Berry Craig: Somehow Noam Chomsky thinks the Tea Baggers, some of whom are putting out Palin-in-2012 bumper stickers, are ripe for leftist picking. He says Tea Baggers are just plain folks who are angry because they feel like they’ve been shafted by “the system.”

Brad Parker: Americans, behavior-modified to trust advertising, swimming in the dead pool of propaganda environmentally disguised as benign advertising and Infotainment, continue to cop to the Triangulating Fog Machine’s all sizzle no steak obfuscation. The only question left to ask, now that the confidence game is more widely known, is – will they keep buying it like a beaten dog or wake up and demand their money and government back?

Articles by Randy Shaw, Charles D. Hayes, Robert Fuller, David A. Love, Shamus Cooke, Michele Waslin, Ed Rampell, Ron Wolff, Paul Hogarth, Ira Chernus, Glyn Strong, Maria Elena Durazo, Maria Brenes, Thunder Horse, Michelle Alexander, Robert Reich, Anthony Asadullah Samad, Rev. Irene Monroe, Robin Lakoff, Andrea Nill, Norman Solomon, Nick Arguimbau, Joseph Palermo, Wendy Block, Tim Gatto, Linda Milazzo, and Berry Craig.

Robin Lakoff: Palin is a complex mix of preacherly earnestness and twangy cowgirl. She really cares about what she is saying and those she is addressing – but not in some heavy-handed do-gooder way – rather, like a cheery, natural gal. So she’s a mommy – but also a babe.

Anthony Samad: he Tea Party was no more than an attention grab. It was like a person who draws attention to themselves at the neighborhood block party by hoo-rawing. All the Tea Partiers said to the nation was, “Party over here!”

Sharon Kyle: When asked if the movement was broad enough to attract conservative democrats, Palin said, “they’re already peeking in — it’s pretty cool to see some of the Blue Dog Democrats peeking under the tent and finding out what is this movement all about and, holy geez, I’m scared if I’m not a part of this.”

Dick Price: To get elected, we understood that Obama had to take a pragmatic approach. But underneath the pragmatism, we were attracted to the compassionate world view, the deep ability to grasp complex issues, and the eloquence to voice our best hopes and dreams for the future that we saw, and see, in the man—traits that had been so woefully absent in George W. Bush fear-mongering, hate-mongering, war-mongering reign.

This week’s articles in the LA Progressive.

H. Scott Prosterman: When all is said and done, the “Peter Principle” will be known as the “Kiffin Effect” – or perhaps the “Putz Principle” -that is, people will be promoted until they reach a level of gross incompetence, if garden variety incompetence does not suffice.

Fox News is hiring Sarah Palin. Here is a poll to get your take on that news. Tell us what you think.

Gene Rothman: we progressives need to follow King’s advice and not merely listen to, but to learn from others in the world. “Compassion and non-violence help us see the enemies point of view . . . . We may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own . . . [and] may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of our brothers who are called the opposition.” Most significantly, he noted that it is the U.S. that is the “greatest purveyor of violence in the world.”

“Can we have a new Senate for Christmas,” asked blogger Joan McCarter yesterday at Daily Kos. “This one is broken.” It’s time for politicians to stop hiding behind an inaccurate, outdated and dishonest view of America. We are not conservative!

When President Barack Obama took office, many activists and organizations saw their role as mobilizing the public support necessary to enable him to implement progressive change. After Obama’s September health care speech this strategy appeared to be working, but the President has since ignored the progressive base and taken a sharp turn to the right.

Palin and other conservatives want us to ignore the fact that shrinking the government and deregulation doesn’t help the small business person and the average worker; it turns the country over to massive corporations like Exxon Mobil. That’s what Riki Ott is telling us.

Lifelong learning advocate and longtime resident of Wasilla, Alaska, Charles D. Hayes wants the world to know that not all Wasilla residents are Sarah Palin fans.

Sadly, the book only increases her appeal to that very base of the shrinking GOP while leaving moderate Republicans, independents and anyone else who actually thinks about things out in the Alaskan cold.

