SOTU: What Was Dick Cheney Laughing About?

"It Must Have Been A Gasser..."

-2Truthy

LOL moment: We didn't tvio the SOTU address last night and yet, while watching it live, it was impossible to miss Dick Cheney, seated behind Bush, laughing -- a WHOLE LOT, and frequently -- to the point that the cameras became fixated on him and not the president, when Bush began to talk about "our gas" problems watch

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wa4xEXPKdGU&eurl=

Then, they framed an image of him that looked like, well, to be specific, a chubby infant passing too much gas. If anyone has not yet seen this footage, well, all I can say is it must have been a real gasser for all three of them to suffer through not only the speech but whatever Cheney was laughing about... But Nancy Pelosi, wearing a stylish, matching seafoam green jacket and tee and also seated behind Bush and next to Cheney, conducted herself (as always) with the utmost professionalism throughout the warmonger's one note speech: Iraq, Iraq, and then more Iraq.

How about global warming? Darfur? Stopping middle class eradication? But NOOOOOO. So the whole audience sat there like one big, soaked Christmas ham on a chafing dish, Hillary in pearls included -- and applauded in between nodding off. What a crowd, our representatives and Big Media. What a bunch. But at least Big Media caught it on camera.

Not too much Axis of Evil this time, which was refreshing. Besides, the whole world now knows that the Axis of Evil is headed by Bush & Co. and supporters, as they plunder the world in their quest for war machine profits.

We actually think the yuks were due to an earphone, that he was listening to O'Reilly or his stock broker but in any event, the leader of the free world was shamed by his vice president - and vice versa -- not that either of them would know the difference...and the tragedy to this comedic scene is that we their victims.

Thanks a lot, Red America, for voting in these thugs. Think you can get it straight in 2008?

-2Truthy

NCMR: Big Media Squatters, "Tear Down That Shantytown"

BIG MEDIA SQUATTERS: WILL DENNIS KUCINICH RUN 'EM OUTTA TOWN?

During the 1980's Ronald Reagan rule, with his eye on Berlin as he famously implored Mr. Gorbachev to "tear down that wall", the Fairness Doctrine to ensure equal opportunity of opposing viewpoints came tumbling down with it. Those were the days. The Reagan years...

If the airwaves really do belong to the people, how about collecting rent from these inner circle squatters who today, get to privatize their value as their own cash cow? While Big Media conglomerates keep buying up our airwaves and sell them back to each other, shareholders, and not the public, are the winners. Instead of the public supporting Big Media shareholders, we need take back the airwaves and collect that rent and then direct those funds to public coffers.

So why are right wing pundits slinging arrows at calls to resurrect the FAIRNESS DOCTRINE? Why does Washington insist on tilting the playing field to Big Media? Government protects Big Media and discourages smaller, innovative media outlets from developing independent local and national programming. The FCC’s pro-consolidation push has given rise to the public’s demand for reform, as presented this month by freepress.net sponsored NCMR in Memphis, TN.

Back in the days before Ronald Reagan dismantled the Fairness Doctrine, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) took seriously the commission's mandate to promote entrepreneurship in the media marketplace. But like all trickle down right wing programs devised to let the plebes eat cake and choke on it, the thirst for new media reform has generated a surge of public interest in taking back the democratic voice of America.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) was Man of the Hour, making a surprise appearance in Memphis to announce that he would be heading up a new House subcommittee which will focus on issues surrounding the Federal Communications Commission. Alrighty, then! Kucinich said in his speech that "We know the media has become the servant of a very narrow corporate agenda" and added "we are now in a position to move a progressive agenda to where it is visible." While libertarians and the right wing are crying foul over reinstating the Fairness Doctrine, insisting that multiple markets drive media and government has no business ‘interfering,’ what exactly is the role of government in the first place -- to protect the interests of the people or the interests of Big Money? Get a clue, wing nuts!

Presidential candidate Kucinich said that the committee would be holding "hearings to push media reform right at the center of Washington.” The Domestic Policy Subcommittee of the House Government Reform Committee was to be officially announced a week later in Washington, D.C., but Kucinich opted to make the news public early.

Watchdogging Big Media? In addition to media ownership, the new committee is also expected to focus on issues such as net neutrality and major telecommunications mergers, a much overdue step to return the airwaves to the people.

Memo to Big Media Squatters: We don't want you in Our Town.

-2Truthy

QUINCY ASKS CLOONEY: DO I NEED A HEADSHOT FOR MR. BOB WOODWARD?

FROM THE DESK OF QUINCY

Hi George,

It’s me, Quincy.

I hope you are easing into the New Year just fine without Max and that memories of the many happy times spent together comfort you, as you look forward to better reviews on “The Good German.”

