December 24, 2010
Merry Christmas from the Punk Patriot!
December 20, 2010
For healthcare, the US is made of four countries.
If you are in the military, you live in England.
If you are over 65, you live in Canada.
If you are insured by your employer, you live in Germany.
If you have no insurance, you live in Afghanistan.
From TR Reid's talk at the Commonwealth Club of California:
WATCH THE WHOLE THING: TR Reid, the Healing of America on Fora.tv
December 14, 2010
Judge calls healthcare mandate unconstitutional
Personally, I think this is a victory.
WHAT?! The Obamatons say.
Chill, let me explain.
The parts of the bill requiring health insurance companies to cover everybody, regardless of pre-existing conditions, still stand.
And the shittiest part-- forcing people to buy private insurance, the one part that the INSURANCE COMPANIES liked best, is facing the axe.
This kind of reminds me of the time that republicans accidentally banned straight marriage.
Victory! (for now).
And to all the Obamatons who think that this past Healthcare bill was the best idea ever, listen up:
Mandating insurance for health is different than mandating insurance for driving a car.
Anybody can choose to not drive and still go about their business.
Health Insurance, through this bill, is a requirement of being alive.
And there's only one way to choose to stop being alive-- and it makes it really difficult to go about your day. (I'm talking about suicide folks).
December 12, 2010
Welfare Talking Points #3
Talking Points on Welfare Part 3:
People on welfare are mostly black teenage mothers:
FALSE: This is a fiction created by assholes like Newt Gingrich to get poor white people to get angry at poor black people, so that poor people in general would spend our time fighting against one another, instead of coming together and fighting against rich assholes like Newt Gingrich.
According to our gov’ts figures, white people receive the largest amount of welfare by race, making up nearly 40% of the welfare recipient population. 43% of welfare recipients with children have only one child, 30% have two, 15% have three, and there’s a real sharp drop-off after that.
Of those who are on welfare, and are mothers, 47% are between the ages 20-29. 32% are between the ages of 30-39. Only 7% of welfare recipients who have children are teenagers.
So sorry. The most common welfare recipient is white, between 20-40 years old, and has two kids or less.
December 10, 2010
15 year old kid tells establishment to suck it
DADT vote fails; my thoughts
Driving home from work today, I was scanning the radio, and came across what turned out to be Sean Hannity's radio show. He was talking about how the blame doesn't rest entirely on the shoulders of the GOP, and that the Democrats should stop Demonizing the GOP when the Democrats vote the same way.
I think this may be the first time I actually agree with Sean Hannity.
Democrats voted with Republicans in blocking DADT.
Now, I've been following politics, and working on campaigns since I was in high school. Let me let you in on a little secret that I've learned along the way: Federal Level Politicians don't give a shit about you, or your issues, unless they can use them to get you to vote for them.
That's right! I know-- shocking. Politicians lie through their teeth about what they are going to get done when you elect them. Why? Because most don't see themselves as beholden to you. They are beholden to their monied donors. Are you rolling in cash? Then who gives a fuck what you have to say?
But that's not all. There's a second half to this equation. You, the voter, make yourself irrelevant every fucking election cycle by buying into their bullshit. That if you don't elect the Democrat/Republican the gays will; be put in camps/destroy America.
They don't give a shit about gay marriage. They don't give a shit about DADT. It's a wedge issue, as I cover in this video:
It hitting your head against the wall hurts your head, maybe you should stop doing it. Stop voting for people who lie to you.
December 9, 2010
In the UK, students prepare to Kill And Eat the Rich
Live Stream of the UK protests from Fox News (no audio)
Footage of the riots as they unfolded. Students say, "This is just the begining."
Live Newsticker from the Guardian.co.uk
Despite the raging fires, and the smashing of windows, the protesters at large have managed to keep fairly cool heads, as demonstrated by the crowds reaction when one student who made his way to the top of the building threw a fire extinguisher down onto riot police:
Now some may think that these protests are a bit extreme.
