Sir: I got your letter ...

Would that more modern day Americans had the courage and wit of ex-slave Jourdan Anderson as demonstrated in a letter he wrote to his former 'boss.' [via Feminist Law Profs]

Let's 'avoid another housing crisis' by ...

... making more profit oriented instruments for mortgage lenders and insurance companies.

2 noted economists outline ways to avoid another housing crisis

One of the economists discussed is Robert J. Shiller, he of Irrational Exuberance, who is quoted elsewhere as saying:

Basically we’re in uncharted territory. It seems we have developed a speculative culture about housing that never existed on a national basis before.

Speculative culture? And just how did that happen? Those speculative devils who designed products, including credit cards and mortgages, to entice and entrap could not possibly have any responsibility in this situation? Is this really a speculative culture or a gang of wealth barons who encourage through financial product design the economic bondage of the populace? And don't forget that they get special help from our elected officials.

“We don’t snoop into private citizens’ lives. We aren’t living in a communist state.”

Oh, yeah? (via Sideshow)

Is the US becoming more and more repressive? ...

When Will We Ban Cigarettes? Reading The Tea Leaves

And corporate run slave-prisons will be the solution to the increasing number of US citizens deemed 'criminals' for the crime of getting caught breathing. Sounds like a best selling science fiction, or is that fantasy [so difficult to distinguish these days] novel.

More destruction of the ideals that made this country strong ...

Public Libraries For Profit by Akito Yoshikane

At some future time, as access to the Internet grows, and assuming that the Internet does not end up in the absolute control of the corporate mafia, perhaps, turning libraries into profit centers for the greedy will not matter.

Believe me, our elected Democrats do NOT believe in Freedom of speech or thought ...

The bill calls for heightened scrutiny of people who believe, or might come to believe, in a violent ideology.

Examining the Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act by Lindsey Beyerstein -- The Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act passed the House of Representatives on Oct. 23 by a vote of 404-6. The wide margin is indicative of a growing concern among U.S. authorities about the potential for so-called “homegrown terrorism” in the United States.

So called Democrats like Giffords and Grijalva voted for surveillance of people based on what they may come to believe. I suppose they will start to black list connections to the Internet next, based on what someone thinks you think or may come to think some day, perhaps, maybe.

And can you believe this: "Rep. Harman is careful to emphasize the language in the bill that states that the Department of Homeland Security’s efforts “shall not violate the constitutional rights, civil rights, or civil liberties of United States citizens or lawful permanent residents.”" 'Our' Reps have learned nothing, absolutely NOTHING, in the past seven years. Idiots! Because they refuse do their job and ensure the structure and controls are in place to actually guarantee our constitutional rights they add meaningless words to their laws repeating what should already be manifest. We have rights. These right are already guaranteed in our Constitution. Our elected officials are ignoring and undermining these rights on a daily basis.

And then there's this:

The broad wording of the bill leaves open many questions. If homegrown terrorism is defined to include “intimidation” of the United States government or any segment of its population—could the Commission or the Center of Excellence task itself with investigating groups advocating boycotts, general strikes, or other forms of non-violent “intimidation”?

Could telling my Rep I will never vote for him again 'til Hell freezes over be considered intimidation? One person's negotiation will turn out to be another person's intimidation. Just one more excuse to arrest someone. They won't care if the arrest is overturned. Government officials will like the harassment value. And it's Democrats who created this monstrosity!

These representatives who hardly take our phone calls, who are likely to arrest us if we show anything other than a subservient attitude in their offices and send gibberish in reply to correspondence are in fact very afraid of us, wouldn't you say?

Here's the Border Reporter's take on the subject: FERTILIZER INDEED

Freedom, not just of the press, temporarily 'safe' in Phoenix ...

The Arizona Republic, hardly the harbinger of freedom and civil rights, is rightly critical of Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas' special prosecutor Dennis Wilenchik's witch hunt at the Phoenix New Times.

From the Arizona Republic opinion editorial:

Whether Thomas knew about them or not, his office issued grand-jury subpoenas against New Times. We would like to see those subpoenas. Since Thomas wishes us to believe they are news to him, we invite him to spread those subpoenas out on our conference table. We'll read up on them together.

The Phoenix New Times announced the investigation on October 18:

Breathtaking Abuse of the Constitution --Joe Arpaio, Andy Thomas and Dennis Wilenchik hit New Times with grand jury subpoenas by Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin at the Phoenix New Times

... More alarming still, Arpaio, Thomas, and Wilenchik subpoenaed detailed information on anyone who has looked at the New Times Web site since 2004. ...

The Feathered Bastard (link and link) at the Phx New Times is, I think, having some well deserved payback at the expense of the Maricopa County Attorney who apparently follows orders from Joe Arpaio who was 'frustrated' according to Thomas' own words (Arpaio is the sheriff who treats a quarantined TB patient as he would his most dangerous criminal; link and link).

Asked if Thomas would go after the many Web sites that have published Arpaio's address online, he made a major legal flub.

"There's a big difference between that and putting his name and address on the front cover," as the New Times did late in 2006. This reporter had to point out to Thomas that the law in question did not apply to print publication of such addresses, only Internet publication of same.

[...]