It has been a little over a month now since I answered Mr. Bob Woodward’s job posting for the Administrative Assistant position in Washington, DC.

http://tootruthy.blogspot.com/2006/12/quincy-goes-to-washington.html

I thought I would send him a follow up letter and wanted to ask your advice:

Do you think I should include my headshot above? Or, how about the above picture of me on Halloween, riding around the driveway popping wheelies on my tricycle? I especially like this one because it demonstrates my keen athletic abilities and shows off my Photoshop skills…

But do you know what? Today, The NY Times ran a story today about Nancy Pelosi and her clothes

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/18/fashion/18pelosi.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

This made me wonder if I should just skip the whole photo thing altogether -- since it looks like people in Washington, DC still judge one another based upon appearances and I am no stranger to discrimination against domestic pets and barnyard animals. Besides, 2Truthy refuses to buy me Ferragamos because she said “Only old, faux democrat windbags like Diane Feinstein wear Fearragamos and that Ugg Boots are just fine as they create an unassuming fashion statement.”

Well, let me know what you think and best wishes on the reviews.

Your pal,

QUINCY

NCMR Memphis 2007: Keynote BILL MOYERS

 -2Truthy Meets With Bill Moyers, Memphis 2007-

NCMR Memphis, 2007: Keynote BILL MOYERS

There were plenty of 'holy shit' moments for 2Truthy this past week at the National Conference for Media Reform (NCMR), which was hosted this year at the Memphis Convention Center (1/12-1/14) and attracted over 3,000 academics, activists and media professionals from across the country to address the problems of Big Media that threaten objective reporting and freedom of the press. NCMR, sponsored by freepress.net http://www.freepress.net/, featured hundreds of combined speeches, workshops, panels and exhibitors with the primary purpose of saving the internet, stopping Big Media, and protecting public media. This week, 2Truthy will report on the speakers and workshops attended as it was utterly impossible to attend them all due to considerable overlap of so many fine speakers. Check back for reports on Phil Donahue, Juan Gonzales, Jeff Cohen, Danny Schecter, Laura Washington, Helen Thomas, Geena Davis and Jane Fonda, to name a few.

Special thanks to the folks at Freepress.net Founder, President and Board Chairman Robert McChesney, (who bears a slight resemblance to John Malkovich - only with more hair, gravitas and degrees) who explained that “the media are in a state of deep, deep crisis, and it’s universally acknowledged that the state of journalism in America has disintegrated.” For three jam packed days of morning through evening speeches and workshops, the camaraderie was kicked off the moment award winning journalist Bill Moyers addressed the conference ballroom of 3,000 with a compelling and moving keynote address that unified the audience more powerfully than a Baptist revival. To have been there to experience his galvanizing message was truly a privilege, and to have had the chance to meet and speak with him after the speech was an honor.

click here to Watch Bill Moyers.

Equal to or Better than a Stones Concert… The standing ovation and applause shook the proverbial rafters before and after – especially after -- Bill Moyers gave his keynote address. The message that the ever graceful Mr. Moyers so inspirationally conveyed about the “Plantation Media Society” ownership was that people want media to foster democracy, not squelch it and that together, we CAN make a difference in what we expect of the media by demanding more and speaking out. That the channels of “radio, TV, and cable, which were hailed as a vehicle to give voice to community and meant to serve the Life of the Mind were controlled by Jello and General Motors” illustrates a numbing picture of the “parasites in politics” that bear down to control our airwaves.
These parasites in politics and other flatworldians, like billionaire blowhard Tom Friedman who hail so-called “free trade” agreements like NAFTA and CAFTA as “inevitable and necessary” and yet never even read, are gathering foam on the exclusive beltway cocktail party circuit of insufferable mutual admiration society ass kissers who will stop at nothing to silence a free and democratic media.

To say you “had to be there” would be an understatement, because, after he delivered that speech, I don’t think there was one person in that ballroom who will ever think about the media in the same way again, in particular how much a part of it we collectively really are, by our silence, and how we have the choice to either passively sit back and allow Big Media to control what we read and think, or to stand up at both the local and national and levels and play an active role in reforming it.

Bill Moyers inspired us all to make a difference working together. By appreciating our individual and collective strengths and talents, we can utilize our local channels and networks of communication to shape our communities in a democratic way that represents everyone. Our country was built on the promise of hard work and compromise by the good character and integrity of our rich and diverse people.

But what Mr. Moyers so eloquently expressed to us all from that stage in Memphis last week was that we can together shape and restore democracy to our media once again, echoing the history that the founders of our great nation so fiercely believed that we can and will regain the power of its true voice, the voice of freedom. Our voice of America.