But I admire these student protesters in their restraint, as they have not yet Killed And Eaten the Rich.
Anonymous & Wikileaks vs Governments: World War III
What we're seeing go down right now really is World War III.
Governments/Corporations are literally trying to censor the internet.
The idea that the internet is information anarchy is being put to the test, and we're finding that the internet is actually far more controlled than we have assumed. Gatekeepers have found their way into places of power, and we've been asleep at the wheel while they've dug their trenches.
Now, if a the corporate government wants you gone, they can shut you down. What we are seeing now is a people's revolt against oppressive virtual regimes.
People who understand computers are not taking to the streets, but are taking to the internet and fighting back in virtual space, throwing virtual maltov cocktails.
Why this war? In the real world, wars are usually fought over access to resources. On the internet, information is the primary resource used. Those in this People's Revolt feel that access to information should be free for everybody.
The powerful entrenched feel that information should be limited; not shared, but hoarded.
We are living in an era where governments want to know everything about us and what nefarious things we're possibly up to, but don't want us to know anything about them and what nefarious things they are possibly up to.
Wikileaks and Anonymous are fighting against exactly that paradigm. And that's ultimately what this is all about.
This is World War III, and it is quite literally is a war of ideas.
Author James Moore is on Team Wikileaks!
And then some shameless self-promotion:
CLICK ON THE PICTURE, BUY AN AWESOME T-SHIRT
Daniel Ellsberg: The attacks they are making against Wikileaks were made against me.
It was down earlier today, so I'm mirroring it on my own blog. -- PP
[Below is a news release put out by the Institute for Public Accuracy, co-signed by Daniel Ellsberg]
Ex-Intelligence Officers, Others See Plusses in WikiLeaks Disclosures
WASHINGTON – December 7 – The following statement was released today, signed by Daniel Ellsberg, Frank Grevil, Katharine Gun, David MacMichael, Ray McGovern, Craig Murray, Coleen Rowley and Larry Wilkerson; all are associated with Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence.
WikiLeaks has teased the genie of transparency out of a very opaque bottle, and powerful forces in America, who thrive on secrecy, are trying desperately to stuff the genie back in. The people listed below this release would be pleased to shed light on these exciting new developments.
How far down the U.S. has slid can be seen, ironically enough, in a recent commentary in Pravda (that’s right, Russia’s Pravda): “What WikiLeaks has done is make people understand why so many Americans are politically apathetic … After all, the evils committed by those in power can be suffocating, and the sense of powerlessness that erupts can be paralyzing, especially when … government evildoers almost always get away with their crimes. …”
So shame on Barack Obama, Eric Holder, and all those who spew platitudes about integrity, justice and accountability while allowing war criminals and torturers to walk freely upon the earth. … the American people should be outraged that their government has transformed a nation with a reputation for freedom, justice, tolerance and respect for human rights into a backwater that revels in its criminality, cover-ups, injustices and hypocrisies.
Odd, isn’t it, that it takes a Pravda commentator to drive home the point that the Obama administration is on the wrong side of history. Most of our own media are demanding that WikiLeaks leader Julian Assange be hunted down — with some of the more bloodthirsty politicians calling for his murder. The corporate-and-government dominated media are apprehensive over the challenge that WikiLeaks presents. Perhaps deep down they know, as Dickens put it, “There is nothing so strong … as the simple truth.”
As part of their attempt to blacken WikiLeaks and Assange, pundit commentary over the weekend has tried to portray Assange’s exposure of classified materials as very different from — and far less laudable than — what Daniel Ellsberg did in releasing the Pentagon Papers in 1971. Ellsberg strongly rejects the mantra “Pentagon Papers good; WikiLeaks material bad.” He continues: “That’s just a cover for people who don’t want to admit that they oppose any and all exposure of even the most misguided, secretive foreign policy. The truth is that EVERY attack now made on WikiLeaks and Julian Assange was made against me and the release of the Pentagon Papers at the time.”
