Bible ought to get the Bible straight, which is to say (a) correct and (b) directly from the page, rather than filtered through the spin of the GOP.

The story of this election

Wed, 07 Nov 2012 08:36:16 -0500

noraleah:

Women showed up to vote.

They showed up early and they showed up strong.

And not only that — women *my age* showed up to vote.

Our great-grandmothers fought for the right to vote today.

Our grandmothers fought for the right to work outside the home.

Our mothers fought for the right to be treated with respect.

Don’t pick a fight with us.

Truth

We the People, and the New American Civil War

Mon, 05 Nov 2012 17:10:54 -0500

robertreich:

The vitriol is worse is worse than I ever recall. Worse than the Palin-induced smarmy 2008. Worse than the swift-boat lies of 2004. Worse, even, than the anything-goes craziness of 2000 and its ensuing bitterness.

It’s almost a civil war. I know families in which close relatives are no longer speaking. A dating service says Democrats won’t even consider going out with Republicans, and vice-versa. My email and twitter feeds contain messages from strangers I wouldn’t share with my granddaughter.

What’s going on? Yes, we’re divided over issues like the size of government and whether women should have control over their bodies. But these aren’t exactly new debates. We’ve been disagreeing over the size and role of government since Thomas Jefferson squared off with Alexander Hamilton, and over abortion rights since before Roe v. Wade, almost forty years ago.

And we’ve had bigger disagreements in the past – over the Vietnam War, civil rights, communist witch hunts – that didn’t rip us apart like this.

Maybe it’s that we’re more separated now, geographically and online.

The town where I grew up in the 1950s was a GOP stronghold, but Henry Wallace, FDR’s left-wing vice president, had retired there quite happily. Our political disagreements then and there didn’t get in the way of our friendships. Or even our families — my father voted Republican and my mother was a Democrat. And we all watched Edward R. Murrow deliver the news, and then, later, Walter Cronkite. Both men were the ultimate arbiters of truth.

But now most of us exist in our own political bubbles, left and right. I live in Berkeley, California – a blue city in a blue state – and rarely stumble across anyone who isn’t a liberal Democrat (the biggest battles here are between the moderate left and the far-left). The TV has hundreds of channels so I can pick what I want to watch and who I want to hear. And everything I read online confirms everything I believe, thanks in part to Google’s convenient algorithms.

So when Americans get upset about politics these days we tend to stew in our own juices, without benefit of anyone we know well and with whom we disagree — and this makes it almost impossible for us to understand the other side.

That geographic split also means more Americans are represented in Congress by people whose political competition comes from primary challengers – right-wing Republicans in red states and districts, left-wing Democrats in blue states and districts. And this drives those who represent us even further apart.

But I think the degree of venom we’re experiencing has deeper roots.

The nation is becoming browner and blacker. Most children born in California are now minorities. In a few years America as a whole will be a majority of minorities. Meanwhile, women have been gaining economic power. Their median wage hasn’t yet caught up with men, but it’s getting close. And with more women getting college degrees than men, their pay will surely exceed male pay in a few years. At the same time, men without college degrees continue to lose economic ground. Adjusted for inflation, their median wage is lower than it was three decades ago.

In other words, white working-class men have been on the losing end of a huge demographic and economic shift. That’s made them a tinder-box of frustration and anger – eagerly ignited by Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and other pedlars of petulance, including an increasing number of Republicans who have gained political power by fanning the flames.

That hate-mongering and attendant scapegoating – of immigrants, blacks, gays, women seeking abortions, our government itself – has legitimized some vitriol and scapegoating on the left as well. I detest what the Koch Brothers, Karl Rove, Grover Norquist, Rupert Murdock, and Paul Ryan are doing, and I hate their politics. But in this heated environment I sometimes have to remind myself I don’t hate them personally.

Not even this degree of divisiveness would have taken root had America preserved the social solidarity we had two generations ago. The Great Depression and World War II reminded us we were all in it together. We had to depend on each other in order to survive. That sense of mutual dependence transcended our disagreements. My father, a “Rockefeller” Republican, strongly supported civil rights and voting rights, Medicare and Medicaid. I remember him saying “we’re all Americans, aren’t we?”

To be sure, we endured 9/11, we’ve gone to war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and we suffered the Great Recession. But these did not not bind us as we were bound together in the Great Depression and World War II. The horror of 9/11 did not touch all of us, and the only sacrifice George W. Bush asked was that we kept shopping. Today’s wars are fought by hired guns – young people who are paid to do the work most of the rest of us don’t want our own children to do. And the Great Recession split us rather than connected us; the rich grew richer, the rest of us, poorer and less secure.

So we come to the end of a bitter election feeling as if we’re two nations rather than one. The challenge – not only for our president and representatives in Washington but for all of us – is to rediscover the public good.

The easiest way to lose an election is to assume your side will win.

Mon, 05 Nov 2012 12:15:38 -0500

abaldwin360:

VOTE

Something we should never forget.

diadoumenos: “There’s been quite a bit of consternation among reporters lately about Mitt Romney’s...

Mon, 05 Nov 2012 12:12:16 -0500

diadoumenos:

“There’s been quite a bit of consternation among reporters lately about Mitt Romney’s refusal to answer their questions. And rightly so. But let’s be clear on why Romney is refusing to engage reporters. If he did, he’d face questions about the mounting instances of dishonesty his campaign has resorted to in the final stretch — potentially tripping him up and placing all the dissembling into even sharper relief. In the race’s final days, Romney has adopted what you might call a Kamikaze strategy. His campaign is cranking out a startling number of falsehoods and sleazy attacks, drawing widespread condemnation in the media that could ultimately crash his campaign… All of this feeds directly into the final argument Obama is making about Romney’s character, integrity, and authenticity: He’ll shamelessly say anything to win and as a result you can’t trust him on anything, let alone to look out for your interests. Romney is banking that he can surf past all the media and Obama camp criticism on a wave of last minute ad spending. Refusing to answer questions from the press is central to pulling that off. If Romney were to take questions from reporters, he’d be asked to answer for all of this stuff.”

— Mitt Romney’s Kamikaze strategy

The only thing transparent about Mitt are his lies.