Newt Gingrich on Occupy Wall St.

Try to watch this without vomiting in disgust or sheer anger at his words.  And this is the current leader of the Republican primary field for president.

Transcript (with my commentary):

"Jefferson said that the people who want to be both free and ignorant are asking for something that has never been and will never be.  Captain John Smith said in 1607 in the first English speaking permanent colony to the aristocrats who paid their way and didn't want to work, if you don't work you don't eat.  There was a deep sense of responsibility.

This disgusts me.  This so called expert on moral values is saying that if you're not working you don't have a deep sense of responsibility.  Unemployed?  Go get a job you dirty hippie.  Laid off or fired?  You obviously didn't work hard enough to keep your job.

"Let me now take that and for a brief moment describe Occupy Wall St."

 Oh please do, since you apparently understand it so well...

 "All of the Occupy movement starts with the premise that we owe them everything."

 No fuck face.  Have you even paid an iota of attention to the protests?  Have you even dedicated one brain cell of what's left in that skull of yours to what the protesters have been demanding?  And by the way, when you say "we", sounds like you are saying that you are a part of the 1%, you know, that corrupt, crime riddled, corporate interest that the Occupy movement simply wants to pay their fair share.  That same 1% that the Occupy movement wants to pay for their crimes.

"They take over a public park they didn't pay for.  To go nearby to bathrooms they didn't pay for..."

Hey moron, if its PUBLIC it belongs to the PEOPLE.  Those same PEOPLE that are protesting PAID for it with their taxes.  Unless poor and middle class Americans don't count to you Newt...

"...to beg for food from places they they don’t want to pay for.  To obstruct those that are going to work to pay the taxes to sustain the bathrooms and to sustain the park so that they can self-righteously explain that they are the paragons of virtue to which we owe everything."

I've been to the protest and Chicago and fellow protesters are actually bringing food to the protest so people don't have to beg.  Bet you didn't know that Newt, but I guess you also didn't go down to the protest yourself.  And isn't one of the POINTS of the protest to Occupy Wall St; to obstruct those that are criminally destroying our country and stealing its wealth?  Oh I forgot, in your world, only the 1% (there's that "we" again) pay taxes that really count.

“Now, that is a pretty good symptom of how much the left has collapsed as a moral system in this country and why you need to reassert something as simple as saying to them, ‘Go get a job right after you take a bath.”

 Let's talk about YOUR moral values Newt (no, you don't get the respect from me to call you "Mr.").  

- You are the only Speaker of the House to be sanctioned for ethics violations.
- You had 84 ethics violations filed against you while in congress.
- You were paid $30,000 an hour for lobbying "work" with Fannie Mae (you know, that good ol' sense of responsibility Newt?)
- You owed $500,000 dollars to Tiffany's, you know, good ol' fiscal responsibility.
- You and your wife went on a luxury cruise during a crucial point in the primaries, you know, good ol' work responsibility.
- Your "charity" gave money to your for-profit businesses that you run.  Oh that's what charity is for Newt.
- You cheated on your first wife while she was in the hospital recovering from surgery, and then married your mistress.
- You cheated on your second wife with a woman 23 years younger than you DURING the Lewinsky Scandal, eventually marrying her.  You claimed you did this out of "love for your country".

And on, and on, and on.  Not to mention that you belong to the party of death, of torture, of war, of corporate crime, of greed, of environmental poisoning, of the death penalty, of secret prisons, of racism, of sexism, and on, and on, and on.

Take a look in the mirror Newt before you tell me the "left has collapsed as a moral system."

***

I'm not going try argue with his point about what he says Occupy Wall St. is about.  To truly know what the protest is about, go down to the protest yourself.  There are numerous protests occurring in hundreds of cities across all fifty states.  Turn off the fucking propaganda which is the corporate owned media and open your eyes for yourself.  Get to the ground, get your brain a little dirty, get your feet a little worn, and make a fucking decision for yourself.

If you can't agree to try turning off Fox News, then you're lost to me.

PEACE

p.s. Newt Gingrich, go Fuck yourself.

Young Americans Suffering Disproportionately

This morning I found an article which discusses the record "wealth gap" between the young and the old in this country.  I have no problem with older Americans having wealth.  I have a problem with the youth of this country suffering like this.  

The following article from this morning's Associated Press:

"WASHINGTON (AP) — The wealth gap between younger and older Americans has stretched to the widest on record, worsened by a prolonged economic downturn that has wiped out job opportunities for young adults and saddled them with housing and college debt.

The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater than a household headed by someone under 35, according to an analysis of census data released Monday.

While people typically accumulate assets as they age, this gap is now more than double what it was in 2005 and nearly five times the 10-to-1 disparity a quarter-century ago, after adjusting for inflation."

 First of all, lets not call it a "wealth gap".  Young people in this country are poor.  I have no shame saying it. 

It's the kind of poor where you can barely get a minimum wage job that forces you to live paycheck to paycheck. 

It's the kind of poor where you have to get two, maybe three jobs just so that you can pay rent, bills, and buy food because you don't want the internal shame of being on public assistance.

It's the kind of poor where you can't save for your future, because every cent is going to student loans that got you that college education that you were told would make your future.

It's the kind of poor that doesn't allow you to have any health insurance.  Hospital visits are out of the question.

