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Holland And U.S. Are Both Bailing Out
Prostitutes, Although Holland's Are The Honest Kind

post from DownWithTyranny! on 04 July 2009 02:00:00 PM. © DownWithTyranny!

This was quite the non-4th of July for me. The closest I can was a festive conflagration in a small village in the interior of Bali called Pejeng where there was a very festive mass cremation ceremony. And then I got this reminder from HCAN that the 4th of July is, afterall, about something that goes quote beyond fireworks and barbeques: Revolution.

Two hundred and thirty-three years ago, our countrymen declared their independence from the tyrannical British Empire.??Today, will you declare your independence from the tyrannical insurance industry and demand the choice of a public health insurance option???

Click here to sign the petition and declare your independence from the insurance industry!??

All over the country today, thousands of Americans are holding these truths to be self-evident - we need health care reform that will provide:

? Coverage we can afford;
? Comprehensive benefits we can count on;
? Choice of a private or public health insurance plan; and
? Equal access to quality care

For too long, the insurance industry has held us in their monopolistic grip, so much so that there is no competition in 94% of our communities. We have no choice but to pay their absurd rates and receive their sub-standard care so they can pay their CEOs another bonus.??No more! With the choice of a public health insurance option, the industry will finally have a competitor strong enough to keep them honest. With this choice, we can restore stability to our lives, with no more unaffordable and low-quality coverage.??Happy Independence Day!

Indeed! But is it just a pack of avaricious Insurance Industry executives who are the cause of our misfortune? Of course not-- not even if you add in a pack of avaricious Big Pharma executives, and a pack of avaricious bankster-predators. It's much harder to come to grips with-- though today is certainly the day to do so-- that our very system of democracy is the root cause. Our political system is financed by those with the wealth and biggest interest in maintaining the status quo. And its quite bipartisan-- the entire GOP (100%) being in thrall to Big Business by ideology as well as human greed and enough Democrats-- from Lieberman, Specter, Baucus, Bayh, Landrieu, Nelson and our own slimy Blanche Lincoln making sure that this conservative coalition overrides anything and everything the people of this country may want. Time for another revolution? Did you think I was kidding the other day when I mentioned that misplaced, divisive eliminationism might be better directed away from racial minorities and towards the real authors of our woes?

Imagine if there were no greedy, dishonest politicians with their hands in the pockets of Big Business. Maybe we wouldn't have just spent uncounted hundreds of billions of dollars bailing out incompetent, crooked banksters. Maybe they'd be rotting in prisons now instead of dividing up our tax dollars among themselves in the form of bonuses. Maybe we'd be having a discussion like they are in Amsterdam about whether or not to bail out honest prostitutes instead of the shady kind we bailed out.

Amsterdam city council is turning its attention to a pressing problem for one of the city's key business sectors -- banking and credit for prostitutes who can't get accounts from mainstream institutions... "Up until now, it's been very difficult for people in the sex industry to get credit with the banks," a city council spokesman said on Friday.

"For them it is a hazard that they can not get regular credit or help or mortgages or anything from a regular bank."
The council is expected to come to some sort of conclusion within the next two months on what it might do to help the industry.

One of the country's most prominent right-wing politicians-- one who until a few weeks ago harbored presidential or vice-presidential delusions-- actually used tax payer money to pay his own prostitute down in Argentina. Is he in prison? On trial? No; he's a politician. They set the rules for themselves and the rules are mighty liberal... for themselves.

Read The Full Article:
http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2009/07/holland-and-us-are-both-bailing-out.h
tml

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HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

post from Zirgar's Fresh New Brain Squeezin's! on 04 July 2009 01:56:00 PM. © Zirgar's Fresh New Brain Squeezin's!

I finally made time to stop and wish everyone a Happy 4th of July! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, U.S.A.; you're 233 years old today, but you don't look a day over 200!! WOO HOO!

Read The Full Article:
http://zirgar.blogspot.com/2009/07/happy-independence-day.html

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Gordon Brown criticises Burma's UN stance

post from Ashin Mettacara on 04 July 2009 01:35:00 PM. © Ashin Mettacara

Gordon Brown attacked the "obstinacy" of the Burmese regime after they refused to allow UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to meet with jailed opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.The Prime Minister, who has been a vocal campaigner for her release, spoke out[...]

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http://www.ashinmettacara.org/2009/07/brown-criticises-burmas-un-stance.html

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Its the 4th of July and Our Founders Are Weeping

post from Firedoglake on 04 July 2009 01:30:08 PM. © Firedoglake

We interrupt our regular programs to bring you special coverage of the latest absurdity.[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://oxdown.firedoglake.com/diary/6115

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Please Have A Nice And Safe Fourth Of July

post from Texas Liberal on 04 July 2009 01:29:51 PM. © Texas Liberal

Please have a nice and safe Fourth of July. (Above–Independence Hall in Philadelphia.)Here is information about visiting Independence Hall.

