Tim goes to a roadmeet

Most of this blog is about serious current affairs from my progressive populist perspective, but I have a hobby too. I call it Roads Scholaring - visiting roads just because they're roads. Roads are interesting. Every person, animal, and plant who has ever lived in the history of the universe agrees about that.

Over the weekend, there was a meet-up of Roads Scholars centered on Ashland, Kentucky, and I was looking fiveward to attending it. I almost didn't get to go because of a slight change of plans, but at the last minute, I was able to catch a Greyhound bus that left Cincinnati on Friday night. The only bus route to Ashland was via Columbus of all places, and the trip took all night. The trip wasn't particularly expensive considering the prolonged route, but I got a grand total of about 30 seconds of sleep that night.

At the Columbus bus station, a man passed out on the floor. A pile of powdered cocaine emerged from his pants.

The bus got to Ashland around 5:30 AM on Saturday. And it was below freezing. And I needed sleep. And the indoor Greyhound station was closed. One of the locals told us it didn't open until 8 AM each day. So folks who got off the bus were stuck out in the subfreezing weather. But this netted me 6 hours to freely roam around Ashland in an arthritis-tinged daze until the roadmeet got under way.

About 25 people from several states showed up for the event. We had an itinerary, and we carpooled for a humor-filled tour all over the Huntington, West Virginia, area. We peeped a supposedly haunted tunnel, some bridge construction, a covered bridge, and other items that were of at least some Scholaring interest.

Due to another change of plans, this roadmeet turned into an actual vacation. On Saturday night, a group of us tried visiting as many restaurants as possible. This was unfortunate because I already had an upset stomach caused by curvy roads and lack of sleep. I planned on going home that night, but it got to be so late that we ended up lodging in Grayson, Kentucky. That itself yielded an amusing story: Yesterday morning, when I was in the motel lobby getting ready to leave, an aging man went to the front desk and told the clerk, "I know where this place got their mattresses: J.D. Rockefeller." Get it? 'Cause they were as hard as a rock!

One of the other attendees of the Roads Scholar meet drove me home yesterday.

Since I know you're going to ask, I detected a series of SBD bunker blasts at the Cincinnati bus station on Friday night. I detected the uproarious bouquet of another silent-but-deadly while we were on the steps overlooking that old tunnel during the roadmeet. In addition - since I know you're going to ask about this too - a young woman bubbled at the Columbus bus terminal. But no celebrity look-alikes or helicopter hats were sighted on this trip.

All in all, the roadmeet was a memorable event indeed!

Lawn Chair Quarterback: "Hemp Is Oil"

Tim celebrates the legalization of industrial hemp in Kentucky...

Kentucky legalizes hemp

Here's a stunner from a state where you never thought a story like this could happen...

Kentucky legislators have passed - and the governor is letting become law - a bill that will legalize the growing of industrial hemp, provided the federal government ever lifts its restrictions. Kentucky joins only 8 other states in passing this bold measure.

It could be bolder, of course. I think Kentucky should just ignore federal restrictions and legalize hemp regardless. This bill also does not legalize marijuana in any ingestible form, so we still have a ways to go to banish the failed War on Drugs.

Hemp is oil, hemp is soil, hemp is loyal, hemp is you.

Tea Party bill would establish poll tax for college students

Now that it's clear that most normal Americans no longer vote for right-wing extremists, the only way the babbling cockheads of the fascist Tea Party can generally win elections is by cheating.

Tea Party-backed Republicans in North Carolina have introduced a bill designed to suppress the student vote. Under this bill, if a college student registers to vote at their college address, their parents would be required to pay extra taxes.

This is clearly unconstitutional. For starts, it's a poll tax. Plus, the Supreme Court already ruled back in 1979 that college students are allowed to register where they attend school.

Leaders of True the Vote - a Tea Party thug operation that intimidates voters at the polls and makes up stories of voter fraud - has praised the measure. There's actually a very real chance of this bill passing. After all, North Carolina Republicans also recently proposed a bill saying the U.S. Constitution doesn't apply in their state.