It's the kind of poor that forces a young couple with a new kid to sell their home, thinking they were secure in their jobs until Wall St. destroyed the economy and any sense of your future with it.

Meanwhile, the old are being forced to stay in their jobs longer just so that they can keep their health insurance while politicians talk of raising the social security and medicare ages.  They are forced to delay a well deserved retirement just so they can remain in their homes for fear of foreclosure. 

***

The current state of affairs is no good.  High unemployment is crippling young people.  Student loans are making them slaves to the system.  Poverty is creeping in to their lives across the board at an alarming rate.  Meanwhile the government cuts education programs, public assistance programs, food stamps, child health insurance, and more.  They are coming for social security and medicare as well.  People are suffering and their suffering is increasing.  If you are young and experiencing this, it is frustrating, angering, but often just damn depressing.  If you are old, you are watching your life's work whittled away at while your children and grandchildren suffer needlessly. 

We're not leeches.  We don't expect much.  We just want a fair chance at achieving our dreams (you know, that "American Dream").  We want to have that chance without being saddled by crippling debt, whether student or medical.  We want to have that chance without having the corporate owned government putting obstacles in our way.  We want to have that chance without the corporate owned media belittling us at every turn.

We want a FAIR chance.  We deserve the same opportunity as the 1% is given.  The same opportunity to try, to succeed, and to fail without fear of death.  The same fair playing ground for everybody, not just the 1% or even just the 99%, but for ALL.

Isn't that what we used to say everyday to start the school day?  "Liberty and Justice for All"!

 

PEACE

 

Delegitimizing Occupy Wall St.

As the Occupy Wall St. protests continue not just in New York but also around the world, the main stream media... I'm sorry, I meant the lame-stream liberal media... seems to be doing everything it can to delegitimize both the movement and the protesters themselves.  I wake up this morning on my day off (you know, from running away, being "brave") and see this on the front page of Yahoo! news. 

NYC arrest records: Many Occupy Wall St Protestors Live in Luxury

"For each of the 984 Occupy Wall Street protesters arrested in New York City between September 18 and October 15, police collected and filed an information sheet recording the arrestee’s name, age, sex, criminal charge, home address and — in most cases — race. The Daily Caller has obtained all of this information from a source in the New York City government.

Among addresses for which information is available, single-family homes listed on those police intake forms have a median value of $305,000 — a far higher number than the $185,400 median value of owner-occupied housing units in the United States.

Some of the homes where “Occupy” arrestees reside, viewed through Google Maps and the Multiple Listing Service real estate database, are the definition of opulence."

A couple things to address here.  

Why is this important?  Why is the media publishing financial information about those arrested?  It's bad enough that these people got arrested for expressing themselves under the first amendment of the Bill of Rights.  Now they have to have their personal lives and finances under scrutiny not just by the police, but by the general public?  It's one thing if you're a politician and you put yourself out there to be scrutinized by the general public.  But people who are protesting should not be afraid of losing all their privacy.

Even if the people protesting are "wealthy", they are still part of the 99% as defined by the protest movement.  Can anyone in the media really defend the 1%, those 400 top earners who make the top wealth in the entire country?  It's easy to generalize and entire group of people, but just because some of these protesters have higher home values does not make them any less legitimate or make their grievances any less legitimate.  If that were the case, then not a single one of our elected officials would have anything worth listening to.

Lastly, the whole point of this article is to frame the protesters in a way that makes the movement seem absurd, violent, illegitimate, and privileged.  Some examples of the article that does this.

"While it would not be fair to conclude that the arrested protesters are fully representative of a movement that is not completely understood, this information forms the most complete snapshot yet of the demonstrations’ more militant participants....

 "It also reinforces the persistent critique of protesters as entitled, upper-class agitators with few legitimate grievances....

 "Sleeping beside the hardcore activists are increasing numbers of wealthy students turning up to make the most of the party atmosphere, drugs and free food..."

"While they dress down to blend in, the youngsters’ privileged backgrounds are revealed by glimpses of expensive gadgetry or the absent minded mention of their private schools during heated political debates...."

Apart from being deceptive and dishonest, some parts of this article are straight up lies.  This movement has been non-violent and non-militant from the start.  If there has been any violence, it is being initiated by the police.  And this lie of drugs at these protests is completely unfounded and has had no proof at all.  But hey, if you keep saying a lie or group of lies over and over and over again, people are bound to start believing you, right?

On a final note, this was linked from Yahoo!'s front page to a "news" organization called The Daily Caller.  Who is the Daily Caller?  With a little research, I find that the Daily Caller is a "news" website founded by disgraced TV host Tucker Carlson with the help of his bowtie.  He founded it with Neil Patel who was a former advisor to Dick Cheney.  Who knows, maybe a certain former Alaskan governor can join this "news" site to make it even more important?  *cough* conservative circle jerk *cough*
 
When you go to their website (which I will refuse to link to here), you will see the following articles after the above discussed articles:
-  "Study: Public School Teachers Aren't Underpaid"
-  "Roger Stone Warns GOP of Great Danger of Third Party Candidate"
-  "The Quick and Dirty Guide to Sexual Harassment"
-  "Cain Sexual Harassment Allegations May be Fundraising Boon"
-  "Regulation is This Halloween's Goblin"

And on that note....*pitter patter*...Brave Sir Robin Ran away!  Bravely ran away....

p.s.  Free food at protests?  Those communists!  E-V-I-L