Do You KNow Nothing about the Teabaggers?

April 22, 2010 By Tom Hall

Tom Hall: Like today’s Teabaggers, the Know Nothings wanted their Constitutional rights, but got angry when anyone asked them to actually discuss constitutional issues and governance. And like today’s Teabaggers, the Know Nothings shouted that if their candidates just got elected, everything would be better.

La Mission

April 22, 2010 By Carl Matthes

Carl Matthes: Not to be missed is Peter Bratt’s “La Mission,” a film brimming with street and domestic violence, and laced with homophobia, search for ethnic identity and machismo. Starring the talented Benjamin Bratt, Peter’s younger brother, “La Mission” refers to the Mission District in San Francisco, the real-life, growing-up family neighborhood of the Bratt brothers.

Buy Stocks and Enter Coal Mines at Your Own Risk

April 22, 2010 By Ron Wolff

Ron Wolff: The logical question to ask is: How much is the CEO of Massey Energy Company compensated for setting the tone and establishing the philosophy that “violations are unfortunately a normal part of the mining process”? According to the New York Times , CEO Don L. Blankenship earned $11.2 million in 2008, about twice what he earned in 2006.

Gay Community Loses Black Civil Rights Ally Dorothy Height

April 22, 2010 By Rev. Irene Monroe

Rev. Irene Monroe: As president for forty years (1957- 1997) of the National Council of Negro Women (NCNW), an organization with the objective of advancing opportunities and the quality of life for African American women, their families, and communities with programs on issues like voting rights, poverty and, in later years, AIDS, Height understood that black families and communities could neither be whole nor healthy without championing gay civil rights for its LGBTQ community.

Cola Wars and the Campaign to Sell Wall Street Status Quo

April 22, 2010 By Tina Dupuy

Tina Dupuy: Health care reform is a far cry from government taking over anything. In the town halls over the summer people were upset by the idea, so with some encouragement and coaching by interest groups they came out to make that known. As the saying goes, feelings are not facts and in the health care debate the latter beat the snot out of the former. In the end we’re a sick nation that pays more than any other country for health care and we still rate low in quality of care. The bill that passed is an improvement not a cure-all and certainly not enough to trigger the end of the world or even cause an unpronounceable Icelandic volcano to erupt.

L.A. Opera Rescues Conflicted Sexuality from Obscurity and the Nazis

April 22, 2010 By Ed Rampell

Ed Rampell: The current production of The Stigmatized is the opera’s U.S. premiere and part of L.A. Opera’s “Recovered Voices” series, which, according to press notes, is “a multi-season initiative to revive the works of composers whose lives and careers were cut short by the Nazi regime.” Schreker’s saucy work, set in 16th century Genoa, was originally presented in Germany in 1918, and can be viewed as being part of the edgy postwar culture of the Weimar Republic that included sexually charged works in various cabaret acts and by playwrights such as Bertolt Brecht.

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer to Choose the Future

April 22, 2010 By Mario Solis-Marich

Mario Solis-Marich: In a single stroke of her pen Governor Brewer can set back her party even deeper into a demographic hole, transform her state into a national social pariah, and downgrade her political future to that of a speaker on the circuit forged by Tom Tancredo and Lou Dobbs. Is Brewer Tom Tancredo or is she Ronald Reagan? This week we shall find out.

Who Let the Blue Dogs Out?

April 21, 2010 By Norman Solomon

Norman Solomon: It’s one thing to support a Blue Dog Democrat in a general election against a Republican. It’s quite another thing for members of the Progressive Caucus to defend a Blue Dog Democrat against a primary challenge from a genuine progressive Democrat. In the case of the Harman-Winograd race, the best grassroots response from progressives around the country will be to strongly support the Winograd campaign between now and Election Day, June 8.

On SB 1070, Arizona Governor Says She Will Do The ‘Right Thing So That Everyone Is Treated Fairly’

April 21, 2010 By Andrea Christina Nill

Andrea Christina Nill: Since the Arizona legislature passed the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act,” a bill which will probably end up establishing the harshest set of state immigration laws in the country, Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer’s phone has been reportedly ringing off the hook with residents encouraging her to either sign or veto Senate Bill 1070. Though Brewer has refused to comment on which action she plans on taking, she did assure attendees of the Arizona Hispanic Chamber of Commerce’s Black and White Ball this Saturday that she will do what is fair.

As Progressives Predicted, Clinton Welfare Reform Law Fails Families

April 21, 2010 By Randy Shaw

Randy Shaw: After President Bill Clinton signed legislation in 1996 “ending welfare as we know it,” many highlighted this “common sense” solution and criticized progressives for opposing the bill. Soon after passage, politicians and the media said it had not caused the downsides that activists had predicted, ignoring that the law had not been fully implemented. But troubling reports soon emerged.

Time to Cut Goldman Sachs and Pals Down to Size

April 21, 2010 By Joseph Palermo

Joseph Palermo: In 13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown , Simon Johnson and James Kwak point out that in September 2008 the high-flying masters of the universe were at their weakest point and had no choice but to do whatever the government demanded of them. Never mind the supreme irony of Wall Street bankers who claimed government had no place interfering in the miracles of the market begging the government to save them, it was at that time when we should have cut them down to size.

Mechanical Morons Unite!

April 20, 2010 By Michael Sigman

Michael Sigman: I am a mechanical moron, a species to whom Larry David once gave voice when, in the opening scene of a 2009 episode of “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” he exploded with “wrap rage” after a death-struggle with the plastic shell that encased a newly gifted GPS device. The mega-humiliating payoff comes at the end of the episode, when he’s lost and desperately needs to un-package the GPS. But the box cutter he’s sure will do the trick turns out to be so hard to open that it requires a box cutter of its own.

CDP Convention Wrap-Up: On the Value of Primary Fights

April 20, 2010 By Paul Hogarth

Paul Hogarth: But with no real competition among Democrats to replace Schwarzenegger, progressives have been nervous that Brown will not excite the base. This left much of the weekend’s drama on down-ballot races, where competitive primaries meant candidates for Lieutenant Governor and State Insurance Commissioner sought the Party’s endorsement going into June 8th. And while there’s much controversy around that process, it’s a good thing for Democrats.

Poor Whites Get Confederate History Month and Coal Mine Disasters

April 20, 2010 By David A. Love

David A. Love: To invoke the Confederacy in 2010 is to throw a bone to disaffected white voters. They are bitter and angry because they can’t make ends meet, and rightly so. But their anger is misdirected. They want their country back, and hope to return to the “good ol’ days”, which was pretty horrible for minorities, women, the poor, and everyone except for rich white WASPy dudes with connections.

Where’s the Religious Left?

April 20, 2010 By Sikivu Hutchinson

Sikivu Hutchinson: Perhaps the only figure with national stature on the “religious left” who has been consistently vocal in his opposition to fundamentalist Christian orthodoxy has been Jimmy Carter. Clearly, if a comparable coalition existed on the Left the Religious Right’s moral and political influence on such issues as abortion, same sex marriage, stem cell research and intelligent design would be balanced by dissenting forces. That such a coalition does not exist underscores the bankruptcy of organized religion’s monopoly on morality and moral principle.