-2Truthy

Frosty Equates Al Gore With Condoms: An Inconvenient Meltdown

"My Name Is Frosty and I Don't Believe In Global Warming"

-Frosty Hardison

The suburban Seattle Federal Way School District this week declared a moratorium on Al Gore's critically acclaimed "An Inconvenient Truth", after an anti-sex education and pro-creationism parent complained about the film.

Frosty Hardison, a Federal Way, WA parent of seven kids in the local public school district, proclaimed this week that "Condoms don't belong in school, and neither does Al Gore. He's not a schoolteacher." Hmm. Ok, so Al's no schoolteacher. So far, Frosty has done his homework. But then, the fact checking begins to go south.

2Truthy did not make this up. Read more
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/299253_inconvenient11.html

Then Frosty continued to splain that, since he believes that the earth is 14,000 years old, "The information that's being presented is a very cockeyed view of what the truth is. ... The Bible says that in the end times everything will burn up, but that perspective isn't in the DVD."

No doubt about it. Gore's intelligent film exposes the big picture dangers of global warming and it is up to all of us as a global community to respond NOW these man made threats on our global environment

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/091906J.shtml

With more parents like Frosty, all I can say is " Break out your shovels, folks. It's going to be a bumpy plight."

For more information on how you can fight global warming, visit
http://participate.net/aninconvenienttruth

-2Truthy

Pelosi's Suggestion For The New House Uniform

Madame Speaker Nancy Pelosi and all of the members of The House of Representatives can wear the above uniform with pride. Every Day.

Whether it's an exclusive Tony Snow affair or routine press briefing, the new 2007 uniform is sure to leave heads and tails wagging.

An interview rebuttal with the ultimate steerage worthy snit, David Brooks? No problem. The 2007 new House uniform is guaranteed to embolden Democratic Congressmen, strengthening their resolve to never lose their spines again.
(Matching helmuts optional.)

-2Truthy

WRINGING IN THE NEW YEAR

"I just bought myself a Saddam Hussein t-shirt.

It's a bit tight around the neck, but it hangs well." -2Truthy

It takes real genius to create a martyr out of Saddam Hussein. That the Butcher of Baghdad had his neck wrung for crimes against humanity and later elevated to martyr status is, well, a bit of a stretch...

Read More: Saddam Hussein: From Monster to Martyr, by Patrick Cockburn

http://countercurrents.org/iraq-cockburn050107.htm

-2Truthy

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL

To All on 2Truthy's Official "You're Invited to My Party List"

http://tootruthy.blogspot.com/2006/03/youre-invited-to-my-party-list.html

Warmest Wishes for a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all of the many other heathens and pagans on the list (we all know who we are) -- I think I have everyone listed. And shame on me if I forgot to add Bill Maher, but I am a little busy.

Danielle Crittenden, who was raised as a Christian but converted to Judaism, basically says the onus of Christmas is always put on the woman of the house (to supervise the clean up, the baking, menu planning, decorations or worse, have to do it yourself), the shopping, the wrapping, and breaking out all the silver and crystal and hoping that something from Tiffany's will fall down the chimney with your name on it in with gracious note for all your trouble.

Now, I don't know if Danielle is still entitled to a little blue box during the Holidays, but the message and magic of Christmas has got to be something for everyone -- whether you're on or off the bus.

In the flurry of the festivities, Peace on Earth and Goodwill to All!

-2Truthy and Quincy

QUINCY GOES TO WASHINGTON

FROM THE DESK OF QUINCY

Dear Mr. Bob Woodward,

It's me, QUINCY.

I am responding to your advertisement in JournalismJobs.com

http://www.journalismjobs.com:80/Job_Listing.cfm?JobID=711067

for the NEW FULL-TIME ASSISTANT position.

My many superlative administrative skills include touch typing, answering multi-line phones, balancing and serving coffee on my snout, insulting offensive partisan Beltway insiders and poseurs who dress up in sheep's clothing (believe me, I can smell them a MILE away),

and in discretely keeping all other nuisance bearing SOBs at bay. My references are of the finest calibre, bar none (available upon request.)

In addition, I am fluent in four languages including French, German, Spanish and Farsi and am available to handle high-level translations between any CIA or NSA mole or terrorist as needed. I am not, however, available to start until late January as 2Truthy is taking me to the SUNDANCE Film Festival so would that still be OK?

Also, your ad did not disclose the salary or the perks...Please send all confidential inquiries to 2Truthy's email address below as I don't have my own email account yet due to my recent move. Thank you for your consideration and I look forward to hearing from you.

I can't wait to become your NEW FULL-TIME ASSISTANT!