Heavens to Murg, they're crazy! The teagaggers filed a frivolous lawsuit to try to bankrupt the Campbell County Public Library (a story that's making national news), and now they want a poll tax? With younger voters moving left, that explains why this tax would apply only to college students' families.

What good is it for us to win in the court of public opinion, when the Tea Party malcontents - who remind me of a broken 78 spinning on a hi-fi - are still allowed to get their way?

(Source: http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/04/04/17600742-fear-of-the-youth-vote-now-in-north-carolina)

Judicial activism destroys local library

You want to talk about legislating from the bench? Here's a big local story for ya...

Three nobodies from the Tea Party sued the Campbell County Public Library because of the library's past tax hikes. Although a 1979 law clearly states that the library is within its power to levy these taxes, Republican Judge Julie Reinhardt Ward ruled today that this wasn't so, and ordered the library to slash its taxes.

The case was a battering ram against the very concept of libraries and literacy. There is a demonic War on Libraries out there. It's been going at least since I worked at the Cold Spring branch back in the '90s. Our local libe isn't the only target. All public libraries are under attack. The Kenton County Public Library is the target of an almost identical lawsuit.

Because of today's ruling, the Campbell County Public Library loses a staggering 61% of its funding. It also sets a dangerous precedent that could stymie libraries throughout the state.

The Tea Party needs to just dry up and blow away already. Everybody hates them anyway.

Tim checks up on Waldvogel Viaduct progress

On Friday, I pept, wept, and oggle-bept the progress being made on the Waldvogel Viaduct reconstruction. This outing yielded 9 Roads Scholaring photos and videos...

http://www.angelfire.com/yt2/lastword/roadpics/millcr13.html

Also, today I went to the Reds' Opening Day parade in Cincinnati! I saw 3 people who were in such a festive mood that they bubbled. (See what I mean about this blog picking up the slack of my old Pitas blog?)

9th Circus makes woman pay legal fees of bank that falsely arrested her

The right-wing 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has seldom met a major corporation they didn't idolize.

Back in 2008, a woman - who happens to be a prosecutor in San Mateo County, California - went into a Bank of America branch in San Francisco to cash a check. The bank said it was a bad check - but it wasn't. They mistakenly thought the name on the check was that of a customer who had nothing to do with the woman.

The bank - which stupidly thought it was a bogus check - called the cops. Police arrested the woman, took her to the police station, shackled her, and cut her off from her diabetes medication.

She then sued the bank. But get this: U.S. District Judge Richard Seeborg said the lawsuit was an attempt to stifle Bank of America's free speech - and ordered her to pay the bank's $50,000 legal bill.

I know it's April 1, but this is no April Fools' joke. Some right-wing judge not only thinks corporations have free speech rights, but that these rights were violated when somebody sued over a false arrest.

Now the 9th Circus has upheld this right-wing ruling.

Oh well. More judges for the impeachment block, I see.

(Source: http://www.kusi.com/story/21831347/court-prosecutor-to-pay-50k-for-filing-lawsuit)

Lawn Chair Quarterback: "Face Farts"

Tim describes the hilarity of when someone farts in a person's face...

H.B. 279 debacle illustrates legislative arrogance

Everybody talks as if the executive branch reigns over all else in Kentucky, but today's fiasco proves nothing can be further from the truth.

H.B. 279 is a bill in Kentucky that masquerades as a religious freedom measure - although it seems to neglect the very essence of religious liberty. For most folks, religious freedom is about the right of free people to exercise their beliefs without interference - not imposing their ideas on everyone else. For instance, real religious freedom would protect people from fascist diktats such as Real ID or public school uniforms.

But H.B. 279 overreaches. It seems to provide a gaping avenue for people to ignore antidiscrimination laws and hide behind religion to justify it. That's not religious freedom. In Kentucky, we have a saying: The right to flail your fist ends where someone else's nose begins. When we say this, we mean it. Mean it like a dictionary, we do.

I would have supported H.B. 279 if lawmakers had modified it so nobody could dodge antidiscrimination laws. But they wouldn't listen to reason.

