Charles Hayes: American demographics are changing the political landscape toward a more thoughtful and tolerant society. If the radical Right persists with its vitriol, their political party will soon be small enough to drown in a bathtub.
Does Romney Stand for Anything?
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Tina Dupuy: As far as Romney goes, I really don’t know who this dude is: I’ve watched dozens of speeches, read hundreds of articles and sat through 23 national debates and I can’t tell you where Romney stands on any issue.
GOP Brand Disaster, Republican Reverse-Rorschach
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Brent Budowsky: masses of voters consider GOP derision, originally directed against liberals and Democrats, to be directed at them.
Politics: It’s About Identity, Stupid
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Charles Hayes: Elections are won and lost through appeals to identity. It’s that simple and that complicated. This is why symbols and 30-second, hot-button commercials sway public opinion.
LA’s Secret Meeting Habit: Contempt and Arrogance or Just Bureaucratic Malpractice?
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Stephen Box: The open and transparent attempt to violate the Brown Act can only be attributed to contempt of the public, arrogant hubris, or complete and thorough ignorance of the law.
Empty the Tea Pot
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Charles Hayes: The progressive political agenda for 2012 has never been clearer: Empty the Tea Pot. Remove the Tea Party ideologues from office and those who cater to their whims.
Occupy LA Faces the Ultimate Opponent: A Jaded Audience
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Stephen Box: Occupy LA should be thanked for challenging the turf lawn status quo and for giving City Hall an opportunity to rethink its commitment to unsustainable landscaping.
Will Obama Ever Hold the Republicans Accountable?
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Paul Loeb: Obama has forgotten the basic lesson of negotiation — you don’t hand everything over before you start, particularly to people who have utter contempt for your values and goals.
The GOP’s Cynical Bluff
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Tina Dupuy: Their real goal is the pyrrhic victory of making the President fail because they think the GOP will rise from the country’s ashes.
So, Did Anything Unusual Happen Over Last Weekend?
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Robert Letcher: With all the violence and contempt that seemed “in the air”, it was starting to feel like some “Tucson” was bound to happen, but there wasn’t enough actionable information: no “when”, no “where”. Nor were resources available to “look into the situation”, as they had been to President Bush.
Are the People Really Seizing Power?
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Tim Gatto: Everyone who calls themselves liberal, progressive, socialist or populist should pitch in and get the corporate lackeys out of Washington and give the government back to the people who really own it. This is just a beginning. We can’t sit on our laurels and let others keep the momentum going.
Our National Epidemic of Violence
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David Swanson: If you wanted to increase violence, he writes, you would take the following steps that the United States has taken: Punish more and more people more and more harshly; ban drugs that inhibit violence and legalize and advertise those that stimulate it; use taxes and economic policies to widen disparities in wealth and income; deny the poor education; perpetuate racism; produce entertainment that glorifies violence; make lethal weapons readily available; maximize the polarization of social roles of men and women; encourage prejudice against homosexuality; use violence to punish children in school and at home; and keep unemployment sufficiently high. And why would you do that? Possibly because most victims of violence are poor, and the poor can organize in rebellion against the rich when they aren’t terrorized by crime.
The Dynamics of Disingenuous Dialog, Page 3
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Charles D. Hayes: uman history demonstrates beyond doubt that both liberals and conservatives are necessary for the common good and that veering too far in either direction is a recipe for ruin.
Right-Wing Sedition
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In 1798, during the Quasi-war with France, Congress, with President John Adams’ support, passed the Sedition Act. Outraged by attacks on her husband, Abigail Adams supported the act, which was opposed by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, among others. “Let us not establish a tyranny,” wrote an alarmed Alexander Hamilton to an ally in Congress. [...]
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Are Our Best Teachers an Endangered Species?
Mark Naison: Given the fault lines that have been revealed in our society by Hurricane Sandy, the last election, and the shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, do we really want to make our schools so impersonal and bureaucratic that the best teachers leave