Sincerely,

QUINCY

c/o 2Truthy at bloggrl-2truthy1@yahoo.com
Los Altos, CA

P.S. 2Truthy's husband lived down the way from you in Wheaton, IL

GEORGE CLOONEY: MY DEEPEST REGRETS

FROM THE DESK OF QUINCY

R.I.P.

MAX CLOONEY

1988-2006

HOLLYWOOD, CA

Dear George,

It is with deepest sympathy that I send my regrets over the loss of your best friend and concubine, Max. I said "concubine" because being a Pig myself, people often mistake us for "porcupines" while a concubine is someone to share your life with. I think. Anyway, it rhymes.

2Truthy's mother was born and raised in Ireland and on their horse farm, she had a pet Pig who was her best friend. His name was Seamus and he was very, very smart, sensitive and nice... only he died prematurely when he fell down the well in the middle of the night while her Father was in London on business. It was sad, and tragic. So along with my regrets, I send this heartfelt message during your difficult time of loss.

Now you feel the rain - as each of you were the shelter for each other. But soon, you will feel no cold - for each of you will be warmth for each other in timeless, splendid memories of days gone by...for Max has passed to his eternal dwelling place to enter a new rout in finding everlasting peace. You gave him companionship, and he gave you joy; and for this, may he rest in peace with and may you find comfort in a lifetime of lasting memories.

To quote the immortal words of the late George Sand:

THERE IS ONLY ONE HAPPINESS IN LIFE;
TO LOVE AND BE LOVED.


But what I would really like to know is, which one of your friends ran over Max in 2001? Was it Matt? or Brad?? Or your old girlfriend? Were they intoxicated?

Well, whoever it was, I hope they sent Max a big BOWL of truffles and massaged his belly on a regular basis and took him for long strolls along the beach after that because, I too George, am no stranger to trauma. The whole reason I was adopted and now live with 2Truthy is because my parents were addicted to internet gambling and neglected me by forgetting to feed me on a regular basis. This caused me to develop a serious gastrointestinal problem, exacerbated by binge eating and night sweats.

Anyway, if you are ever in SF and just want to talk, you can always count on me.

Your new friend,

Quincy

Mary Matalin's Libby Defense Fund

Give to the Libby Defense Fund

In a recent HuffPo post, a letter to the public from Mary Matalin requesting funds to bail out Scooter Libby was posted (letter and complete thread below, which includes 3 separate comments on different pages from Yours truly...)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2006/11/20/mary-matalin-solicits-mon_n_34545.html?p=2

2Truthy had an important birthday celebration that day - her own -- to dash off to and declined to donate for reasons explained in the above thread. Although 2Truthy does her rank best to support worthy causes, what exactly does it take to open the golden ropes?

As described on the Libby Defense Fund website:

"Scooter Libby - White House adviser, mystery novelist, and neoconservative hack is one of the most traitorous men pulling the strings behind the scenes in the Bush administration. Libby, who's held more titles than a small town Library, served mostly, until his resignation, as vice presidential chief of staff. He's been called Dick Cheney's Dick Cheney - a strange little man managing just about every detail of Cheney's professional life and career since he was hired."

Mind you, the Bush Administration has performed extraordinarily well for those in the one percent income tax bracket, who have delighted in decreased personal and corporate taxes which, most assuredly, provide plenty of disposable income to make necessary 'home' beautification projects

http://tootruthy.blogspot.com/2006/05/2truthys-take-on-mary-matalins.html

imperative to keep up with the Jones'. Most notable is Ms. Matalin's gesture to solicit funds from the Plebes because giving to charity not only provides intangible gratification but it also offers a write off. The only problem here is, guilt by association. Perhaps it is time for Mary to find a pro-American cause celebre.

As the Libby Defense Fund solicits

http://www.libbydefensefund.com/index.htm

"We hope you will join us in supporting this effort to Defend America from Scooter Libby, and we'll be adding more worthy causes to donate to in the days and weeks ahead."

-2Truthy

Not Enough Chiefs

Too Many Indians and Not Enough Chiefs

Snake oil? Cooking oil?? Who cares anymore about the neighborhood?