The legislature approved H.B. 279 - but Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear vetoed it, probably because of the aforementioned flaw. Today, however, lawmakers overrode Beshear's veto.

What does this tell us about the arrogance of those who subscribe to the warped notion that the legislative branch should have greater power than government's other branches? The situation in Kentucky is particularly dangerous, because it only takes a simple majority of each chamber to override a governor's veto. Fact is, the branches were originally conceived to be coequal - in Kentucky and at the federal level. There are times when lawmakers are supposed to pipe down and let governors do their job. The idea of coequal branches is supposed to safeguard the people's rights from mob rule by a privileged few.

Apparently, some other states have already passed laws like H.B. 279. The good news is that people who try hiding behind these laws to defend discrimination haven't had much traction. So today's override may prove to be a pyrrhic victory for those who fail to grasp religious liberty.

Farty City

Earlier at the Party City in Eastgate, somebody ripped an SBD bunker blast, which stunk up an entire aisle.

CVS forces workers to reveal private health data

When you see stories like this, you can probably understand why my faith in the system is just about nil. I'm a swell guy, but my patience ended decades ago.

CVS Pharmacy - America's largest drugstore chain - has a new policy that menaces all 200,000 employees. Workers must now submit their private health data such as their body fat level - or pay a $50 fine each month.

There's no way in hell this is legal. Medical data is supposed to be confidential. It's between you and your doctor - not between you and your boss.

I know this is a dumb question, but it must be asked: Do CVS employees have a union? If they had one, they might be able to halt the pharmacy chain's snooping. Without a union, they're probably out of luck.

Violence against child abusers: right or wrong?

I usually mean what I say. If I cheer violence against known child abusers, it's no exception.

I hate people who beat children. By that, I don't mean actions that might be widely regarded as reasonable parental discipline (though I'm not a supporter of corporal punishment either). I'm talking about outright battery. A few years ago, I posted a strongly worded entry on this blog about a case in which a school administrator beat the living shit out of an 8-year-old boy, and prosecutors refused to bring charges. I demanded nothing less than complete ruin for child abusers.

I truly believe what I posted. But once in a while, I get a pang of regret over posting this. It's not because I didn't mean what I said - because I meant it. It's not because I'm afraid the sheriff is going to try to have me institutionalized just for saying it - because I will absolutely humiliate anyone who tries that. Rather, it's because that entry might scare away folks who might otherwise enjoy this blog. They might want me to try to "understand" child abusers. Why, where's the love?

I've been around long enough to know there are crybaby so-called "liberals" out there who give real progressives like me a bad name. I know that if they saw the entry I wrote, they'd mewl about it for the next few centuries and look for other excuses to criticize me. (I can imagine them crying, "How can you call yourself left-wing when you didn't endorse Mark Warner?")

I will defend what I said. And I'm not alone. People on other websites have also had some tough words about other abuse cases. One person said of an abusive principal, "I'm afraid I'd have to take my fist to him and go to jail for battery but it would be worth it."

The real question is: Is it morally right to endorse violence against known child abusers? I've added a poll on this blog that asks this question, and I plan to have this survey up until the end of April. Hopefully, it won't be freeped by the now-discredited FairTax cult like the old 'Pail Poll was.

The outcome of this poll will not change my mind. I'm not here to "understand" people who beat kids. If you knock a defenseless child around, you deserve what's coming.

Local lawmaker opposes popular domestic violence bill

Damn, Joe Fischer is fucking pitiful.

The Kentucky House recently approved H.B. 9, a very popular bill that would allow dating partners to obtain domestic violence protective orders. The vote was 92 to 5 in favor.

Kentucky has been weak regarding protective orders - a fact that has led to the deaths of some victims. In fact, there was reportedly no such thing as a protective order in Kentucky until sometime very recently. But H.B. 9 is a strong safeguard for victims.

Guess who was among the 5 members who voted against this robust bill? That's right, folks. Campbell County's very own Joe Fischer. Mr. "Right-to-Work" himself. The same Joe Fischer who was almost laughed out of the chamber for trying to gut Kentucky's laws against corporate funding of elections. The same Joe Fischer who sued the state in order to force it draw a House district where he could get elected.