According to a post on Huff Po, Sarah Palin will be interviewed on the Oprah Show about her new book, “Going Rogue: An American Life”.  The  show is to be released on Nov. 17th. After …

But if Obama doesn’t weigh in forcefully and say “no” to the hush money for Big Pharma, big insurance, and the AMA, America’s middle class will get walloped. And if the walloping starts before 2012, Sarah Palin or some other right wing-nut populist will wallop Obama.

Huckabee, the silver-tongued, jovial Baptist preacher now best known for losing weight, charmed the crowd gathered in Washington over Rosh Hashanah weekend – Shanatova, en shallah to all – by dog whistling coded racist messages that wowed folks in the ballroom.

Meanwhile, to my knowledge, only one elected Republican official has called for this to stop. I guess crazy is a pre-existing condition, as Paul Krugman notes in his blog.

The questions for this survey were drawn from a presentation by Dr. Matt Hendrickson, founder of the Southern California Chapter of Physicians for National Healthcare Program, which we reported on in “A Long and Winding …

Red-Baiting and Racism: Socialism as the New Black Bogeyman. This noise is about race. It is about “othering” a President who is seen as a symbol of white dispossession: dispossession of white hegemony, white entitlement, …

The “town meetings” that are now spewing such anger reflect deepseated fears that are welling up across America during this economic crisis. Healthcare reform may ease some of these fears. But the demagogues that are manipulating those fears for political gain don’t give a hoot.

Complaining to Fox News, or even CNN about Lou Dobbs, for instance, does not always seem productive. Boycotting sponsors/advertisers seems a stronger way to protest.

Last night tempers flared during a boisterous town hall meeting on health-care reform attended by 3,000 people.
The event was organized by U.S. Rep. Adam Schiff (D- Burbank). The townhall meeting was originally to be held …

The current state of the health care “debate” illustrates, even with the election of Barack Obama and large Democratic majorities in Congress, we might have already lost the vocabulary for collective moral discourse.

No wonder even Ann Coulter — Ann Coulter! — has distanced herself from Taitz saying, in effect: “I don’t want to encourage that woman, she’s a nutjob!”

President Obama must find a way to re-frame the debate in moral terms. Hopefully, he’ll make a series of public appearances this fall culminating in a stadium-size rally where thousands of people can tell their personal health care atrocity stories

Sadly for the country, compadres of this group run amok in the nation, blocking health care reform, trying to stop card check, fighting financial industry regulation and taking stimulus money for their state in one hand while slamming it with the other. The GOP once was the Grand Old Party; now, sadly, the initials stand for Goofy Old Poops.

I can’t summon up any empathy for Michael Steele. Trying to rescue the Republican party while is sinks in a morass of scandal and historical irrelevancy is a task I wouldn’t wish on anyone.

Senate Republicans confirmed they have an odd, almost sexual, obsession with “wise Latina women” that borders on a fetish.

Each is a polarizing figure in this head-to-head Celeb smackdown. And, while one of them bewilders with shocking statements, the other shocks with bewildering statements.

Did any of the media really expect Palin would suddenly turn all serious and thoughtful and coherent, giving answers that both made sense and were introspective?

While fishing in Alaska, Sarah Palin answers accusations that she is a quitter. Palin says running for president is not off the table.

Threatened by litigation from Palin camp, AK bloggers close ranks, scoff at intimidation effort by cutting-and-running Governor…

This morning’s New York Times which reports today that Governor Sarah Palin resigned because of the rising cost of her mounting personal legal bills

In addition to learning few lessons about national politics last fall, neither, apparently did she learn a real world, life lesson: Never pick a fight with anyone who buys newsprint by the ton

Happy Independence Day, on the eve of which we’ve been reminded that we are FAR from declaring our national independence from the Sarah Palin addiction.
After watching her rambling, disjointed “W-T-F Moment” as she announced she’s …

