As important as safe sex is, so is safe politics.
A new organization won't stop bombarding the public e-mail account with their e-mails and I can't figure out if they think I'm really stupid or or that they're incredibly smart?
Maybe it's a combination of the two?
And I can be stupid, no question. But in my life, I've always approached work prospects from the following perspective: The unknown I can handle. But going in on something that feels wrong at the start, going in on something with people you know you can't trust? Give me the unknown over that every time. If your gut tells you that there will be problems even before things start, it will never get better and you need to learn to listen to your gut.
That's always paid the billls (and then some) while allowing me to hold on to whatever's left of my sanity.
A new organization with new people wanting to end the war? Unknown. But I would promote it at least once.
A 'new' organization with some of the worst whores in the organization and pimping the organization?
Hell no.
Ladies and gentleman, the pathetic and not to be trusted RootsAction.
The co-exeuctive director of the front group -- it's a front group -- is Aimee Allison. It seems like a lifetime ago that I supported "Green" Aimee Allison. As a Democrat, I wasn't threatened by Aimee of the Green Party. I thought she'd be a great voice and an independent one. And said so when asked by KPFA friends. And for about a year or so on the air she was just that.
Then she proved that her true gift was in whoring.
I don't associate with whores. While Aimee whored for Barack, she's got other problems as well. She called for the burning of copies of The New Yorker. I have never in my life supported the burning of books or periodicals and am not about to start now. She was whoring for Barack and she didn't like the cover of The New Yorker, she didn't care for the illustration. So the answer to her was to burn it. She revealed that on KPFA in a segment in which she was supposed to be a moderator -- meaing she wasn't supposed to have a bias.
She's a coward.
She had the NPR ombudsperson on with her one morning to discuss the attacks on Helen Thomas. She allowed Alicia Shepherd to claim that everyone knew Helen was anti-Jewish and then, later in the interview, allowed Alicia to claim she'd never heard Helen say anything anti-Semitic. A real journalist or radio host would have purusued the inconsistency. But Aimee was too busy clucking over Helen's 'misdeeds.' (Ava and I covered this in "Media: Let's Kill Helen!" for Third.) If ever someone needed defending it was Helen Thomas. There was a feeding frenzy going on and as shameful as the attacks on Helen were, so was the silence. Aimee did a lot of sighing and pitying but she didn't defend Helen. (For the most in depth criticism of Aimee's on air 'abilities,' go to Ann's site and search "Aimee Allison" -- Ann documented repeatedly how unprepared Aimme was for every interview she did.)
She defended the drone attacks.
Aimee's whoring for Barack was so great that, after he became president (and after she and Michelle Obama friended each other on FaceBook -- always a 'classy' move by a journalist, right?), Aimes taped herself a cute little video that she so loved she put it online. The lives of people in Pakistan mattered far less than what Barack was facing. At least that's the argument Aimee wanted to present.
We could go on and on. But Aimee Allison is a fraud and fake. And someone who couldn't even keep her job on what is, let's be honest, the radio equivalent of public access TV (Aimee was fired from KPFA where she co-hosted The Morning Show) 'rises' to co-executive director of an organization? This is the woman who couldn't even put together a worthwhile audition reel for Oprah's new network and we're supposed to trust in her abilities to be an executive? The same woman who never once prepared for an interview and stumbled on air with one guest after another in interviews that came across like random word association?
Aimee's the first problem, she's not the last.
This organization has backing!!!!!
Wait, let's explain what it's going to do. It's going to hold Barack accountable.
Honest.
B.S. This organization was started to allow the left to let off steam but ensure that, by the time November 2012 rolls around, they'll be ready to pull the lever for Barack. That's how they got their start-up money in fact. In fact, they should probably be posting that online.
They insist they're activists and: "That’s why the launch of RootsAction has been strongly endorsed by such respected, independent-minded progressives as Jim Hightower, Barbara Ehrenreich, Cornel West, Daniel Ellsberg, Glenn Greenwald, Naomi Klein, Bill Fletcher Jr., Laura Flanders, former U.S. Senator James Abourezk and Coleen Rowley." Good heavens.
Jim Hightower? I don't have time for closet cases. Especially those who autographed tons of books for LGBT stores but wouldn't do events there. He'd call around and try to get them to carry his books -- autographed copies! -- but he wouldn't do events there. But he'd shop at some in his area. But, repeating, he wouldn't do events there.
Babsie Ehrenreich?