The other 4 members opposing the bill were - like Fischer - also Republicans: Mike Harmon, Kim King, Mike Meredith, and of course failed attorney general candidate Stan Lee.

Hey, we just got a message for Stan Lee: Jim Photoglo called. He wants his mustache back.

(Source: http://pageonekentucky.com/2013/03/22/naming-names-on-the-house-bill-9-shenanigans)

Lawn Chair Quarterback: "Because It Bips"

Why ask why, when the answer is always, "Because it bips"...

GOP wants to hang up on phone service for the poor

GOP evil never ends.

Congressional Republicans now want to shut down a program called Lifeline - which funds phone service for tens of millions of low-income Americans. The Media calls this program the "Obamaphone", even though it began in 1985 and was expanded to cell phones back in 2005 - long before President Obama took office.

Lifeline is one of the most efficient government programs and yields some of the best results. The program has saved lives by paying for phone service that allows people to call for help in case of an emergency.

Far-right wrath against Lifeline was aggravated last year when a video appeared featuring a woman saying she would vote for Obama because he gave her a free phone. That video has since been debunked as a hoax.

Now, Rep. Tim Griffin (R-Arkansas) has introduced a bill that would bar Lifeline from funding potentially life-saving cell phone service.

Republicans also use the budget sequester to try to justify cutting Lifeline, but they don't seem willing to cut a penny from their bloated "defense" programs or their failed Washington, D.C., school voucher program. When it comes to wasting taxpayer money, the GOP wins hands-down.

Fascist class warfare and government waste rule the roost in the modern Republican Party.

(Source: http://thehill.com/blogs/hillicon-valley/technology/288553-supporters-rally-to-defense-of-obama-phone-program-)

10 years, zero prosecutions

I am livid.

According to Wikipedia, the Iraq War began on March 20, 2003, and ended on December 18, 2011. That means today is the 10th anniversary of the start of this unpopular, illegal war.

Ten years - yet not a single prosecution of Bush, Cheney, and other lying war criminals in the Bush regime.

And while the war itself has ended, the insurgency in Iraq continues and threatens the lives and mobility of Iraqis daily. All because of the Bush thugocracy - and The Media that cheered the war.

Time to start the prosecutions.

Livin' in the KCIT...Talkin' hard times in Kansas City...

Now for something a little more lighthearted...

I majored in radio/TV, so I reserve the right to lapse into an uncontrollably animated state whenever I see a website dedicated to a failed TV station. Over 40 years ago, there was a station in Kansas City bearing the unmistakable call letters KCIT. Evidently, TV in Kansas City at the time was just as laden with questionable preemptions as Cincinnati was later. KCIT's selling point was that they picked up the shows that the main network affiliates preempted. (Even The Brady Bunch was preempted! What is this world coming to?!)

Now there's a bloke out there who has an entire website lamenting the loss of this short-lived station. And it's hilarious! Like where he talks about how KCIT once spliced out a climactic scene from a movie to use in a promo, then spliced it back in upside-down and backwards before they aired the film.

The best part of this guy's website is his lengthy diatribe about his heroic efforts to pick up this station. He goes on and on and on about how his parents wouldn't buy him a TV set that was capable of picking up KCIT clearly. This cranky narrative takes up most of a page. It sounds like his inability to watch KCIT ruined his whole life.

I can sympathize to some extent. I recently learned that the real reason Cincinnati radio stations banned songs over lyrics that were tolerated in other cities is that right-wing groups threatened to picket the stations' advertisers. When these songs were first banned, it led to the internalization of the notion that a song was somehow "tainted" unless it was "safe" enough not to be banned from local airwaves. Thus, anyone who listened to the few stations you could pick up locally that played these songs was made to feel like some sort of pariah. Long story short: right-wing extremism kills.

America's seemingly wide smorgasbord of TV and radio stations doesn't always foster diversity of voices. Rather, it often creates media congestion. This congestion has turned the airwaves into a specialty medium where right-wing talking points are amplified and songs are repeated too often. Dissenting voices usually can't afford to compete.