Motivation? WikiLeaks’ reported source, Army Pvt. Bradley Manning, having watched Iraqi police abuses, and having read of similar and worse incidents in official messages, reportedly concluded, “I was actively involved in something that I was completely against.” Rather than simply go with the flow, Manning wrote: “I want people to see the truth … because without information you cannot make informed decisions as a public,” adding that he hoped to provoke worldwide discussion, debates, and reform.
There is nothing to suggest that WikiLeaks/Assange’s motives were any different. Granted, mothers are not the most impartial observers. Yet, given what we have seen of Assange’s behavior, there was the ring of truth in Assange’s mother’s recent remarks in an interview with an Australian newspaper. She put it this way: “Living by what you believe in and standing up for something is a good thing. … He sees what he is doing as a good thing in the world, fighting baddies, if you like.”
That may sound a bit quixotic, but Assange and his associates appear the opposite of benighted. Still, with the Pentagon PR man Geoff Morrell and even Attorney General Eric Holder making thinly disguised threats of extrajudicial steps, Assange may be in personal danger.
The media: again, the media is key. No one has said it better than Monseñor Romero of El Salvador, who just before he was assassinated 25 years ago warned, “The corruption of the press is part of our sad reality, and it reveals the complicity of the oligarchy.” Sadly, that is also true of the media situation in America today.
The big question is not whether Americans can “handle the truth.” We believe they can. The challenge is to make the truth available to them in a straightforward way so they can draw their own conclusions — an uphill battle given the dominance of the mainstream media, most of which have mounted a hateful campaign to discredit Assange and WikiLeaks.
So far, the question of whether Americans can “handle the truth” has been an academic rather than an experience-based one, because Americans have had very little access to the truth. Now, however, with the WikiLeaks disclosures, they do. Indeed, the classified messages from the Army and the State Department released by WikiLeaks are, quite literally, “ground truth.”
How to inform American citizens? As a step in that direction, on October 23 we “Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence” (see below) presented our annual award for integrity to Julian Assange. He accepted the honor “on behalf of our sources, without which WikiLeaks’ contributions are of no significance.” In presenting the award, we noted that many around the world are deeply indebted to truth-tellers like WikiLeaks and its sources.
Here is a brief footnote: Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence (SAAII) is a group of former CIA colleagues and other admirers of former intelligence analyst Sam Adams, who hold up his example as a model for those who would aspire to the courage to speak truth to power. (For more, please see here.)
Sam did speak truth to power on Vietnam, and in honoring his memory, SAAII confers an award each year to a truth-teller exemplifying Sam Adams’ courage, persistence, and devotion to truth — no matter the consequences. Previous recipients include:
-Coleen Rowley of the FBI
-Katharine Gun of British Intelligence
-Sibel Edmonds of the FBI
-Craig Murray, former UK ambassador to Uzbekistan
-Sam Provance, former Sgt., US Army
-Frank Grevil, Maj., Danish Army Intelligence
-Larry Wilkerson, Col., US Army (ret.)
-Julian Assange, WikiLeaks
“There is nothing concealed that will not be revealed, nothing hidden that will not be made known. Everything you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight; what you have whispered in locked rooms will be proclaimed from the rooftops.”
– Luke 12:2-3
The following former awardees and other associates have signed the above statement; some are available for interviews:
DANIEL ELLSBERG
A former government analyst, Ellsberg leaked the Pentagon Papers, a secret government history of the Vietnam War to the New York Times and other newspapers in 1971. He was an admirer of Sam Adams when they were both working on Vietnam and in March 1968 disclosed to the New York Times some of Adams’ accurate analysis, helping head off reinforcement of 206,000 additional troops into South Vietnam and a widening of the war at that time to neighboring countries.