FURTHER UPDATE: Okay, I’ve now been able to get independent information from multiple sources that all of this precedes what are said to be possible federal indictments against Palin, concerning an embezzlement scandal related to …

Some progressives and liberals may cheer at a rudderless and shrinking GOP but as a nation we should be concerned. Recent events illustrate why: The killing of Dr. George Tiller by an anti-abortion …

“You Are Now the Owner of a Brand New Car (Company)!”—John Delloro
Should Catholic Justices Recuse Themselves on Certain Cases? —Joyce Appleby
Plea Bargains in the Criminal McJustice System—David A. Love
The United States of Euphemism—William J. …

The following is an excerpt of an article I published after attending a Sarah Palin rally in Southern California where I witnessed reinvigorated anti-abortion fanatics spurred on by Palin’s inflammatory rhetoric. At that time, as …

I’m so angry I feel like concealing a loaded hand gun and walking into a national park.
No, I’m not going postal. Once President Obama signs the new credit card law, it will be legal for …

It’s hard to believe that less than five years ago George W. Bush won re-election, and the G.O.P. secured control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Since that time, the Republican Party …

Southern Republican Governors Haley Barbour of Mississippi, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, Rick Perry of Texas, and Mark Sanford of South Carolina are making noises about “refusing” federal dollars from President Barack Obama’s economic stimulus package. …

Chair Michael Steele, of Republican National Committee (RNC) fame, has announced that a first objective as newly elected leader of the GOP will be to reach out to the hip-hop community. He’s planning an “off …

The conservative Republican ideology for this first decade of the new millennium (during which they led the world into two holy wars, bankrupted a nation, and linked radical fundamentalist Christianity to governing) is boiled down …

Every Friday the LA Progressive features a comment that was particularly noteworthy. This week we are featuring a comment submitted by Stephen F. Stringham, Director of Alaska’s Bear Vieiwing Association, writing in response to Jessica …

On February 2nd, Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund launched a new campaign – Eye on Palin – to draw awareness to Alaska’s barbaric wildlife management policies. “Sarah Palin isn’t fading into the background, so neither …

I started to laugh when I heard that Michael Steele was selected as the first African American to chair the Republican National Committee. I don’t think much of the “new” Republican Party, but then again, …

At his press conference on Monday, President Barack Obama had to remind Mara Liasson of Fox News and NPR that it was the Republicans who doubled the national debt over the past eight years and …

Just when a friend of mine got ready to coin the phrase, “that is so Sarah Palin,” along comes a RepubliCANT who cannot memorize the Presidential oath of office (a job that has only been …

Remember that crazy woman in Pittsburgh who carved a backwards “B” into her own cheek and then claimed that rampaging black men had assaulted her because they saw a “McCain-Palin” bumper sticker on her car? …

Countdown, hosted by Keith Olbermann, prepared a video of it’s favorite people of 2008. Guess who made the list (hint: the photo accompanying this article won’t give you a clue)

by Charley James –
I detest the Top 10 lists sprouting up daily: Newspapers, magazines, television, cable, blogs, whatever. One acquaintance in New Mexico sent a mass e-mail to everyone in her Outlook directory asking each …

by Gene Rothman –
A new Goldilocks gauge has gripped the Guardians of Greed. Too Big to Fail (TBTF) used to be one size fits all. Big corporations would be bailed out only if they were …

by Shane Hamilton –

Apparently “Joe the Plumber,” the McCain-Palin mascot for the “real [read: white, small-town, anti-elitist] America,” did not represent the political views of the majority of voters in the 2008 presidential election. Strikingly, …

by Joel K. Goldstein –
John McCain probably lost whatever chance he had to become president on August 28, the day he invited Sarah Palin to be his running mate. In making that decision, McCain ignored …

A friend of mine who is a Republican contends the rampant criticism of Sarah Palin in the media is largely based on the fact that she is a woman. My friend also blames the John …

There can be little doubt that the biggest loser in this election was the political brand of Karl Rove and his politics of divisiveness and fear. The major policies of the Bush administration, including the …