Makes no difference when greedy and hubris driven CEO's get rid of America's educated, upwardly mobile, white collar professional middle class executives, computer scientists and physicians in favor of an overloaded, unskilled and cheap labor force. As our quality of goods and services plummet, the dollar tanks and the country faces bankruptcy, CEO's and Beltway insiders fatten up their stock portfolios while America turns into the third world quagmire it's becoming...with an overabundance of cheap, foreign labor, CEO's and their political operatives fashion themselves as the new lords and cultural rock stars of public policy...all this without public and social policy oversight! Today's Mercury News includes a hideous, major promotions piece for outsourcing giant, Wipro

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/special_packages/india/16154761.

htm

** Note to Evanston: Online articles don't tend to stick around long **

Like all MSM rags, this San Jose Mercury News piece is nothing more than a press release for Wipro and has nothing whatsoever to do with journalism -- let alone "investigative" journalism. This press release was written by an employee of the Mercury News whose job is to sell whoever and whatever will keep himself in a job as approved by his corporate welfare sponsored management (formerly Knight-Ridder.) Newspapers these days have morphed into corporate welfare sponsored PR outlets...and they expect the Plebes to actually PAY to subscribe to this propaganda masquerading as "reporting"? Never mind the "investigative" part! Fair and balanced? The great myth in America is that we need millions of imported workers to replace the jobs that educated white collar Americans now hold or have held. Why? For corporate profit. For every American professional, most with advanced degrees, corporations replace each one with 2-6 foreign workers, many with unverifiable educations and weak or non-existent English skills, who will work for a fraction of the compensation.

Six years ago, when I saw a news photo of Hillary Clinton posing in a Wipro tee-shirt with the cooking oil salesman turned CEO of Wipro, (a billionaire Indian whose outsourcing company is complicit in eradicating the educated American middle class) in New York City, I knew something was really wrong - not only with Wipro, but with Hillary -- and her handlers or 'consultants' as the nation anticipates her announcement to run in 2008. Needless to say, she is a consummate supporter of corporate welfare policies.

Who is minding the chicken coop? Where is the oversight? Tom Friedeman and his billionairre friends and the David Brooks wannabe crowd are laughting all the way to the bank with the caste system this great myth is creating in America.

There is nothing wrong with a company hiring verifiably educated and highly skilled immigrants who are experienced for a job, when needed. But to first fire millions of educated Americans with advanced degrees in favor of the wholesale hiring of many millions of dubious, underskilled workers who can barely speak English and are less educated than our citizens is treasonous.

There exists absolutely no oversight within corporations as millions of middle class Americans continue to lose their job prospects, health insurance and pensions. In addition, the media suggests that our schools are at fault, citing America's failed public school system as the culprit, insisting that the only way to remedy this mythical problem is to lift H1B visa caps and allow unlimited millions of students from India to attend our competitive colleges. In the same way that the media downplayed global warming over the past 35 years due to their corporate owned bosses, the myths and lies that are spun on a daily basis by our political and corporate "leaders" are destoying our country.

Why? All for plummeting wages and eradicating middle class, educated Americans. America's corporations have very few, if any "chiefs" who care about product quality or people. It is a club of smug sycophants, continuously looking over their shoulders to see how the other guy is driving down wages and how fast they can race them to the bottom who use the 'Great Education Myth' as a smokescreen to deflect attention from their greedy agenda which is bolstered by harmful so-called trade agreements like NAFTA. After all, a mutual admiration society that insists on elite status is only capable of accomodating a finite group of individuals.

American corporations need CEO's with integrity and foresight who know that building strong and enduring companies starts first with valuing fellow Americans who pay taxes and support our educational system. We need a fair and balanced set of immigration and employment policies that put America first. As educated Americans, we deserve to reap the economic rewards of our hard work and politicians who stand up for what is right. Unless the Plebes wake up and say "no more" to the shameless "corporate elite" and Beltway insiders who are working day and night to sell us out by pushing corporate welfare shills as presidential candidates, we can consider ourselves complicit in this race to the bottom and downfall of our civilization.

No Hillary, No Biden, No Barack; Or Gore, who all uphold the corporate welfare machine.

-2Truthy

2Truthy's GORE 2008 TEE SHIRT

GET EM' WHILE THEY'RE HOT!

(Frank Zappa, back and Al Gore, front)

-AL GORE 2008-

"Give me, your dirty love...like some tacky little pamphlet in your Daddy's bottom drawer...Give me, your dirty love..." - Frank Zappa

Tipper would loooooove this one, hey? The shirt's design has Al Gore (above, right) in a provocative pose and the legendary musician and master of lyrics himself, Frank Zappa, (above, left) ALSO in a provocative pose. Who says that racy pics for a political race can't be R rated? Or X rated?

We'll have to check in with Tipper on this one.