FRANK GREVIL
Grevil, a former Danish intelligence analyst, was imprisoned for giving the Danish press documents showing that Denmark’s Prime Minister (now NATO Secretary General) disregarded warnings that there was no authentic evidence of WMD in Iraq; in Copenhagen, Denmark.
KATHARINE GUN
Gun is a former British government employee who faced two years imprisonment in England for leaking a U.S. intelligence memo before the invasion of Iraq. The memo indicated that the U.S. had mounted a spying “surge” against U.N. Security Council delegations in early 2003 in an effort to win approval for an Iraq war resolution. The leaked memo — published by the British newspaper The Observer on March 2, 2003 — was big news in parts of the world, but almost ignored in the United States. The U.S. government then failed to obtain a U.N. resolution approving war, but still proceeded with the invasion.
DAVID MacMICHAEL
MacMichael is a former CIA analyst. He resigned in the 1980s when he came to the conclusion that the CIA was slanting intelligence on Central America for political reasons. He is a member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
RAY McGOVERN
McGovern was a CIA analyst for 27 years, whose duties included preparing and briefing the President’s Daily Brief and chairing National Intelligence Estimates. He is on the Steering Group of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
CRAIG MURRAY
Murray, former UK ambassador to Uzbekistan, was fired from his job when he objected to Uzbeks being tortured to gain “intelligence” on “terrorists.” Upon receiving his Sam Adams award, Murray said, “I would rather die than let someone be tortured in an attempt to give me some increment of security.” Observers have noted that Murray was subjected to similar character assassination techniques as Julian Assange is now encountering to discredit him.
COLEEN ROWLEY
Rowley, a former FBI Special Agent and Division Counsel whose May 2002 memo described some of the FBI’s pre-9/11 failures, was named one of Time Magazine’s “Persons of the Year” in 2002. She recently co-wrote a Los Angeles Times op-ed titled, “WikiLeaks and 9/11: What if? Frustrated investigators might have chosen to leak information that their superiors bottled up, perhaps averting the terrorism attacks.”
LARRY WILKERSON
Wilkerson, Col., U.S. Army (ret.), former chief of staff to Secretary Colin Powell at the State Department, who criticized what he called the “Cheney-Rumsfeld cabal.” See recent interviews
For more information, contact at the Institute for Public Accuracy:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
Is it time to use Killing And Eating The Rich as a bargaining chip?
Much thanks to Davis Fleetwood and No Cure For That Productions for adding fuel to the fire.
We're building a movement here folks.
CLICK HERE AND GET SOME
Send in your photos of you in your shirt to PunkPatriot411 {at} Gmail [dot] com.
What's that? You don't HAVE one yet? You gotta change that.
December 8, 2010
Keith Olberman Nails it
Also, MoveOn.org is taking a stand against Obama. If you're a Democratic President, and MoveOn.org is against you, you KNOW you've fucked up.
Obama is turning out to be a Hoover, not an FDR.
December 7, 2010
The Punk Patriot Plays Pundit: What Obama Should Do
Here's what's going down:
The GOP is saying that they want to make the Bush Tax cuts permanent.
If we do that, our country is so incredibly fucked, you have no idea. If we dont' start paying back our debts, other countries are going to drop the dollar like it's hot feces, and our creditor nations like China are going to call in our debt. We'd be totally fucked.
We HAVE to increase revenue and pay down our debt.
The GOP is making a power move, saying that "If you don't give us what we want, we're not going to let you have anything!" Basically they'd block every possible vote on things like Unemployment benefits, and other much needed reforms.
Now, I'm going to get super cold and game-theory on you.
What Obama should do is this: Veto the tax bill, force the Bush Tax Cuts to expire, and throw out the Unemployment benefits with it. Then immediately go to the microphones and say, "America needs congress to get SERIOUS. (explain the debt crisis). We gave the GOP an opportunity to give middle income Americans an extension on the tax breaks, while letting the tax cuts for the most wealthy expire so that we can do the responsible thing and pay down our debt.
