January 3, 2012

Pulaski WI Marching Band "Sticking to the Union" in Rose Bowl Parade

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There once was a union maid, She never was afraid
Of goons and ginks and company finks
And the deputy sheriffs who made the raid
She went to the union hall, When a meeting it was called
And when the company boys came round
She always stood her ground

Listen to the announcers -- they have no idea what's going on, what the tune is, what statement is being made here. "They just stopped in the middle, this band, and they're gettin' down!" says the announcer. Oh yes, they're gettin' down -- to Union Maid, written by Woody Guthrie!

Oh, you can't scare me,
I'm sticking to the union
I'm sticking to the union,
I'm sticking to the union
Oh, you can't scare me,
I'm sticking to the union
I'm sticking to the union
till the day I die

The cheers as they finish the song are great. I bet there were more than a few people in the crowd who realized what had just happened. "The crowd likes them!" declares the announcer, blissfully unaware.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/01/03/1051043/-Pulaski-WI-Marching-Band-Sticking-to-the-Union-in-Rose-Bowl-Parade?via=siderec

January 3, 2012

Doth not Romney bootless kneel?

Mitt Romney ended his third of four rallies today by charging up the most spirited crowd for him all week with a verbal fusillade aimed right at President Barack Obama.

"I think president Obama wants to make us a European style welfare state, where instead of being a merit society we're an entitlement society, where government's role is to take from some and give to others," Romney told the crowd.

"What I know is if they do that, they'll substitute envy for ambition, and they'll poison the very spirit of America and keep us from being one nation under God," Romney said, leveling rhetoric at the president that he had not used before.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/27/iowa-caucus-2012-live_n_1170077.html#172_romney-obama-will-keep-us-from-being-nation-under-god-

January 3, 2012

Twitching the GOP Horses

Rick Santorum, Twitching Demagogue of the Fake Iowa
By Charles P. Pierce


Read more: http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/rick-santorum-iowa-6631492#ixzz1iPEGw1xi

POLK CITY, Iowa — So Dennis Wendle and Don Boone were hanging out together at home down around Liberty, Missouri (no kidding), and they decided that they were tired of living in a state that counted for so very little in the presidential nominating process, especially when compared to The Crucial Iowa Caucuses. So they packed themselves up for the drive north and, yesterday, they found themselves at a table in the Riesling Sun Cafe in downtown Polk City, which was jumping for nine in the morning, and waiting for the imminent arrival of Rick Santorum, whose campaign was said to be jumping as well, perhaps even as high as second place in TCIC. Dennis and Don were pretty much trapped over their breakfast, what with the fact that patrons of the Riesling Sun were outnumbered about 50-1 by journalists, camerapeople, and TV news haircuts from many lands. (Frank Luntz was haunting the ice-cream counter, possibly attempting to lie pistachio into thinking itself to be chocolate.) Don spoke, in succession, to Canadian TV, Japanese TV, German TV, and a local station from Boston.

“Hey,” Dennis said to me, showing some admirable entrepreneurial drive. “For fifty bucks, you can stand on my chair.”

Dennis is a retired TWA mechanic, and Don worked for Kansas City Power and Light for over 20 years, and also was an official in an IBEW local. They are shopping around for someone to get behind during this election year. They are not optimistic. “It’s big money and it’s big business, and it doesn’t reflect the views of working-class people like us,” Dennis said. “Corporations are not people. See what I mean? The people’s wishes. I don’t even follow Santorum, but I’ll bet, here’s what we’re gonna talk about. We’re gonna talk about the moral issues. We’re gonna talk about abortion. We’re gonna talk about all those things that are pretty much settled.

“There’s a trick in the horse industry that we learned before we had sedatives that, if you grab a horse by the lip, and squeeze it, he forgets about anything else. It’s called ‘twitching.’ That’s what they do to us. They twitch us with all that other stuff and pass over the important issues. Not gonna talk about jobs, either, because they’re not here, and they know where they went, but they’re not gonna do anything to bring them back.”..

MORE:
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/rick-santorum-iowa-6631492

January 3, 2012

Barney Frank: ‘We’re Not Perfect, But They’re Nuts’

Barney Frank Offers Lawrence O’Donnell A 2012 Democrat Slogan: ‘We’re Not Perfect, But They’re Nuts’

O’Donnell opened the segment with a montage of claims from the Republican contenders, which he described by saying, “they always say what they are going to do as if they are running for king,” in “these simple declarative sentences.” “You can blame the candidates, and you can blame the media,” Rep. Frank responded, “but one party is (also) partially responsible, and that’s the voter.” He continued to argue that “understanding how to get the government to function, knowing how to make things work, is an important qualification for the job,” but voters often didn’t want to hear about it, “in the atmosphere in which we live today and probably in which we’ve always live, in which politics is a bad word.” Often, he concluded, “the public does not want you to talk about one of the most important parts of the job.”

