America For Purchase

Closing Gitmo Must Be A Top Priority

By Greg Sargent - TalkingPointsMemo November 12, 2008, 10:35AM A pair of must-reads this morning do a nice job of laying out one of Obama’s top transition priorities, and the huge challenges inherent in getting it done: The closing of Guantanamo Bay.First, Time magazine has a solid and detailed report explaining that there’s a serious thicket [...]

Taxpayers Will Pay for Gonzales Private Attorney

Marisa Taylor | McClatchy Newspapers 2008 | November 18, 2008 WASHINGTON — The Justice Department has agreed to pay for a private lawyer to defend former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales against allegations that he encouraged officials to inject partisan politics into the department’s hiring and firing practices.Lawyers from the Justice Department’s civil division often represent department [...]

The Subprime Good Guys

These mortgage lenders loan to poor people, strengthen communities, and are still making a profit. How do they do it? By Daniel Gross | Slate Nov. 15, 2008In recent months, conservative economists and editorialists have tried to pin the blame for the international financial mess on subprime lending and subprime borrowers. If bureaucrats and social activists [...]

Wall Street Bailout is Borderline Criminal

By Naomi Klein, This article appeared in the December 1, 2008 edition of The Nation.The more details emerge, the clearer it becomes that Washington’s handling of the Wall Street bailout is not merely incompetent. It is borderline criminal.The bailout is a parting gift to the people that George Bush once referred to jokingly as “my [...]

How Did Bush Get Away Being a War President

How Did We Ever Let This Guy Get Away with Being a War President? By Gary Brecher, eXiledOnline.com, November 17, 2008 AlterNet What George W. Bush loved best about his job was being a war president. Playing war, that is, as opposed to making war like a grown-up. Remember him strutting onto that carrier in his little [...]

Ten Autos that Sank Detroit

By Rick Newman, U.S.News & World Report, Friday November 14, 2008 The global financial crisis is suffocating the Detroit automakers, but the problems at General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler have been festering for years–even when the mighty “Big Three” were earning billions. Aging factories, inflexible unions, arrogant executives and shoddy quality have all damaged Detroit.Now, with [...]

Election Spurs Race Threats and Violence

JESSE WASHINGTON, AP National Writer Cross burnings. School children chanting “Assassinate Obama.” Black figures hung from nooses. Racial epithets scrawled on homes and cars.Incidents around the country referring to President-elect Barack Obama are dampening the postelection glow of racial progress and harmony, highlighting the stubborn racism that remains in America. From California to Maine, police have documented [...]

Dennis Kucinich Investigates Treasurys Blank Check

By Nick Baumann with MotherJones It looks like the Bush administration can create its own reality after all. Just this week Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson turned the $700 billion bailout from a program to purchase toxic assets from troubled financial institutions to one that will invest in banks.Understandably, this abrupt change of course angered members of [...]

Air Marshals Smuggle Coke and Molest Kids

Exposed: Federal Air Marshals Too Busy Smuggling Coke and Molesting Kids to Protect You By Michael Grabell, ProPublica November 14, 2008 http://www.alternet.org/story/107021/ Shawn Nguyen bragged that he could sneak anything past airport security using his top-secret clearance as a federal air marshal. And for months, he smuggled cocaine and drug money onto flights across the country, boasting [...]

Looking Back With Pride, Looking Forward With Hope

Madeleine Albright (former US Secretary of State) Sixty years ago today, a ship carrying my family sailed around the Statue of Liberty into New York harbor. Having fled first Nazism then Communism, we had finally arrived in the United States. Aside from the birth dates of my children, it was the most important day of my [...]

Sarah Palin Blamed by US Secret Service over Death Threats

Sarah Palin Blamed by US Secret Service over Obama Death Threats By Tim Shipman, The Telegraph (UK), November 11, 2008, http://www.alternet.org/story/106448 Sarah Palin’s attacks on Barack Obama’s patriotism provoked a spike in death threats against the future president, Secret Service agents revealed during the final weeks of the campaign. The Republican vice presidential candidate attracted criticism for accusing Mr. [...]

Born Gay and the Bible

The open expression of prejudice towards gays and lesbians has reached new heights in the past few decades mostly created and fostered by the Religious Right. These people in positions of power and leadership vehemently attack these groups while at the same time using their attacks to raise money by placing fear in their listeners [...]