Who the hell would get in bed with that? Her trashy daughter works for the administration. Oops. They forgot to tell you that, didn't they?
But they're INDEPENDENT! And they're about holding her daughter's boss accountable!!
And if you believe that, you really are stupid.
Babsie is the Socialist who posed as a Democrat to endorse Barack. Political closet cases are embarrassments as well. Now I have a lot of clothes -- I have way too many even though I thin out my wardrobe four times a year -- but even if I had a lot less, I think I'd still use my closets for my wardrobe, not to hide in.
Babsie thinks this is a great organization. In 2008, Babsie wrote weekly -- sometimes more than that -- hit pieces on Hillary Clinton. Since Barack got into office, how many columns has Babsie written holding him accountable?
Zero.
Cornel West has at least gotten honest which puts him ahead of his peer group. Daniel Ellsberg sometimes has strong words about Barack, sometimes doesn't. He should always have strong words because of the issues that matter to him and the way he spoke when Bully Boy Bush occupied the Oval Office. I find Daniel too inconsistent these days. Glenn Greenwald. He's independent in the abstract. And let's just leave him an abstraction but note that he did his part to clear the field for Barack in 2008 along with his pathetic friend that looks like a newborn baby chick -- albiet one with many, many wrinkles. Coleen Rowley? When she trashed two women who may have been raped and did so with glee and did so laughing? Why the hell would we care what that woman said? The woman who came forward after 9-11 -- AFTER. Love those 'heroes' who come forward AFTER. Love 'em.
Bill Fletcher Jr.? Let's go to Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report -- link has text and audio):
The left-wing Obamites were the nastiest of all. They viciously libeled anyone that advanced a Left critique of their hero, calling them enemies of a new "people's movement," when in fact it was they who were shutting the movement down in favor of a fan club and cheering section for Obama. Amiri Baraka spit poison at all who failed to pledge allegiance to the Great Obama, calling us infantile ultra-leftists and just plain "rascals." Bill Fletcher and Tom Hayden stuck with Obama like little sorcerer's apprentices as the president methodically savaged virtually every item on the progressive agenda. What else could they do? To break with Obama would amount to an admission that they were wrong about the progressive "potential" of their candidate; that he had always been a thoroughly corporate politician who would lurch to the Right as soon as he took office; and that, by failing to criticize Obama early in the campaign, they were guaranteeing that he would disrespect and ignore Blacks and progressives, once in office.
Tom Hayden now declares it's finally "time to strip the Obama sticker" off his car. Well, whoopee. Back in the day, Hayden would have been expected to engage in some serious self-criticism for misleading so many people about Obama. The same goes for Bill Fletcher, who appeared on a Pacifica radio show last week sounding like he'd never been an Obama fan. Fletcher said it was inappropriate for the Nobel committee to award Obama the Peace Prize when the president had done nothing to cause a "fundamental shift" in U.S. foreign policy. You can't influence a president of the United States to do the right thing, Fletcher said, by giving him awards in hopes that he will earn them. But that's exactly what Fletcher and his fellow Obama fanatics tried to pull off when they endorsed candidate Obama on a wish and a prayer when there was no reason to believe he would undertake any "fundamental shift" in U.S. foreign or domestic policy. As a result, the Left played no role whatsoever in the 2008 election. They just blew kisses at Obama, hoping he'd kiss them back after the inauguration.
And let's not forget Bill's bitchy and dishonest response to "An Open Letter to the Left Establishment." (Bill's response ran at ZNet. I'm not linking to it.) I'll leave the former senator alone and move on to the next person. Laura Flanders has tried to be more honest. She hasn't yet taken accountability. She would most likely argue that "I said I supported the movement beneath Barack" (Wall Street?) "and not Barack." She did make similar statements in 2008. But she cleared the field for Barack. She went on programs as an independent analysist 'forgetting' to disclose that she had endorsed Barack and, as an 'independent,' trashing every one in the Democratic primary . . . except Barack.
If anyone could take accountability on that list, it would be Laura. She's the only one with real guts and real strength. I will give her credit for refusing to be part of the post-election Pep Squad. But I also know she could do a great deal more including taking accountability. Once upon a time, Laura was the most promising voice the left had. I wish like crazy she'd become that again.
Explain to me why Naomi Klein is on the list?
Did Fat Ass vote in our elections? She doesn't live in the United States. She claims dual citizenship -- but Congress could strip her of that with legislation barring any former US citizen who deserts the military and country from passing on citizenship to their child born in another country.
