struggle4progress
struggle4progress's JournalBusted
well the bills are all dueand the babies need shoes.
were busted
weve had a hard time
since they closed down the mines
were busted
got a cow that's gone dry
and a hen that won't lay
a big stack of bills
that gets bigger each day
tomorrow theyll haul
our belongings away.
were busted
well our friends are all leaving
this ole mining town
were busted ...
The blind fiddler
I lost my eyes in a blacksmith shop
in the year of 76
while working on a revolver
and it was out of six ...
I've been down to Knoxville
had a talk with Dr Lane
he operated on one of my eyes
but nothing could he gain
oh I'm so sad and lonely
and I am condemned to roam
well I am a blind fiddler
I'm a great long ways from home ...
Draft dodger rag
Sarah Harrison has a bad habit of misrepresenting facts:
"... Manning ... is currently serving a 35-year sentence for exposing the true nature of war ..."Um, no. Manning was sentenced for the unauthorized bulk release of approximately 730 000 restricted documents. Manning arrived in Iraq in October 2009 and was arrested in May 2010 -- a period not exceeding eight months. If, for sixteen hours a day during this eight months, Manning had done nothing but read those documents, Manning would have had to read and assess about 200 documents an hour, which is an impossibility The only conclusion is that Manning engaged in an unprincipled document dump
"Jeremy Hammond is facing a decade in a New York jail for allegedly providing journalists with documents that exposed corporate surveillance"
Um, no. Hammond was indicting for hacking. He pleaded guilty in May, at which time he also admitted his involvement in multiple additional hacks, including: the June 2011 hack of computer systems used by the Federal Bureau of Investigations Virtual Academy; the June 2011 hack of computer systems used by the Arizona Department of Public Safety, a state law enforcement agency in Arizona; the July 2011 hack of computer systems owned by Brooks-Jeffrey Marketing, Inc., a company based in Mountain Home, Arkansas, and various law enforcement-related websites; the August 2011 hack of computer systems used by Special Forces Gear, a company based in California; the August 2011 hack of computer systems used by Vanguard Defense Industries, a company based in Texas; the October 2011 hack of computer systems used by the Jefferson County, Alabama Sheriffs Office; the October 2011 hack of computer systems used by the Boston Police Patrolmens Association; and the February 2012 hack of computer systems used by the Combined Systems, Inc., a company based in Pennsylvania.
Hammond is a troubled man. He has in the past pleaded guilty to battery. In 2006, Hammond pleaded guilty and received a prison sentence for hacking activities and possession of stolen credit card information. In another case, he was convicted participating in a mob action with property damage
"Barrett Brown is indicted for reporting on unethical surveillance practices"
Um, no. Brown's first three indictments were for making an online threat, retaliating against a federal officer and conspiring to release the personal information of a U.S. government employee. Then he was indicted further for possessing stolen credit card numbers and CCVs. His third indictment was for obstruction of justice and concealing evidence
My editor Julian Assange has asylum over US threats, but the United Kingdom refuses to allow him to fully exercise this right, violating the law
Um, no. Assange jumped bail and fled to the Ecuadorian embassy to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he faced prosecution for sexual assault. The legal process for his extradition took about a year and a half, and Assange chose to jump bail, rather than to continue his appeals. There is no reason to think that United States has ever threatened him. There is no universally recognized right under international law to diplomatic asylum in an embassy. Although Ecuador is itself party to some Latin American treaties governing diplomatic asylum between the signatories, the UK does not officially recognize diplomatic asylum and is not party to any such treaty, with Ecuador or anyone else
It's a sloppy analysis. What happened is that the GOP became more and more reliant
on modern advertising tricks to ensure it would win
This began when Nixon first decided to hire professional ad-men to design his campaign. Part of the game was to target new demographics for the GOP to activate. In Nixon's case that meant an appeal to Southern racists who willingly fled the Democratic party of the once-solid South, angered by the Federal-level successes of the anti-Jim-Crow movement
Reagan kicked off his 1980 campaign with a coded bow to the racists, by traveling to Philadelphia, Mississippi, where three civil rights workers were infamously murdered in 1964, and giving a speech on "states rights" -- the old language of the Confederacy, which had later been taken up anew by the segregationists. But Reagan also began reaching out to the right wing religious fundamentalists, as a demographic that could help the GOP win
The negativism of the GOP under Gingrich's leadership also reflects an advertising technique. The ad-men do not want the potential customer happy and comfortable when the sales pitch begins, as then there is no motive to buy: what is desired, instead, is a potential customer who is somewhat anxious and unhappy, because the pitch can then be framed as "a cure for your troubles." The GOP tried harder and harder to make America jittery and nervous, rendering it more likely to buy the pitch for the GOP brand
By the time of Bush II, Rove had carried this combination of modern advertising outreach and careful bean-counting to an extreme: the GOP purchased and analyzed extraordinary amounts of detailed personal information to help them target and motivate potential GOP voters in a fine-grained way based on individual data. They also increasingly reached out to the rightwing fringes, hoping to engage them once again in politics on the GOP side. And the fringes brought with them a rhetoric that produced anxiety, which was useful for selling the GOP to the public