"The GOP felt that it was MORE IMPORTANT to give the wealthiest 2% of Americans millions of dollars that we can't pay for, that we're borrowing money from China to pay for, than to give the working people of this country the majority of Americans, a much needed break.
Then the GOP will freak out, and accuse Obama of all sorts of things. Who cares what they have to say, it's a bunch of noise.
Obama stays on the offensive, accusing GOP and BlueDogs in congress of opposing the policies that we need to make America great again.
Unemployment benefits end for thousands of Americans.
Hit the microphones, and beat the GOP over the head with it. Blame them for letting them expire, because they were more worried about serving the super-wealthy than helping out the Average American. Lay out a New Deal type plan for putting americans back to work.
Homelessness ticks up as folks lose unemployment benefits.
Once again, Obama hits the microphones, accusing the Congress of inaction, and paint himself as the change agent whose progressive policies will save the day.
Repeat this tactic ad naseum until you beat them into submission.
How do I know this will work?
It's what FDR did.
By allowing the GOP to frame the debate, Obama will inevitably lose:
* the argument
*the war of ideas
*he'll lose ground on policy
* and he might even lose the next election.
Anonymous Hackers Join Team Wikileaks!
Apparently, they have taken down the website of the bank that froze Wikileak's funds.
RawStory gets one thing wrong-- they say the group is called "Operation Payback." The group is called Anonymous, and they've been around for a while. What they're doing is "Operation Payback." This is interesting, because as far as I know, their protests have in the past been limited to DNS attacks on Scientologist websites, and standing around with Guy Fawkes masks on, evoking V for Vendetta.
From RawStory:
Earlier in the day, Swiss bank PostFinance issued a statement announcing that it had frozen 31,000 euro ($41,000 US) in an account set up as a legal defense fund for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
The bank said it had frozen the account because, in opening it, Assange had claimed residency in Geneva.
"Assange cannot provide proof of residence in Switzerland and thus does not meet the criteria for a customer relationship with PostFinance," the bank said.
As of Monday evening, the PostFinance website was unavailable.
Operation Payback also promised a hack attack on PayPal, the online payment service that last week cut off WikiLeaks, denying the group a major tool for collecting donations from supporters.
Here's a video Anonymous posted on YouTube about what they are doing.
For more on the Wikileaks story as it unfolds, check out the New York Times blog
Glad to see Anonymous is on Team Wikileaks!
CLICK HERE AND GET YOURS
Taxing the Hell out of the Rich is the More American than Apple Pie
"Our revenues liberated by the discharge of the public debt, and its surplus applied to canals, roads, schools, etc., the farmer will see his government supported, his children educated, and the face of his country made a paradise by the contributions of the rich alone, without his being called on to spend a cent from his earnings." *
--Thomas Jefferson, 1811
"Another means of silently lessening the inequality of property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions of property in geometrical progression as they rise."
--Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1785.
*Emphasis mine.
December 5, 2010
Ron Paul is on Team Wikileaks!
December 4, 2010
YOUR PHOTOS #2
We're building a movement here folks. GET YOURS
December 3, 2010
TheRealNews interviews Ray McGovern about Wikileaks
They are the real deal
Ex-CIA analyst, and anti-war activist Ray McGovern is on Team Wikileaks!
BUY THIS SHIRT
Also, Donate to The Real News Network
DEAR CYNICS- STOP EMAILING ME
I get about half a dozen of these emails a week. I guess that means I'm doing something right?
Here's one that I got today:
From: Atheist Howard
To: punkpatriot411@gmail.com
Sent: Fri, December 3, 2010 4:59:32 AM
Subject: I'm sad to say this, but it's time to give up.