Without further ado, here's that uproarious ode to KCIT that I've been talking about...

http://www.wtv-zone.com/dpjohnson/kcit50

GOP tries to punish schools for failing to bust unions

The spirit of Hitler has come to life in Michigan lately.

Much as the Republican Congress in the '90s defunded colleges and universities that didn't adhere to unbending right-wing creed, GOP lawmakers in Michigan are now attempting to do the same. Because the University of Michigan and Wayne State University approved new labor contracts before the state's fascist "right-to-work" law takes effect, legislators are now threatening to defund these schools.

Another Republican bill would revoke funding from public school districts that approve labor contracts before the right-to-scab law goes into force.

The latest act of Republican goosestepping might not become law, because the Michigan legislature today is less Republican than it was during the Tea Party-fueled session that foisted the right-to-loaf law upon the state. What's ironic is that one of the biggest legacies of the Tea Party - which claims to be for limited government - is the passage of so-called "right-to-work" laws in 2 states. They claim to be for smaller, less intrusive government, yet they passed a law requiring union workers to subsidize nonunion labor.

That's why we call 'em fascists.

(Source: http://www.mlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/03/right_to_work_michigan_univers.html)

Tea Party leader has ties to American Fascist Party

James Ives is one of the leading lights of the far-right Tea Party in the Houston area. Now the conservative activist has some explaining to do.

It turns out that Ives - who has hosted statewide Tea Party events, contributed to right-wing radio, and cavorted with local Republican politicians - was the director of propaganda for the American Fascist Party. He regularly touted the AFP's dogma on a right-wing Internet forum, and an AFP promotional video even shows him in the party's black uniform. In one post, he said that building up the fascist movement was "our spirit, our calling."

When asked recently about his involvement in the American Fascist Party, Ives said, "It was all pro-Constitution, pro-America."

Most of the rest of the Tea Party is of course involved in not the American Fascist Party, but a fascist party in America - called the Republicans.

(Source: http://bigcountryhomepage.com/fulltext?nxd_id=580012)

Media talking heads weep for rapists

A few months ago, 2 high school football players in Steubenville, Ohio, were indicted for raping a 16-year-old girl at a party. The defendants have now been found guilty and will be incarcerated. In the months leading up to the trial, however, defenders of the rapists swaggered about town, accusing the victim of ruining the rapists' lives. The pro-rape contingent even said the crime should be overlooked because the perpetrators had such a promising future in football. School and government officials also led a cover-up of the rape in order to protect the rapists.

Occupy has been conducting protests in Steubenville against this cover-up. These rallies helped expose the rape and bring about the conviction of the defendants.

The attitudes of a city's residents are often a product of local institutions. I'm confident that most folks in Steubenville surely don't want rapists anywhere near. But the relatively small number who support the rape defendants were influenced by local organizations known for their conservative bent. In that regard, Steubenville is like many other places - where a small, arrogant contingent inspired by reactionary institutions catatonically excuses violent crimes that afflict the community.

Several nobodies at CNN seem to share the view of this small contingent. Today, one of these nobodies sniffed that it was "incredibly difficult" to watch the rapists hear the verdict "as they believed their life fell apart." Another of these CNN nonentities added, "There's always that moment of just - lives are destroyed. But in terms of what happens now, the most severe thing with these young men is being labeled as registered sex offenders."

Tough shit. Crimes have consequences. Don't do the crime if you can't do the time.

Why do the thought guardians at CNN expect us to feel sorry for 2 young criminals who raped a teenage girl? It sounds like they care more about the perpetrators than the victim.

The fact that a media outlet has so much concern for the rapists is another example of how the hard frost of rightism has dashed America's morals. But victim-blaming is not "cool" like The Media thinks it is. One of the most shameful aspects of this story is that some will insist that the defendants' conviction is a sign of "tyranny" by "the liberals." Those who say this are those who judged the victim for attending the party where she was raped - but not the football players who attended the same party.