For a Canadian gal, Naomi sure has a lot time to keep her fat ass in our business, doesn't she?
Granted, when you've assembled a bunch of ideas others developed over 50 years before -- but convinced people you came up with "shock doctrine" -- you probably do have time on your hands -- certainly more time than someone who actually went to the trouble of thinking through and writing an actual book.
Canada's left has been swearing for years that it's just a matter of time (they're practically Randy Travis, they sing that tune so often) before they reclaim their government. Yet every time I turn around conservative Stephen Harper's being re-installed all over again. Maybe if they spent a little less time obsessing over US politics and a little more time focusing on their own country, Stephen Harper wouldn't still be prime minister (he's been prime minister since Feb. 6, 2006).
Naomi turned her late 2008 book tour into a Barack campaign and her 'jokes' about Sarah Palin really can't be repeated. In fact, these days, I doubt you could even scrawl what she said on a high school bathroom (men's room) and get away with it.
Times move on.
Naomi, unfortunately, didn't.
After the election, well after Barack was sworn in, when she attended a function for The Progressive and should have been talking about single-payer, she decided what progressives really needed were more 'jokes' (at least these weren't dirty, right, Nomi?) about Sarah Palin.
Naomi must have woken up that morning and, after finishing off 6 Grand Slams at Dennys (at least six), asked herself, "What would be better for a progressive future? Distracting with Sarah Palin or outlining what the country really needs? Probably the latter. But hell, I'm Canadian. Screw the US. I'm doing my Palin stand up!"
The Progressive, of course, carried the interview that still haunts her. The one she was so proud of at one time but not now. There was the mental midget, the former mall rat, whining to Matt Rothschild (the interview's in transcript format) about how her dumb friends were telling her that nothing would change with Barack as president. And Nomi wasn't having any of it, mind you. She told them to get lost. She made the choice to be happy, she made the choice. (Just like Madonna chained herself.)
Then Naomi went on to tell a really bad lie that haunts her to this day because so many make fun of her for it. She sees Black people. White Naomi couldn't be happy about Barack on her own. She needed to create a Black story. So she weaves this unbelievable tale in which she all but has X-ray vision (truly Superman's vision has nothing on Naomi's) and also telepathy because, in approximately 30 seconds of time, she can tell you what every move across a busy street, off in the distance meant, what was behind every silence. She gets the Black experience. She gets it. She really gets it. (She needs to get a mental professional to sit her down and do some serious work on her issues.)
These are the people we're going to trust?
Again, HELL NO.
You have to check out their "About RootsAction" page to really laugh. "We need a fresh approach to defend the public interest," they insist. "Our country faces a far-right Republican Party that is a wholly-owned susidiary of corporate America, and" as a whispered after thought, "a Democratic Party whose leadership is enmeshed with corporate power."
You seeing they have problems with balance, fairness and honesty? The Dem Party currently doesn't just hold hands with "corporate power." What a bunch of cheap whores.
They want you to know that "RootsAction is a new online initiative . . ." What the world needs now . . . more people sitting at their computers.
E-activists.
RootsAction exists to get you to do some e-mails, to feel good about yourself because, golly, you tried, didn't you, and to come around, in November 2012, to the conclusion that there is nothing to do but vote Democratic.
RootsAction isn't an organization, it's a sausage factory. It's going to grind you up and all your complaints and any chance of you doing real action and spit you out in a shiny casing all ready to pull the lever for Barack.
I'm a Democrat. I don't hide that. But it was truly amazing in 2008 and is truly amazing since to watch as so many non-Democrats -- Socialists, Communists, etc -- on the left are so damn willing to sell out for a Democrat -- and a corporatist War Hawk at that. I didn't vote for Barack in 2008. I won't be voting for him in 2012. (I will not be one of those whiny idiots who says, "Why won't my Congress person vote for what's right!" while I vote for a candidate -- Barack -- who declares one war after another. Don't whine about your member of Congress not having a backbone if you yourself don't have enough of a backbone to stop voting for War Hawks.)
It's over, I'm done writing songs about love
There's a war going on
So I'm holding my gun with a strap and a glove
And I'm writing a song about war
And it goes
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Na na na na na na na
I hate the war
Oh oh oh oh
-- "I Hate The War" (written by Greg Goldberg, on The Ballet's Mattachine!)
Last week, ICCC's number of US troops killed in Iraq since the start of the illegal war was 4455. Tonight it is still [PDF format warning] 4455.
The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.
iraq
i hate the war
the ballet