Read The Full Article:
http://texasliberal.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/please-have-a-nice-and-safe-fourth-o
f-july/

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Obama: America was not built by
‘naysayers.’

post from Think Progress on 04 July 2009 01:29:00 PM. © Think Progress

President Obama devotes his address this week to remembering the “indomitable spirit of the first American citizens” who built this country and the lessons we can apply to the current challenges:

That is the spirit we are called to show once more. We are facing an array of challenges on a scale unseen in our time. We are waging two wars. We are battling a deep recession. And our economy ? and our nation itself ? are endangered by festering problems we have kicked down the road for far too long: spiraling health care costs; inadequate schools; and a dependence on foreign oil. [...]
These are some of the challenges that our generation has been called to meet. And yet, there are those who would have us try what has already failed; who would defend the status quo. They argue that our health care system is fine the way it is and that a clean energy economy can wait. They say we are trying to do too much, that we are moving too quickly, and that we all ought to just take a deep breath and scale back our goals.
These naysayers have short memories. They forget that we, as a people, did not get here by standing pat in a time of change. We did not get here by doing what was easy. That is not how a cluster of 13 colonies became the United States of America.

Watch it:

video details and more

Read The Full Article:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/07/04/obama-july-4/

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TPMDC Fourth Of July Roundup

post from Talking Points Memo on 04 July 2009 01:13:00 PM. © Talking Points Memo

It seems like old times -- Barack Obama and John McCain release dueling messages on Independence Day. That and other political news in today's TPMDC Fourth of July Roundup.[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Talking-Points-Memo/~3/MHQyxUmAVOE/tpmdc_fourth_of
_july_roundup.php

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Texas Progressive Alliance Round Up With Map Of
Spanish Missions In Texas

post from Texas Liberal on 04 July 2009 01:09:08 PM. © Texas Liberal

Below is the weekly Texas Progressive Alliance round-up. The Texas Progressive Alliance is a confederation of the best political bloggers in Texas.Above is a map of where Spanish Missions were located in Texas between 1659 and 1795. Here is information and history about Spanish Missions in Texas from the very good Handbook of Texas Online. From the Handbook—”The [...]

Read The Full Article:
http://texasliberal.wordpress.com/2009/07/04/texas-progressive-alliance-rouns-up-
with-map-of-spanish-missions-in-texas/

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Sessions Getting Nastier over Sotomayor
Nomination

That's a real man bites dog headline, I know, but Sessions has decided to get particularly nasty over an utterly irrelevant issue in the Sotomayor nomination. He's demanded decades worth of paperwork from a Puerto Rican civil rights organization. Sotomayor once served on the board for the group, Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.

Sessions has demanded reams of documents from the organization that weren't written, edited, reviewed, or approved by Sotomayor, acting in her capacity as a board member. Which White House Counsel Greg Craig pointed out in a letter sent to Sessions.

"Perhaps there is confusion about Judge Sotomayor's role with PRLDEF, and that confusion may account for your unusual interest," Craig wrote. "Let me be clear: On Judge Sotomayor's behalf, we submitted all documents the committee requested of her, and we did so in record time."

To which, Session responded:

"During her time there, the organization took extreme positions on legal issues ranging from the death penalty to abortion to racial quotas," Sessions said in a statement. He said it was "absurd" for the White House to call the documents irrelevant.

Because staff that was not under her control or supervision wrote things that she was not in a position to approve or reject. Gottcha. This is pro forma obstructionism from Sessions, another pathetic attempt to try to drum up some kind of real opposition to Sotomayor and to potentially delay the hearings while they wait for irrelevant documents.

Senator Leahy remains philosophical, saying:

some in the GOP were going to oppose any Obama pick - "even if the president had nominated Moses."

Republicans "were going to object no matter who it was. And several of them have told me that privately," Leahy told The Associated Press in an interview at his Vermont farmhouse.

That would be an interesting nomination fight, Sessions versus Moses. As it is, they aren't going ot be able to stop the Sotomayor nomination. But that won't stop them from being assholes about it for as long as they can, riding that wave of white male privilege into electoral irrelevance.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/iJhp9vJfAP8/-Sessions-Getting-Nast
ier-over-Sotomayor-Nomination

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Andrea Mitchell: Sarah Palin is Out of Politics
Period and Does Not Want to Run for Higher Office

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MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell reports that according to her sources, not only is Sarah Palin stepping down as Governor of Alaska, she is also getting out of politics, period. Time will tell if Mitchell's reporting is accurate, and whether this is a result of her legal problems that are potentially mounting in Alaska or her thinking that this move somehow would help her in a Presidential run. I would bet on the former if forced to take odds.