He then turned to the Democrats’ behavior running the country, and lamented that President Obama “was too trusting of the Republicans” given “how right-wing the Republican Party has become.” “He said he would govern in a post-partisan manner; I got post-partisan depression,” Rep. Frank quipped. Admitting that the campaign has been “very entertaining,” he concluded with a slogan suggestion for 2012 Democratic candidates: “we’re not perfect, but they’re nuts.”

MORE: http://www.mediaite.com/tv/barney-frank-offers-lawrence-odonnell-a-2012-democrat-slogan-were-not-perfect-but-theyre-nuts/

January 2, 2012

Banks are double charging people on escrow fees and calling it a "MISTAKE" when they get caught

Unreal. More blatant Wall Street criminality, this time by Wells Fargo and in the form of billions of dollars of "mistakes" that cost the average person $2,000 each but often go unnoticed by the unsuspecting consumer. This is why we need a full funded and fully staffed Consumer Financial Protection Agency, among other things . . .
......................

Despite the general “missing in action” posture of bank regulators, one office has taken a tough stance of abuses, namely, the US Bankruptcy Trustee. A New York Post story by Catherine Curan reports that the Trustee is investigating double dipping in the New York City area by Wells Fargo and GMAC (now Ally). Borrower attorneys contend this practice is common at all servicers:

***Many homeowners opt to pay part of their property taxes and homeowners insurance with their mortgage every month. The funds are then put into an escrow account and used to periodically pay the taxes and insurance.

But after falling behind on a few payments, troubled borrowers in Chapter 13 often find that their bank or mortgage servicer tries to collect twice on the escrow funds — once as part of the overall mortgage payment, and again as a separate “escrow shortage” charge.

The average double charge is about $2,000, said forensic accountant Jay Patterson of Full Disclosure in Arkansas, who sees escrow issues in half the cases he examines.

http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2012/01/more-bank-chicanery-double-charging-on-escrow-fees.html
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/sloppy_seconds_hhPMGlBggrkLMwD1BbpY2O#ixzz1iHMtSlVq
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/01/02/1050773/-OWS:-Banks-are-double-charging-people-on-escrow-fees-and-calling-it-a-mistake-when-they-get-caught?via=siderec

January 2, 2012

Woody's New Year: Change Socks, Dream Good, Wake Up and Fight

http://boingboing.net/2011/12/19/woody-guthries-new-years-r.html

January 2, 2012

Sensible thinkers - by Tom Tomorrow

January 2, 2012

Exclusive: Gordon Brown's Downing Street emails 'hacked'

Exclusive:
Gordon Brown's Downing Street emails 'hacked'
Computer crime by press may be as widespread as phone scandal

Police investigating computer hacking by private investigators commissioned by national newspapers have uncovered evidence that emails sent and received by Gordon Brown during his time as Chancellor were illegally accessed.

Mr Brown's private communications, along with emails belonging to a former Labour adviser and lobbyist, Derek Draper, have been identified by Scotland Yard's Operation Tuleta team as potentially hacked material. They are currently looking at evidence from around 20 computers which hold data revealing that hundreds of individuals may have had their private emails hacked.

The links discovered from the seized computers suggest that the email investigation could involve as many victims as those involved in the News of the World phone-hacking scandal.

The eight-strong Tuleta team is looking at the possibility that several Fleet Street titles commissioned specialist private detectives to access computers. News International said yesterday that NI has "no alleged link" to Gordon Brown and Derek Draper.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/gordon-browns-downing-street-emails-hacked-6283985.html

January 2, 2012

How much longer can the 80% hang in there with only 7% of the money?

more:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/01/02/1050385/-80-of-Americans-have-7-of-Americas-wealth!-(Sobering-poverty-in-America-video)?via=siderec

January 2, 2012

Failure To Prosecute Banking THIEVES Legitimizes The Revolutionary Worldview

The failure to hold any of these egregious thieves accountable is fraying the social contract. It legitimizes the revolutionary worldview.

Part of the decision not to prosecute them has undoubtedly been (apart from pure corruption and the difficulty and expense involved in the prosecutions) the desire not to do anything too divisive. But the fact is that not prosecuting them has led to increasing political division in this country, as groups on both the left and the right believe the system incapable of dispensing justice. That in turn leads to a revolutionary theory of change, which (each in their own characteristic way) is what binds Tea Partiers with guns at congressional rallies promising "second Amendment remedies," and Occupiers illegally shutting down ports, declaring basic city zoning laws unconstitutional, and demanding the right to pitch tents on public property for years on end if need be to accomplish undefined goals.

Don't blame the Tea Partiers or the Occupiers for this state of affairs. Blame the elected officials who have refused to the prosecute the people responsible for the economic crisis. If people thought the system was working the way it should be and prosecuting the right people, it would do a lot to pull the release on the political pressure valve.

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2011/01/failure-to-prosecute-bankers-leads-to.html