Dog Pile on the Rabbit!

Sorry, but I can’t resist piling on Gov. Bobby Jindal (R, Louisiana) for his Republican response speech to President Obama’s congressional address. Jindal has taken heat from just about every corner of the media; this includes Republicans as well as Democrats. The heat is justified as Jindal’s speech was full of the same old rhetoric that conservatives have been spouting for years; tax cuts good, government bad.

Jindal attempted to release the conservative hounds (Smithers, release the hounds) by tossing out a piece of red meat or as I like to call it, the other white meat; pork. Jindal’s now infamous example of unnecessary spending in the stimulus package is for volcano monitoring. It is pretty obvious that Jindal chose volcano monitoring because most of the American public is not even remotely familiar with volcanoes, so it seems like a good strategy to play on that ignorance. Well, do you know who is familiar with volcanoes, the United States Geological Survey is and they state some pretty darn good reasons to monitor volcanoes over at fivethirtyeight.com?

Now I realize that Jindal is a Rhodes Scholar and that implies that he is very intelligent, but how could he have missed the obvious correlation between hurricanes, i.e. Katrina and volcanoes when he first read the speech, assuming he did not write it. Both are natural disasters that have the potential to kill many people if they are not monitored. Here is the governor of Louisiana mocking a program to monitor natural disasters. Now, I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t smack of high intellect to me.

This is one of the great things about the Internet; in years past much of what Jindal said in his speech would have only been discussed in newspaper editorials and on talk radio, but today it is all over the internet. Millions of people are now exposed to the reality of what was really said, assuming you read the right sites such as factcheck.org.

Now that is what I call taking to the streets, digital streets that is…

And Now for Something a Little Different...

Now for something a little different; instead of a post about a self serving politician here is a positive story which reaffirms the power of taking it to the streets. The story of Rocky, the Australian cattle dog was chronicled in today’s Washington Post. Rocky went missing on January 3, 2009 while being walked by a friend of Rocky’s “daddy,” Ravi Pimplaskar. Ravi was devastated by the loss of his best friend who has been with him through six apartments, four cities, two states, three jobs, and one wife in the past seven years.

Ravi proceeded to do everything humanly possible to find Rocky by using the most powerful tool at his disposal; the power of the people. Aside from posting Rocky’s picture everywhere, Ravi created a blog titled “Help Find Rocky” in which he posted sightings replete with maps along with posts describing how he was dealing with the heartbreak.

Thirty-six days later Ravi’s efforts were rewarded when Rocky was returned to him; a little worse for wear, but for the most part healthy. Here we have a perfect example of the power that people have at their disposal. Using tools such as communication, organization, and technology much can be accomplished. Let this be a lesson; taking it to the streets can produce positive results as long as the right tactics are employed in a focused strategy.

Feinstein's Folly

Here we go again. Can any bill make it through Congress without being used by our elected officials as their own personal campaign contribution solicitation fund? Crooks and Liars posted an entry on the attempted rape of the senate's version of the stimulus bill by US Senator Diane Feinstein. Apparently, Feinstein is trying to insert an amendment into the bill to allow Internet Service Providers (ISPs) the power to "manage" network traffic in order to deter child pornography, copyright infringement, and other unlawful activity.

The IT watchdog group Public Knowledge has reported that the Motion Picture Association of America is behind Feinstein's folly. This is really about the MPAA attempting to use the legislative branch of our government to stop the financial bleeding caused by the public's streaming of illegal copies of movies and television programs over the Internet. Due to the fact that copyright infringement laws are so hard to enforce in the digital age Feinstein is willing to give ISPs the power to peek into every packet of data on the Internet because this is the only way to find illegal files. This is akin to the US Post Office opening every piece of mail looking for child pornography. How would you feel if your mail arrived already opened every day?

Just how hypocritical can Feinstein be? Here is one of the most outspoken senators against the former Bush administration and his unconstitutional programs alowing domestic spying on US citizen's telephone and email communications doing the exact same thing. Apparently, when it suits their personal needs our elected officials are willing to use the U.S. Constitution as toilet paper.

Perhaps it time we take to the streets...

Certainty? In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes.

Was Ben Franklin speaking strictly of the common man when he stated the quote above, because it's hard to believe that even in Franklin's day the elites were paying all of their taxes? That it is a privilege of the wealthy to circumvent the law without consequences is certainly not a new concept. Tom Daschle, Nancy Killefer, and Tim Geithner are the most recent poster children for the "I'm not a crook, I'm just an idiot" defense. This defense was ubiquitous within the Bush Administration; when caught doing anything extra judicial, just plead ignorance/stupidity. Imagine, a treasury secretary who is not smart enough to pay all of his taxes. If the current tax code is too complicated even for this financial whiz kid what chance do we commoners have? Are you listening IRS? I am puzzled why Geithner was given a pass, yet Daschle was run out of town on a rail. The White House suppossedly received hundreds of phone calls and emails from angry Americans about Daschle; again, why Daschle and not Geithner? Perhaps it was the disproportionate media attention to the Daschle story as compared to the Geithner story. Wake up people; if you are angry about Daschle's pilfering, check out the the tax thievery going on at the corporate level. Now that is something to take to the streets about...