Skill Sets and Null Sets

First, two quotes:

1) “If reason be against a person, that person will always be against reason.” 2) “May we not be of one heart, though we are not of one opinion?” (Both from John Wesley.)

 

The first cleverly but plainly states a residual truth about both GOP policies and the people who argue for them. The second echoes the patriotism once at the heart of the American promise–now willingly abandoned by those who are in the first null set.

After the 2008 election, many of these people went out and created a run not on Treasuries but on bullets. Six month order backlogs were common within 30 days after the results were tallied. This time, it seems petition is the choice of protest–mainly from states that take in more federal money than they pay out.

On top of the looped stories, we also have mass sightings (still unconfirmed?) of black people in voting lines in Maine; a website, Unskewered Polls, publishing entire charts of false data with wrong totals from precincts and counties in FL, OH, and elsewhere (I checked the data against the official county-reported results; the only pattern were false numbers posted for each fraud claim–the fraud was theirs!).

Here in South Carolina, a hack of state computers got a total of 4.45 million state residents SS#s and business tax numbers; Governor Nikki Haley has said she plans to tell Washington how wrong it was.

Remember when truth was a skill set of governance?

Walmart Workers; Dallas, Texas

Picketing Walmarton BlackFrday, 2012

What Resides In The Background?

~Romney may be just doing the very sort of thing David Brooks is espousing and insisting that he’s really a moderate who was just being pragmatic when he presented himself as a severe conservative, in order to get elected.  I suspect David himself uses a similar justification for what he does as a conservative pundit who has been known to toe the party line but is the moderate darling of Democrats and liberals.  The problem is, to put it in language David might understand, is character; what kind of person does this, and can such a person ever be trusted?  How do we know when he’s posing and when he’s being sincere?  Others need from him, if not consistency, then the through-line of a coherent theme that an inner core, that is intact and to which we connect, allows.  And we don’t want the cheap substitute of being bullied or lied to or manipulated instead.

These are penetrating, core questions, clearly framed, aimed at how ideas, actions, and decisions relate to trust and authenticity. I offer 3 methods to determine “how we know” our interpretations are accurate.

One (drawn from addictions), when a behavior is center stage, increasingly dominates the frame or can be seen through the other positions or actions (not a Romney example, but lynching empty chairs points to deeper problems!). Repeated, long-term behavior, appearing in all phases of a process points to a character anchor unlikely to change (Obama’s or Romney’s).

Two, when the behavior is strongly tied to short term goals and is often quickly abandoned.  (Those who ask for money for food, but walk away if you offer to buy a meal. I doubled a gift once in NC when a person made a specific menu choice, demonstrating authenticity.)

Three, when a central life experience resides in the background but is glimpsed repeatedly. (Again, definitely not a Romney example, but serial criminals have a disguised central goal.)

I submit for Romney, flip-floping is an action strategy to keep others off base, options open, and disguise intent. Poland, England, the NAACP were quickly abandoned after being used and no appearences have taken place at former Bain sites. Coded and uncoded language, fictions, personal behavior and a budget sheet emphasis on capital extraction disguise–and affirm–Romney’s real goal: a massive redistribution of public wealth.

 

George Zimmerman/Sean Hannity Interview In It's Entirety

Reblogged from The ObamaCrat.Com™:

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By Jueseppi B.

Entire George Zimmerman Hannity Q & A. Major News: First Time Talking To The News!

Here is George Zimmerman's news Q & A on the Hannity Show, that was on Fox News on July 18, 2012.

This is big news since all we have heard on the national news is coverage of things from Trayvon Martin's side, or a media perspective.

Read more… 182 more words

The June Monthly Giveaway is Here

Reblogged from Publisher's Corner:

The ‘Create’ tab on MagCloud.com is your one stop shop for getting started designing and publishing your next publication. Speaking of design, from trim and bleeds to color selection and typeface dos and don’ts – we know design can be quite complex. To make things easier for you, we’ve pulled together some ideas that can help you deal with some of these challenging design elements…

Read more… 298 more words

The Day I Was Terminated

Reblogged from Diane Ravitch's blog:

A few years ago, when I began speaking out about the destructive policies that are now called “education reform,” I had the comfort of knowing that no one could punish me. I didn’t want a job, I didn’t want a political appointment, and I didn’t want a foundation grant.

Imagine my surprise, therefore, when I learned on June 5 that I would not be reappointed as a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Read more… 764 more words

Republican Mythology: Small Business Facts and Fantasies

Reblogged from Desert Beacon:

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Nothing is more predictable than the insertion of the Great GOP Myth that Republicans protect the interests of SMALL businesses into any political campaign.  First, let's deal with some small business FACTS.

As of 2007 there were 27,757,676 firms in this country.   21,708,021 of these were non-payroll companies.   6,049,655 were firms with payrolls.   The firms operated 29,413,039 establishments.   The firms with payrolls operated 7,705,018 establishments. 

Read more… 1,521 more words

Some Things Never Change

Some Things Never Change.

obamasupport

The Afghan Tragedy

Many are focused on the Afghan tragedy and the incredible reality that a soldier was involved. But our men and women in uniform reflect the generation and national cuture of our present moment. As we grieve innocent children and families killed in Afghanistan, think of the women around the world in the military–fellow soldiers for whom the military instills honor, respect, trust–who are raped by other soldiers wearing the same uniform–and often meet cover-ups or resistance to reporting by command authority. Look at the hometown news; unexplained incidents of killing innocent individuals, women, families, students, and random victims fill the news space.

That this ethos, of which Congress member Giffords was a victim, as were soldiers at Ft. Hood, and the 85 youth in Norway killed on retreat, is not confined to the military or a fixed number of tours or duty, but is pervasive and defies our current insights, which treats each case as singular, althrough as a whole they form a distrubing and widely distributed pattern.  We have no understanding of its causes. We cite only associations and tangent experiences as causes, yet our understanding falls far short.

All that we know in our denial is extended violence, from sexual assaults to shootings, is now being widely employed by individuals in situations involving a nexus of unresolved external and internal conflicts, out of control impulses and delusional thinking, institutional misses, and a puzzled, worried public.