I hope that future prospective employers will see that these thugs have a rape conviction on their records. If workers in 24 states can be fired for the "crime" of entering into a union security contract, then I sure as hell hope a person can be fired for being a rapist.

(Source: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/03/17/cnn-grieves-that-guilty-verdict-ruined-promising-lives-of-steubenville-rapists)

Cincinnati! Dayton! It's a great place to start!

Roads Scholars like me love stories like this, and you will too, provided you're a Roads Scholar and all.

Much cooing has been generated by local economic boosters claiming that Cincinnati and Dayton will merge into one lump metropolitan area because of the results of the 2010 census. Well, now the new official definitions of America's metropolitan areas have been released, and it is not to be: Cincinnati and Dayton remain separate. They're not even in the same combined statistical area (though nobody uses combined statistical areas anyway).

In the new definitions, the Cincinnati metropolitan area actually dropped Franklin County, Indiana - and gained neighboring Union County. So now there's a nice big dent in the official map of the metro. Rules are rules, and Union County apparently now has greater commuter ties to Cincinnati than Franklin County does.

It makes sense, mapfaces. Trust me on that.

Another week ruined by shingles

Keek! Ruin!

I reported last week that several days were flushed down the johnnypooper by an unspecified illness. Now I know that I've been suffering from shingles.

I started feeling sick to my stomach a couple days after I posted that, and I began experiencing a rash on the right side of my abdomen that burned like it was going out of style. Also, the high fever returned briefly. 'Twas shingles and a force to be reckoned with!

For the record, this will extend my illness log entry by a week.

Bet yer excited about that, huh?

Lawn Chair Quarterback: "Bananagate"

Tim describes how Richard Nixon always looked like he was storing bananas in his mouth...

GOP lawmakers squander taxpayer money on meals

The Kentucky Senate is heavily Republican - since it's gerrymandered like there's no tomorrow. And it shows, considering the GOP's record of waste.

Last week, the Kentucky Senate pissed away almost $1,000 in taxpayer money on expensive dinners for themselves. Each meal consisted of pork barbecue, potato salad, beverages, and of course a cookie. Had to include the cookie, didn't it?

We're paying senators to do a low-budget Cookie Monster impression instead of writing laws? You can bet your bottom dolllar Katie Stine grabbed a cookie, lurched into Chris McDaniel's face, and roared, "Coooookie!" as she shoveled the dessert into her mouth and made munching noises.

Now the ornate Kentucky Senate chamber is stained with crumbs and barbecue sauce - which will cost even more to remove.

The Kentucky GOP keeps telling state employees and other working people throughout the state to tighten their belts - but they won't lead by example. Some state workers haven't gotten a raise in 6 years!

The $1,000 spent on the Kentucky Senate's barbecue dinners seems even more exorbitant when you consider that this chamber has only 38 members. Do the math.

Don't let the party of wastage and spilled food win the Kentucky House too.

(Source: http://www.kentucky.com/2013/03/14/2557544/state-senate-orders-985-meal-at.html)

When Elaine Chao attacked workers

The only thing that stops the Republican Party of Kentucky from shriveling into a petrified husk is a friendly media that props it up and amplifies its demagoguery.

Elaine Chao - Secretary of Labor under dictator George W. Bush - is the wife of Kentucky's embattled multimillionaire Sen. Mitch McConnell. It's a fact that Chao's father James is a friend of some of mainland China's political leaders and has contracted to do business with a shipbuilding company owned by the Chinese government. McConnell has used his position in the Senate to enrich James Chao and the Chinese government, make slaves of Chinese workers, and send American jobs to China.

This information is factual. Republican apologists say it's racist to bring it up. But it isn't - as long as the story is true. I don't judge anybody based on their ethnicity. When an immigrant comes to America and works hard, great. The real story here is that a senator abuses his power to benefit his father-in-law - killing American jobs.

As an official in the corrupt Bush regime, Elaine Chao carried out an endless war against American workers. She supported union-busting and refused to endorse raising the minimum wage. She tried to erase government regulations that protected workers from repetitive motion injuries.