I found your youtube website and blog after viewing your "Fix the Economy" video and while I agree with it, I don't see the point of making such a video in the first place. Nothing you say in there is going to be realized. Progressives have lost, it's time to face the music and watch the destruction of the economy and possibly the country. It's time to face the music, there's no light at the end of the tunnel, it's over with. The democratic party has sold us out, after he put so much momentum and support behind President Barack Obama. And now, look at him, he's a complete disappointment. And the Tea Party is rising up, it will take America and there's nothing we can do about it. Ever heard of Rob Bishop? He's a house rep from Utah who's introducing a constitutional amendment to allow states to veto and not follow federal laws, and the tea party is backing removing so many constitutional amendments, including citizenship rights! And it's all going to happen! We're going to see the economy collapse from their economic plans and the complete destruction of our civil liberties, and seeing people like you thinking we have a chance and there's something to do seems horribly unrealistic and crazy, and I'm here to correct you on it.
Our progressive reforms, our economic strengthening, our civil liberties, came from great leaders who gave it "from the top down" FDR for example, because people voted democrat enthusiastically and they were rewarded for it. Now people don't, and the democrats have become a crappy party standing for little different than old guard republicans. Because of such, we're fucked now and not a single progressive thing is happening on a municipal, state or federal level. As Chris Hedges said, it's time not to vote, not to participate, we're fucked and at least we can send a message of disapproval.
Thanks for your time, hope you understand why I sent this message.
And here's my form letter response...
From: punkpatriot411@gmail.com
To: Atheist Howard
Sent: Fri, December 3, 2010 12:11:32 AM
Subject:RE: I'm sad to say this, but it's time to give up.
Hey there. I think I've got you cynics figured out. The reason you spend so much time trying to convince people like myself, the people who have done work to change things for the better, that we're wasting our time, isn't because you're trying to convince us. You're trying to convince you.
If you really believed that everything was without hope, and if you really wanted nothing more than to just sit on the sidelines and watch it all fall down you would be equally amused to watch folks like me struggle as we do, with little help and with little avail.
But instead you make it a point to try to convince us of something other than what our own life experience tells us, something other than what folks like me have found to be empirically true.
You're not actually trying to convince me of anything. My existence, my work, and my philosophy threaten your worldview.
You think you have everything all figured out, but then somebody like myself says something, or does something, that-- at least subconsciously-- calls that into question.
If you really truly didn't care, you'd never have initiated this conversation. You'd have laughed, shook your head, and moved on.
But the truth is, small changes for the better slowly add up to large changes for the better. Just look at Czechoslovakia. Of course, the Velvet Revolution wasn't all good. Nothing in this world is entirely good. Everything has downsides. But some things just suck less. And some governments are less fucked up than others.
To life, liberty, and pursuit of a less fucked-up government,
The Punk Patriot
TEAM WIKILEAKS
So just like people are dividing between Team Vampire and Team Werewolf around the Twilight series, people are also dividing between Team Wikileaks and Team Secrecy.
Which team are you on?
If you're on Team Wikileaks, show it by wearing this shirt.
If you're on Team Secrecy, show it by telling NO ONE.
CLICK HERE TO BUY IT!
December 2, 2010
Welfare Talking Points #2
Talking Points and facts on Welfare part 2:
"I was denied welfare because I’m white."
The largest population of welfare recipients, by race, is white. So that’s clearly false.
You were denied welfare because conservatives like you threw a hissy fit back in the 1990s, because you thought it was too easy to get on welfare, and that too many people were getting on it. Now that you’ve applied for it, you’ve seen hard to get on it, and rather than admit to your own mistake, now you’re playing the race card.
Typical...
NASA discovers ALIEN LIFE- here on earth!
Which lends credence to my crazy theory that all life on earth probably DIDN'T evolve from a common ancestor. My thinking: If life really IS due to chemistry and not some direct divine intervention, there's no reason that it should be rare. In fact it should be as ubiquitous as other things caused by chemistry are. In fact, I see no reason why some of the five kingdoms of life could not have evolved separately from unique origins.
UPDATE
Okay, yeah, so it's not nearly as cool as Gizmodo initially made it seem:
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