It Is Good to have Former Senators in Charge

Commentary: Why it’s good to have former senators in charge By William H. Frist – Special to CNN Editor’s Note: William Frist, the former Republican majority leader of the U.S. Senate, is a physician. He was elected to represent Tennessee in the Senate in 1994 and served two terms before deciding not to run for re-election in [...]

Bush Gives Banks a Windfall

A quiet windfall for U.S. banks; With attention on bailout debate, Treasury made change to tax law By Amit R. Paley The Washington Post Sun., Nov. 9, 2008 The financial world was fixated on Capitol Hill as Congress battled over the Bush administration’s request for a $700 billion bailout of the banking industry. In the midst of [...]

Dear President Elect Obama

Congratulations on your recent victory. You are assuming the leadership of our nation at a challenging time, and we are sure there are many people and organizations competing for your attention. As you prepare to assume office, we would like you to consider the importance of separation of church and state. This principle, enshrined in our [...]

The Top Ten Power Brokers of the Religious Right

By Rob Boston, Church & State Magazine, November 10, 2008 For the past two years, numerous media pundits have been all abuzz over the so-called “death” of the Religious Right. There is one problem, however: Someone forgot to tell the Religious Right. A recent Americans United study of the finances and influence of the Religious Right shows [...]

The Religious Right is a Cult

The dictionary defines cult as “a system of religious worship or ritual”; “devoted attachment to, or extravagant admiration for, a person, principle, etc.” According to this definition, any believer in any god is a member of a cult. In the popular media, a cult is typically defined as a religious sect whose members are “controlled” [...]

A Dream Realized Obama and America Look Forward

People all across the U.S., and even the world, were moved by the election of Barack Obama on Tuesday. As the news honed in on Chicago’s Grant Park crowded with jubilant supports, so too were cities, towns, and even homes throughout the country. People took to the streets, they filled public spaces, and they honked [...]

Is Fox Abandoning the Mob it Created

Watching Them Squirm: Is Fox News Abandoning the Mob It Created? By Mark Ames, Alternet.org, November 7, 2008 The first polls had just closed when the Republican Right’s “Agony of Defeat” moment arrived. It was just after 8 p.m. — right as Fox’s “America’s Election HQ” show returned from a commercial break, and Brit Hume welcomed viewers [...]

Wall Street Fat Cats to Pocket Billions in Bailout Cash

By Nomi Prins, AlterNet Posted on November 7, 2008 The election results pretty much confirmed the extent to which Main Street is rightly livid about the Wall Street mentality that led to our financial crisis. During his historic victory speech, President-elect Barack Obama told supporters, and the rest of the world, “If this financial crisis taught [...]

John Boehner Get with the Program

John Boehner it is time to become a part of the solution, not a part of the problem. With the historic 2008 Presidential Election behind us, now is a great opportunity to unite this country and get it moving in the right direction. What direction? The direction the majority of Americans supported with a landslide win [...]

Change Fighting Against Something to Fighting for Something

I have always been on what some members of my family see as the ‘radical’ side of politics. Growing up in the Deep South in the 1950’s the sense of injustice was all around me as I witnessed the discrimination common during those times. I always felt an internal and innate sense of what I perceived [...]

Religious Right Fear Mongering by Lamb Lion

Lamb Lion published a fear-mongering article on November 5, 2008 in an attempt to mislead and scare Americans, under their continued guise to make Americans believe their religious right political views are the same as Christian values. Below is my personal response to yet another attack on Christians in America. Thursday, November 06, 2008 Dr. David R [...]

How the Rich Cheat on Taxes

By Janet Novack at Forbes, October 23, 2008 A new study based on unpublished Internal Revenue Service data shows the rich are different when it comes to paying taxes: They hide more of their income.The previously unreported study estimates that taxpayers whose true income was between $500,000 and $1 million a year understated their adjusted gross [...]

Obama Victory Reactions In The Media: Shock And Awe

After covering the longest campaign in American history for the past two years, it’s fitting that all anyone in the media can talk about today is Obama’s historic win. The New York Times put Obama’s win in this context, looking back at the campaign. Showing extraordinary focus and quiet certainty, Mr. Obama swept away one political presumption [...]