Dirty Love

by Frank Zappa

Give me
Your dirty love
Like you might surrender
To some dragon in your dreams
Give me
Your dirty love
Like a pink donation
To the dragon in your dreams
I don't need your sweet devotion
An' I don't want your cheap emotion
Whip me up some dragon lotion
For your dirty love
Your dirty love
Give me
Your dirty love
Like some tacky little pamphlet
In your daddy's bottom drawer
Give me
Your dirty love
I don't believe you never seen
His book before
I don't need no consolation
I don't want your reservation
I only got one destination
An' that's your dirty love
Your dirty love
Give me
Your dirty love
Just like your mama
Make her fuzzy poodle do
(Oh, Frenchie . . . )
Give me
Your dirty love
The way your mama
Make that nasty poodle chew
I'll ignore your cheap aroma
And your little-bo-peep diploma
I'll just put you in a coma
With some dirty love
Some dirty love
That dirty love
That dirty love
THE POODLE BITES!
(Come on, Frenchie)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Snap it!)
THE POODLE BITES!
(Come on, Frenchie)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Snap it!)
THE POODLE BITES!
(Come on, Frenchie)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Snap it!)
THE POODLE BITES!
(Come on, Frenchie)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Not a speck of cereal!)
THE POODLE BITES!
(Come on, Frenchie)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Nothing but the best for my dog!)
THE POODLE BITES!
(Come on, Frenchie)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Come on!)
THE POODLE BITES!
(Come on, Frenchie)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Little paws sticking up!)
THE POODLE BITES!
(Little curly hairs!)
THE POODLE CHEWS IT!
(Little curly hairs!)*

*DISCLAIMER: This is NOT an official 2Truthy presidential endorsement for Al Gore - or Frank Zappa - in 2008.

-2Truthy

Lou Dobbs to Corporate America: Get a Conscience!

"What we all need to be about now is honesty and forthrightness. And the truth is, our political, business and media elites have abandoned the cornerstone of this great nation: equality of rights, equality of economic opportunity and equality of educational opportunity." -Lou Dobbs


Listen up Larry Ellison. And John Doerr, Vinod Khosla and T.J. Rogers. Oh - did I neglect to mention the granddaddy of them all, Bill Gates? Throw in the phantom, hyper-sycophant CEO of Nozpix.com and anyone else I left out in this circle jerk of Silicon Valley's corporate values driven "establishment" friends of outsourcing, hell-bent on ridding the country of educated white collar Americans. It is feared that the Cornyn-Shadegg "SKIL BILL" (co-authored by George Allen) which is a trojan horse crafted to unemploy American high technology professionals will be approved in the lame duck sessions.

Some scoundrels in Washington are plotting to dump foreign workers on the American tech labor market by flooding the labor pool with underpaid, dubiously "skilled" workers from India to take away our professional jobs and further drive down wages.

Watch Lou Dobbs http://www.forthecause.us/ftc-video-CNN-MoreCheapLabor_061110.wmv

The "Skill Bill", if passed, would result in American professionals destroyed by the Congress that is supposed to be protecting their constitutional liberty interest in working in their chosen profession. The "Skil Bill" and the outsourcing machine behind it (courtesy TechNet) ensures that THERE IS NO REQUIREMENT TO GIVE PREFERENCE TO EDUCATED, AMERICAN WHITE COLLAR PROFESSIONALS.

U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, Jr. (D-NJ-8), last year announced introduction of H.R. 4378, the “Defend the American Dream Act of 2005" to address the flawed H-1B visa program.
Pascrell's reform act addresses the key problem with corporate America's lust for cheap foreign workers.
“In report after report, government investigators have found serious weaknesses and failings in the H-1B program,” IEEE-USA President Gerard A. Alphonse said. The program is used to "fill any job at almost any wage, and the vast majority of employers are not required to recruit American workers first." The IEEE-USA has applauded Rep. Pascrell for drafting a bill that seeks to reform the number one problem of the outsourcing movement: destroying the middle class. See

http://www.pascrell.house.gov/issues2.cfm?id=11398

Read more Professor Norm Matloff http://heather.cs.ucdavis.edu/Archive/SKILAct.txt

Here's the Memo to Larry Ellison et al: Like the fast food junkies your companies have become, your hiring binges of plenty of cheap hardly skilled foreign workers bring comfort to you because there are so many of them and they cost so little. Like a fast food container brimming full of overcooked french fries, you prefer them to a smaller portion of high quality restaurant fries that cost more becauase you feel you are getting such a good deal when you get more of them... Instead, you are making your companies unhealthy with poor quality products and choking the middle class at the same time. Ready to clean up your corporate hiring practices diet and do something good for the heart of your companies and America yet?

There is a simple solution to this manufactued problem by Corporate America: HIRE AMERICANS FIRST, and forget about your bogus claims that educated Americans with advanced degrees from leading U.S. Universities are "unskilled." You unpatriotic traitors. Get your overpaid HR busybodies to form a line that places Americans in the front and THEN determine how many positions are actually left to be filled. You may have less fries, but the ones you will have will taste sooo good and more than satiate your quality production needs. Stop ordering the burnt fries just because you get more of them.

