Such tribunals so far have been little more than kangaroo courts.
Apparently, a 90 plus percent conviction rate isn’t good enough to stave off political disadvantage, so the cowardly way out is, as usual, the easy choice.
Gorilla says: “We are a country of laws, unless we feel like breaking them, then we’re a country of injustice!”
He, and many other Congresspersons of both parties, want a moratorium on EPA regulation of greenhouse gases.
It’s being framed as a Congress v. Executive Branch fight over prerogatives, but, like health care and financial services “reform”, it’s actually just another attempt to avoid serious policymaking that might gore a few oxen, especially those oxen who thought their Congress was already bought and paid for.
Gorilla thinks: “Another lump of coal for the EPA’s stocking!”
While the Germans themselves continue to fight non-existent inflation and beggar their neighbors via non-existent domestic consumption, the Greeks are expected to go to the wall, be shot, and like it.
Gorilla says: “There’s nothing like mercantilism to keep a good moussaka down!”
Seems the BBC reported that a lot of the money raised (up to 95%) went to buy arms in the (one of many) Horn of Africa civil wars, but concert organizer Bob Geldorf’s having none of it!
“If that percentage of money had been diverted, far more than a million people would have died,” he told The Times. “It’s possible that in one of the worst, longest-running conflicts on the continent some money was mislaid. But to suggest it was on this scale is just b******s.”
Ethiopia, Eritrea, and Somalia are really doing great, right Bob?
Yet another reason why celebrity telethons aren’t worth a bean.
If celebrities want to help a cause, then they should start by donating a big chunk of their own money, anonymously and with no thought whatever of credit.
What happens instead, in most cases of urgent need, is that the telethon’s all about them, their careers, their singles, their return to/glow in the spotlight.
Gorilla pastiches: “Alas, I bring in nothing, but I’d give it all for a chance to give it all!”
Rangel, like the late John Murtha, is one of the last dinosaurs standing.
He’s been an effective legislator in some ways, but power’s prevented him from being remembered as anything but a sleazy pol. Failing to pay income taxes, cozy real estate deals in New York and the Dominican Republic, free trips paid for by lobbyists: it’s the usual litany.
Facing a possible disaster in the fall elections, the Democrats have decided to pitch Rangel over the side.
Gorilla thinks: “If only health care reform could be passed with such alacrity!”
“This election was about hard-working Texans sending a simple, compelling message to Washington: quit spending all the money, stop trying to take over our lives and our businesses,” Governor Perry said.
Actually, the election highlights just how little Texas has benefitted from conservative rule.
According to the Center for Public Policy Priorities, looking at data for 2008 (before the recession really hit, thus the current figures are even worse):
Texas’ poverty rate is the 8th worst in the country, with 15.8 percent, or over 3.7 million Texans living in poverty in 2008 (e.g., $17,163 for a family of 3) compared to a national average of 13.2 percent. Although Texas’ poverty rate is still among the worst in the nation, it is an improvement from 2007 (16.3 percent).
A significantly higher percentage of Texas children lived in poverty in 2008. Nearly one of every four Texas kids—22.5 percent, or more than 1.4 million—lives in poverty, leaving Texas amongst the 10 worst states in the country with a rank of 8th worst. The U.S. child poverty rate is 18.2 percent. Although the child poverty rate also improved from 2007 (23.2 percent), the nearly 1.5 million Texas children living in poverty exceeds the combined child populations of Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth, and San Antonio.
Gorilla says: “Poverty remains deep in the heart of Texas!”
Of course, for a parent to admit this is only natural and healthy, but unless they have access to a doctor who’s not a complete neanderthal, it’s very difficult in this country to arrange a more merciful death for a child who is suffering.
Time for the Supreme Court, ever vigilant in supporting the right to death by firearms, to allow parents in such circumstances to unlock the gun cabinet and blast away, much quicker than having to appear before “death panels” and other canards of the right-wing nutosphere!
Gorilla says, somewhat in jest: “Our society is infantile, so why shouldn’t the Supremes encourage the right to infanticide, as part of a well-regulated parental militia?”
Shall be upheld, apparently, so long as arms are involved!
Not that this should be a surprise, the current Supreme Court is dominated by right-wing, Know Nothing ideologues who are committed to keeping this country just as backward as it possibly can be!
So, let the killing continue, let screwing the unemployed continue, let America descend to the lowest common denominators of selfishness, racism, and hatred!