In 2007, Chao launched a stunning broadside against the industriousness and intelligence of American workers. She flatly claimed that American workers have poor workplace skills, and that this justifies moving jobs overseas. "American employees must be punctual, dress appropriately, and have good personal hygiene," she scolded. "They need anger management and conflict resolution skills, and they have to be able to accept direction. Too many young people bristle when a supervisor asks them to do something."

Incidentally, that cry wasn't new - but it was as bogus as ever. Our corporate masters had long complained that there was something wrong with the American workforce. Many of you have probably had a dickish boss who grumbled about your "attitude" because you wouldn't come into work on Thanksgiving every year to clean the toilets. Usually, complaints about workers' "attitude" is shorthand for a desire to subjugate. When your boss says, "I don't like your attitude," it means, "I don't like it that we can't pay people only 12 cents an hour to sort used syringes with their bare hands."

It's easy to picture well-known officials in the Bush regime telling someone, "I don't like your attitude." Authoritarian personality types are the people Bushism appealed to. If you're stunned that there were actually people out there who thought Bush was a credible politician, now you know what his base of support was. Normal people would consider Bush one of the least compelling politicians around, but the authoritarian GOP base considers his reign to be an era of shimmering national greatness (as a Daily Kos user put it).

The Department of Labor was created to protect workers. But under Elaine Chao, its only function seemed to be to scold workers, call them stupid slobs, and offshore their jobs.

Conservative dogma has failed, so diversion is now one of the Evil Empire's last tactics. They accuse their enemies of the same things they're guilty of themselves. It's a propaganda technique. Forewarned is forearmed.

Scabs on society

"One who is slack in his work is brother to one who destroys." –Proverbs 18:9

The right-wing Bowling Green Daily News gloats that it's "inevitable" that Kentucky will become a so-called "right-to-work" state. Never mind that right-to-scab laws violate not only the U.S. Constitution (which conservatives ignore) but also the National Labor Relations Act and Section 19 of the Kentucky Constitution, which bars the impairing of contracts. Never mind that passing such a law will be legislatively impossible if the upcoming redistricting conforms to laws that govern the redistricting process.

We will fight against the violence and fascism of "right-to-work" laws. I'm not afraid to die for the cause.

In workplaces that I've been in or have become at least somewhat familiar with, the laziest people were always those who supported union-busting. Strikebreakers are called scabs for a reason. Incidentally, employing people to break a strike also violates the National Labor Relations Act - but it occurs anyway. Back to my main point: I worked at the local library in the '90s. One day, the libe hired a bloke to work in my office who personified the attitude of scabs everywhere.

The man was about 65, so he was a bit older than the average worker there. Still, his somewhat advanced age didn't excuse his behavior. He had a desk job, so it's not like he was expected to lift TV's and adjust the satellite dish like I had to do. I know people who had to break their backs daily well past 60, so it's hard for me to feel bad for this guy.

This man bore an unwavering reptilian smirk as he sat at his desk. He didn't seem to do much actual work. Supervisors would give him stacks of books to process, and a day later, the same pile would still be sitting there. The only thing different would be that one of the books would have our all-important roll of lamination sheeting hanging off of it. He hadn't gotten around to cutting the sheet yet (an act that took a whole 30 seconds).

This guy would offer his right-wing commentaries just out of the clear blue. We'd all be sitting there working in the quiet office, when all of a sudden, he might say, "You know, I never did like unions." Thus would begin a speech lasting at least 10 minutes about the "corruption" of organized labor. He once treated us to a philippic about how he thought the Kennedys were communists. And one day, when some of us were lamenting the rise of the police state, he pointed to the government-mandated warning label on a bottle of Liquid Paper - as if he thought consumer protection regulations were the same as being arrested without charges by secret police spying on you at a Cheap Trick concert.

This gent's economic views indicated he was among the then-burgeoning brand of loudmouth who believed that being anything more than barely breathing was a privilege, not a right. He's like the clod who attacked me on a BBS around the same time during a discussion about proper wages for personal groundskeepers. I had a good mind to slug that guy! I wasn't even talking to him, and he started calling me a punk kid because I said minimum wage wasn't enough for a person to tend someone's lawn.