The extent of Thomas' retreat became apparent when MCAO flack Barnett Lotstein later admitted that attorney Wilenchik will no longer serve the MCAO in criminal matters, though he will continue to represent the County in civil matters when someone like Arpaio requests him.

Obviously, Wilenchik this week crossed the line into political liability territory, and Thomas threw him under the bus. Interestingly, New Times reporter Ray Stern's disorderly conduct citation for looking at public documents has not been dismissed. Stern was viewing MCSO press releases at the PHX law offices of Michelle Iafrate, press releases the MCSO refuses to e-mail to New Times. Stern took some digital snaps of these public docs. They asked him to leave. There were words between he and Iafrate, and he left. Then they hit him with a citation later in the evening as part of this mess.

In my America? ...

"Jim Spencer, a former columnist for the Denver Post who has been critical of the Bush administration, told me today that I could use his name: he is on the watch list. An attorney contacts me to say that she told her colleagues at the Justice Department not to torture a detainee; she says she then faced a criminal investigation, a professional referral, saw her emails deleted — and now she is on the watch list. I was told last night that a leader of Code Pink, the anti-war women’s action group, was refused entry to Canada. I hear from a tech guy who works for the airlines — again, probably a Republican — that once you are on the list you never get off. Someone else says that his friend opened his luggage to find a letter from the TSA saying that they did not appreciate his reading material. Before I go into the security lines, I find myself editing my possessions. In New York’s LaGuardia, I reluctantly found myself putting a hardcover copy of Tara McKelvey’s excellent Monstering, an expose of CIA interrogation practices, in a garbage can before I get in the security line; it is based on classified information. This morning at my hotel, before going to the airport, I threw away a very nice black T-shirt that said `We Will Not be Silenced’ — with an Arabic translation — that someone had given me, along with a copy of poems written by detainees at Guantanamo.

"In my America we are not scared to get in line at the airport. In my America, we will not be silenced."

As pessimistic as I am, I really did not think it had gone this deep and insidious yet!

Won’t Back Down

By: Naomi Wolf

(Link via Alternate Brain)

Yesterday's QUOTES ...

We do NOT ... torture!

... "we start with the least harsh measures first" and stop the progression "if someone becomes cooperative." ... that is, Frances Fragos Townsend of Homeland Security is telling us that the US doesn't torture once those doing the torturing are satisfied with what the victim has said, what the victim has turned into, or that the victim is completely incopacitated or dead!

I hope the Burmese can free themselves. I hope we can. Because there isn't much help on the way from above, folks. Even if we got the perfect progressive president in 2008, they'd have to rely on the public to get their backs. In the end, there's only ever going to be boring, ordinary people deciding that they just can't take the bullshit and the inhumanity anymore and that maybe it's time to act to stop it.

It's not women they're seeking to honor with that proverbial 'pedestal' ... These people who say they have nothing but respect for the military are the very ones who denigrate those who serve. They say they’re "honoring" us, while they’re telling us we’re unable to think for ourselves.
... No, it's soldiers who dare to think for themselves and step out of the mold set by those with the Neo-Con (really the neo-fascist) mindset who mostly reside among the 'conservatives' of this nation.
... Would that there were genuinely leftist voices in mainstream American politics, not because I agree with many of their positions, necessarily, but simply because the breadth of "acceptable" public discourse in this country is dangerously claustrophobic. ...

Big Surprise, Bush's Justice Department against net neutrality ...

The Justice Department said imposing a Net neutrality regulation could hamper development of the Internet and prevent service providers from upgrading or expanding their networks. It could also shift the ''entire burden of implementing costly network expansions and improvements onto consumers,'' the agency said in its filing.

I think they have it backwards and I assume they know it. Lying as usual this administration is doing whatever it can to lock down the internet. If the Democrats in Congress don't come through then the 'free-wheeling' web will come under corporate control in no time.

And as the Democrats have repeatedly demonstrated they cannot be depended upon.

It's unanimous. The Arizona legislature is made up of anti-Constitution jerks...

Arizona Daily Star: Shirts with dead troops' names would be banned by Howard Fischer owned and operated by Capitol Media Services

Arizona Daily Star: Free speech takes a hit in Legislature --Our view: Misguided, feel-good bill tramples First Amendment, merits veto

ADDED: RADAMISTO has images of the 'offending' T-shirt that caused Arizona's legislative to throw a hissy fit: WINGNUTTERY IN ARIZONA

Just 10 easy steps ...

And the steps have already been taken: Fascist America, in 10 easy steps

... As Americans turn away quite leisurely, keeping tuned to internet shopping and American Idol, the foundations of democracy are being fatally corroded. Something has changed profoundly that weakens us unprecedentedly: our democratic traditions, independent judiciary and free press do their work today in a context in which we are "at war" in a "long war" - a war without end, on a battlefield described as the globe, in a context that gives the president - without US citizens realising it yet - the power over US citizens of freedom or long solitary incarceration, on his say-so alone.

That means a hollowness has been expanding under the foundation of all these still- free-looking institutions - and this foundation can give way under certain kinds of pressure. ...

Link via Crooks and Liars.

Feel a little queasy about the GOP's Real ID?

Here, this should help ...