Kill the "Skil" Bill.

-2Truthy

Kill The "Skil Bill"

InfoWorld Tech Watch InfoWorld Programmers Guild fears lame duck Congress will pass the Skil Bill November 10, 2006 10:03 AM By Ephraim Schwartz
(click above)

Silicon Valley's hostile maneuver to unemploy America's educated white collar professionals by ramming through the hushed "Skil Bill" (yes, you read that right: SKIL, with only one "L") or sometimes referred to as the "Skill Act 2006" during this lame duck session (co-sponsored by George Allen) would be a dream come true for Corporate America. Why does Corporate America hate educated American professionals?

What exactly is driving this disastrous race to the bottom and precisely what are Americans doing about it?
-2Truthy

Mary Matalin Calls Election ‘Last Gasp of Liberals’

Mary Matalin Calls Election ‘Last Gasp of Liberals’

(click above)

Every picture tells a story, and at the end, a story tells everyone listening what the listener wants to hear.

-2Truthy

Corporate Welfare Workers Anonymous

"To spin, perchance to scheme." -William Shakespeare's ghost as he spins in his grave over Beltway greed.

Corporate Welfare Workers Anonymous

Anyone know the name of Jimmy Crack Carville's 'public relations' consulting company? Is it Corporate Welfare Workers Anonymous? Enough talk about looking for integrity in all the wrong places.

There's big money in the quaint yet adddictive cottage industry known as corporate welfare, funded exclusively by middle class tax payers. You know -- the same cash that you and I pay out to uncle Sam each year. November's midterm election delivered to Democrats the House and Senate and yet, somehow, the Democrats (you know, that faux republican lite group whose names here shall remain anonymous for now) are taking swings at the very core of the party that made it happen.

Back in 2003, Rahm Emanuel made a pledge to "stop rewarding low ethics with high returns" http://www.house.gov/apps/list/press/il05_emanuel/Coporate_welfare.html

And look how so very FAR we have come over the past three years

http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?itemid=21656

And just this week, insider beltway Democratic consultant, James Carville, got in front of a news camera and told us all how he thinks Howard Dean - who was responsible for the success of mobilizing the party -- should now step down as DNC Chair in favor for Harold Ford!

To the average Democrat on a dirt farm in Iowa, it would have to appear that Carville must be developing a mighty relationship with his CRACK pipe when he suggested that Dean be replaced as head the DNC in favor of Ford.

Thanks alot, Howard. See ya'll maybe at a tractor pull down in Bristol, VA next time you're in town lookin' for work!

It is remotely quite possible that Dean's anti-corporate welfare stance would pose a threat to his M.O. and no doubt to his stock portfolio? If this is the case, the spinning and desperate self promotion has only just begun.

Aw Shucks....if only these two could possibly change horses and use what influence together they have to work for progressive, meaningful change that would positively affect the lives of over 50 million Americans without health insurance and jobs? That they (together with wife, Mary Matalin) could work to halt the erosion of the middle class through using their collective insider 'consulting' influence and contacts to work for socially responsible employment, trade, and healthcare legislation with teeth?

How noble that cause would be. A cause, indeed, reserved only for the truly noble.
-2Truthy

Tech leaders, immigrants want change / Drive to let companies hire more foreign-born workers

Tech leaders, immigrants want change / Drive to let companies hire more foreign-born workers

They're at it again... Those gluttonous captains of industry otherwise known as the National Venture Capital Association who are responsible for the erosion of quality high technology products and services as they attempt to ram through the "Skill Bill" during this lame-duck session as a seperate measure to eliminate jobs for native born Americans with advanced degrees in favor of cheap and hardly skilled foreign labor. Drive down wages some more? No problem. More bucks for the venture capitalists with a few more to go around to the "friends" of high tech...possibly including the newly elected Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi?

-2Truthy

Breakfast of Champions

Blue Wednesday

Today is a sad day for California. And Connecticut. And anywhere else in the country where voters had the chance to vote out corrupt and arrogant corporate welfare candidates in favor of candidates with integrity and progressive values.

Like Kurt Vonnegut said when he wrote Breakfast of Champions, I am more mystified and enraged by the "idiot decisions made by my countrymen" than ever before.

It is sad for the citizens of California because it highlights the problem with America: an epidemic of hubris and delusion. What is most troublesome, is that Californians proved that they would rather vote for a dishonest, huckster of an actor to "play governor" than for an experienced politician and man of conviction and principle, Phil Angelides; for it is so "old school" and boring to care about integrity and principle when you can close your eyes and imagine you are on a par with George Clooney, Brad Pitt or Steven Spielberg (Gropinator supporters who say they are Democrats) and shrug off what it means to vote with your conscience. And yes, like Howard Dean says, there IS a difference between Democrats and Republicans -- no matter how much triangulating at times occurs. These shameless entertainment sycophants and the scores of lemming voters that followed their lead are the soulless clang of the gong today that represents the deterioration of our culture and modern civilization.