The old-style business Republicans were not at all innocent in this regard: independent of their social or religious beliefs, they supported and funded such outreach as part of a strategy for winning elections
The problem, of course, is that the GOP thus alienated more and more of its centrist support in the process. The party figured it could do so safely, since it seemed a net gain if they lost only one centrist for every two or three disaffected xtremists brought from the fringes into the GOP fold. But the increasing extremism of party loyalists began to fuel centrist flight. Today the GOP has much less centrist support than it once did, and the extremists are much more visible and vocal
An important thing to recognize is that the bizarre GOP coalition does not represent a natural coalition, formed by interest groups with similar material interests coming together to work for a common goal: it was deliberately and cynically forged by advertising methods, bringing together fringe groups to vote in support of the GOP. It is not a stable coalition, and as it unravels the GOP has resorted to vote-suppression to attempt to maintain control
Another important thing to recognize is that one cannot persuade ideologues, whose world-views are separated from reality: it is simply impossible to engage in meaningful dialogue with the diehards, whether they be laissez-faire anti-government libertarians, Christian dominionists, neo-Confederate racist secessionists, atheist Randian objectivists, corporate authoritarians, anti-feminists, or whatever. And the worst of the diehards will never hear anything except what they want to hear -- so they will always rationalize contradictions in statements from candidates whom they believe might hold their views. The game, as always, is in the center -- which is to say, the game consists of redefining the center, reconstructing the center, and holding the center
I myself do not particularly like the Christian rightwing. I regard the Christian rightwing as potentially dangerous, and as decidedly culpable in the deterioration of modern US politics, but it is certainly not the only player here, and in many respects it is not really in control of this process. The Christian rightwing has easy access to many butts sitting in pews, and that gives it some clout, but many of those butts are probably reachable by outsiders, if approached properly. To simply blame the Christian rightwing requires that we overlook important features of our current political pathology
Gone gone gone
No more store-bought teeth
... grandma she was deafwe had to shout and cuss
but since she got her hearing aid
she cusses back at us ...
oh the union put us wise
the union put us wise
we got ourselves a doctor
since the union put us wise
Agnes "Sis" Cunningham and husband Gordon Friesen were the founders of Broadside, the influential music journal that first published many of the most popular and enduring songs of the folk revival era, including seminal contributions from then-fledgling artists Bob Dylan and Phil Ochs. Cunningham was born in Watonga, OK, in 1909, the product of a poor farming family homesteading on the former Cheyenne-Arapaho Indian Reservation. Her father -- an avowed socialist and follower of Socialist Party of America founder Eugene Debs -- kept the family afloat through a series of natural disasters like crop failures and livestock loss, but eventually the bank foreclosed on their mortgage, forcing the Cunninghams from their home. Agnes eventually graduated from Southwestern State College in nearby Weatherford, but after four years on the job she enrolled in Commonwealth College to study radical politics; there she also began writing songs ...
http://www.allmusic.com/artist/agnes-sis-cunningham-mn0001400761/biography
How Can a Poor Man Stand Such Times and Live? (1929)
there once was a time when everything was cheapbut now prices almost puts a man to sleep
when we pay our grocery bill
we just feel like making our will
tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live?
I remember when dry goods were cheap as dirt
we could take two bits and buy a dandy shirt
now we pay three bucks or more
maybe get a shirt that another man's wore
tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live? ...
prohibition's good if it's conducted right
there's no sense in shooting a man til he shows flight
officers kill without a cause
they complain about funny laws
tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live? ...
oh it's time for every man to be awake
we pay fifty cents a pound when we ask for steak
when we get our package home
a little wad of paper with gristle and a bone
tell me how can a poor man stand such times and live? ...
Crimson Parson
... all the way up to sitting bull
they told their bloody tale
and the warpipes smoked
as they hadn't smoked
since they cut the oregon trail
indian wars
for just twelve years
scattered about the land
and the reverend colonel chivington
done it all with his little band ...
How Can I Keep From Singing
my life goes on in endless songabove earth's lamentation
I hear the real -- though far-off -- hymn
that hails the new creation ...
no storm can shake my inmost calm
while to that rock I'm clinging
since love is lord of heaven and earth
how can I keep from singing?
when tyrants tremble in their fear
and hear their death knell ringing
when friends rejoice both far and near
how can I keep from singing?
in prison cell and dungeon vile
our thoughts to them are winging
when friends by shame are undefiled
how can I keep from singing?
Profile Information
Gender: MaleCurrent location: undisclosed
Member since: Fri Feb 27, 2004, 09:28 PM
Number of posts: 118,345