Some people understand the value of a dollar. Scabs and their apologists don't. And they can't stand that I know better than to sell myself short.

Their ignorance can't be anything but deliberate. And - just as the Book of Proverbs says - they are just like those who destroy. Right-to-scab laws are destructive.

If the Daily News gets its way and Kentucky - by some miracle - becomes a right-to-loaf state, I will either go on strike until the law is repealed or start my own business. I'll be damned if I'm going to work for less just so nonunion labor can be subsidized. That's slavery. If I own my own business, then at least I can choose to defy the right-to-scab law. If you work for me, you pay the union fees. End of discussion.

Teabagger who makes robocalls must close unlicensed "university"

Xanthi Gionis is a Tea Party candidate for California Senate who keeps making illegal, unsolicited robocalls to voters.

Gionis founded and ran something called Aristotle University. She falsely advertised it as an accredited school. It was not accredited. Now the state has ordered it closed for not having a license.

This closure follows Gionis defrauding students from all over the world. One student came all the way from Ghana and lost his entire life savings to this scam. Gionis also threatened to take away students' visas and have them deported.

This is the movement that runs the U.S. House, a significant number of state legislatures, and the bulk of the American media. The country is being controlled by scam artists and grifters who have an agenda, and don't care what the majority thinks, because this is a holy war for them.

We are at war. What will be necessary to fight back?

(Source: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/03/11/1193234/-Tea-Partier-accused-fraudster-scumbag-still-robocalling-in-CA-Senate-bid)

Great rally brings MediaFail

On Friday, I attended the rally outside Western & Southern in Cincinnati where we protested against the financial service giant's bullying of the women of the Anna Louise Inn. The event wasn't organized by Occupy, but Occupy folks were face-deep in attendance. In all, about 300 people showed up.

I'll at least give The Media credit for covering it more than they've covered any local Occupy event in months. Channel 9 was on hand, and CityBeat covered it before the fact. But I didn't see any other media there - even though the local press endlessly hyped the Tea Party's Day of Resistance garbage a couple weeks ago.

Channel 12 - called WKRC-TV by those in the know - was particularly disappointing. Channel 12 was recently taken over by the far-right Sinclair syndicate - a takeover that was rubber-stamped by the FCC, of course! It shows. I watched Channel 12's news in the hopes they'd covered the rally, but instead, here's a partial list of stories covered in that hour of news:

• Local college sports teams switching conferences. This was their top story, believe it or not.

• A run-of-the-mill high school basketball game. This too was covered within the first 12 minutes.

• A point-by-point rehashing of talking points about the federal budget sequester. This piece - which looked like it was produced by Sinclair's central propaganda ministry - repeated each right-wing lie one by one, as it absurdly denied that the sequester would contribute to the austerity-fueled recession.

• How nobody likes caffeinated chewing gum, because it tastes like shit.

• Justin Bieber's troubles.

The local media is as bad as the national media that invites Jeb Bush on every single Sunday talk show.

Message for Rand Paul

AT&T accused of threatening Kentucky lawmakers over bill

Make no mistake: We are at war.

Republicans in Kentucky have introduced a bill - written by ALEC and backed by the Tea Party - that would allow phone companies to stop offering phone service. In other words, they would be unimproved monopolies - monopolies that don't even provide the service that they've been granted a monopoly on.

Legislators who oppose the bill say they've been threatened by AT&T for their stance. AT&T has reportedly been making robocalls warning these lawmakers about the looming threat of what's called a 527 - which is in essence like a tax-exempt PAC that has no contribution limits.

This is why Kentucky needs to ignore the spuzzybuzz Citizens United ruling - and imprison anyone who attempts to enforce it. Kentucky also needs to enact its own regulations on 527's.

Instead, like always, the fart-like miasma of capitulation lingers in the air - for a "compromise" bill is in the works.

(Source: http://bluegrasspolitics.bloginky.com/2013/03/07/lawmaker-accuses-att-of-heavy-handed-tactics-to-pass-land-line-bill)