During breakfast this morning while I read the midterm election results, thoughts of Kilgore Trout (the fictitious, unknown "Breakfast of Champions" science fiction writer) came to mind. The Kurt Vonnegut story contrasts Trout's unknown status to that of the well-known and well-off Pontiac dealer, Dwayne Hoover.

My attention has been focused on California's gubernatorial race and my support for Phil Angelides, where as the polls predicted and most unfortunately, a "fabulously well-to-do" former bodybuilder and Hollywood action 'movie star' won. Like the Pontiac dealer, Dwayne Hoover, whose appearance on the outside molds neatly to the status quo, Arnold won by a landslide not by any measure of personal character or integrity but precisely the opposite. Sadly, voters elected Schwarzenegger because they want to identify with figures larger and louder than themselves which in turn ratifies their own deficient existences.

When Kurt Vonnegut wrote Breakfast of Champions, he said the following about his motivation:

"As I approached my fiftieth birthday, I had become more and more enraged and mystified by the idiot decisions made by my countrymen. And then I had come suddenly to pity them, for I understood how innocent and natural it was for them to behave so abominably, and with such abominable results: They were doing their best to live like people invented instory books. This was the reason Americans shot each other so often: It was a convenient literary device for ending short stories and books. Why were so many Americans treated by their government as though their lives were as disposable as paper facial tissues? Because that was the way authors customarily treated bit-part players in their made-up tales. And so on. Once I understood what was making America such a dangerous, unhappy nation of people who had nothing to do withreal life, I resolved to shun storytelling. I would write about life. Every person would be exactly as important as any other. All facts would also be given equal weightiness. Nothing would be left out. Let others bring order to chaos. Iwould bring chaos to order, instead, which I think I have done. If all writers would do that, then perhaps citizens not in the literary trades will understand that there is no order in the world around us, that we must adapt ourselves tothe requirements of chaos instead. It is hard to adapt to chaos, but it can be done. I am living proof of that: It can be done."
-Kurt Vonnegut

Many have said that Angelides did not get his message out or that his message was not clear. That's bullshit. The bloc of voters that he needed to carry him were the faux democrat sell outs. You can't fix stupid and apparently, you can't fix greed.

No doubt he did not have the huge special interest war chest like the Gropinator but greed and hubris are the problem. Californians proved that they are by and large a hubris addled lot and are deluded. Today while the pigs at the trough celebrate, it is an embarrassing day for intelligent and decent citizens who care about our society enough to want to make a difference; albeit a day that has served to mobilize the country for 2008.
-2Truthy

You're a MEAN Man!

"Don't treat others the way you don't want to be treated" -Confucius

Now, it's one thing to have a monkey on your back...it's quite another to have two on your head -- let alone in this unquestionably uncompromising position.

So who is this guy and what are these two monkeys trying to prove? 21st Century new tatoo idea? Who are these monkeys?

Answer: The guy is the middle class and the two monkeys are Mr. Republican and Mr. Faux Democrat-Corporate Welfare. Can you tell them apart?

Yesterday afternoon, while walking out of the local post office, (which has an unintuitive, haphazard one way only enter and exit parking lot), a bully of a manly-man driving an oversized SUV with an American Flag sticker on the windshield honked and shouted at a young woman who had entered the parking lot the wrong way. As the petite young woman got out of her car holding an infant in one arm and the hand of a toddler in the other, this angry yet oddly arrogant man actually drove back into the parking lot and shouted "you stupid ***** who do you think you are/where did you learn to drive?" The young woman looked up at him, and, after a beat, in a faint southern Tenessee accent loudly shouted back "You're a MEAN man!" and the guy drove off.

Visibly upset and shaking, the young woman turned to me and told me that she and her husband had just moved here from Nashville last week and how this was her first trip to the post office. As I told her she was great in telling the guy off - particularly with such remarkable strength -- she walked toward the doors with her two children clinging to her and said to me "And today is my birthday!"

This Tuesday, on November 7, Americans get to vote for candidates who best represent the values (hey, how about civility!) and convictions (how about a candidate who does NOT support corporate welfare policies or a bully like Ahnuld who insults and gropes people!) that we believe will make our lives and society better at both the local and national level. Here in California, let's get these bully Republicans and faux Democrat monkeys off our backs and vote for Phil Angelides!

"What the superior man seeks is in himself. What the mean man seeks is in others"-Confucius

-2Truthy