48 Minutes Well Spent

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Due to what appears to be an overloaded comment thread on C&L concerning the debate on Telecom Immunity comments may be placed here if you like.

FIRED UP!!!

Part 2

The "Argument" Against Dennis Kucinich

I don't usually post comments I have made on other sites, but after reading and responding to the following comment I felt it might be helpful if more people were aware of Dennis Kucinich's record.

"5 zozie Says:

Love the Glassbooth.

Good questions and not to long. I am 90% Kucinich - I would support him if he didn’t seem to be more of a dilletante than a serious candidate."


Is this what people really think?

Here is my response:

"6 xoites defends Constitution Says:

zozie @ 5:

Love the Glassbooth.

Good questions and not to long. I am 90% Kucinich - I would support him if he didn’t seem to be more of a dilletante than a serious candidate.

Let’s explore this statement a little closer, shall we?

dil·et·tante /ˈdɪlɪˌtɑnt, ˌdɪlɪˈtɑnt, -ˈtɑnteɪ, -ˈtænti/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[dil-i-tahnt, dil-i-tahnt, -tahn-tey, -tan-tee] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation noun, plural -tantes, -tan·ti /-ˈtɑnti/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[-tahn-tee] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation, adjective
–noun 1. a person who takes up an art, activity, or subject merely for amusement, esp. in a desultory or superficial way; dabbler.
2. a lover of an art or science, esp. of a fine art.
–adjective 3. of or pertaining to dilettantes.

——————————————————————————–

[Origin: 1725–35; < It, n. use of prp. of dilettare

“Having been elected to Cleveland’s City Council at age 23, Dennis J. Kucinich was well-known to Cleveland residents when they chose him as their mayor in 1977 at the age of 31. At the time, Kucinich was the youngest person ever elected to lead a major American city.

In 1978, Cleveland’s banks demanded that he sell the city’s 70 year-old municipally-owned electric system to its private competitor (in which the banks had a financial interest) as a precondition of extending credit to city government.

When Mayor Kucinich refused to sell Muny Light, the banks took the unprecedented step of refusing to roll over the city’s debt, as is customary. Instead, they pushed the city into default. It turned out the banks were thoroughly interlocked with the private utility, CEI, which would have acquired monopoly status by taking over Muny Light. Five of the six banks held almost 1.8 million shares of CEI stock; of the 11 directors of CEI, eight were also directors of four of the six banks involved.

By holding to his promise and putting principle above politics, Kucinich lost his re-election bid and his political career was temporarily derailed. But today, Kucinich stands vindicated for having confronted the Enron of his day, and for saving the municipal power company. “There is little debate,” wrote Cleveland Magazine in May 1996, “over the value of Muny Light today. Now Cleveland Public Power, it is a proven asset to the city that between 1985 and 1995 saved its customers $195,148,520 over what they would have paid CEI.” He also preserved hundreds of union jobs.

In addition to being Mayor of Cleveland, Kucinich has served on the Cleveland City Council (1970-75, 1981-82); served as the Clerk of Courts for the Cleveland Municipal Court (1976-77); been an Ohio State Senator (1994-96); and in November 2004, was elected to his fifth term as a Member of the United States House of Representatives (1997-present).

Kucinich was born in Cleveland, Ohio on October 8, 1946. He is the eldest of 7 children of Frank and Virginia Kucinich. He and his family lived in twenty-one places by the time Kucinich was 17 years old. Kucinich graduated with a Bachelor of Arts and a Masters in Speech Communications from Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio in 1974.

Kucinich has held many jobs outside of politics including being a hospital orderly, newspaper copy boy, teacher, consultant, television analyst and author.

Since being elected to Congress in 1996, Kucinich has been a tireless advocate for worker rights, civil rights and human rights.

In Congress, Kucinich has authored and co-sponsored legislation to create a national health care system, preserve Social Security, lower the costs of prescription drugs, provide economic development through infrastructure improvements, abolish the death penalty, provide universal prekindergarten to all 3, 4, and 5 year olds, create a Department of Peace, regulate genetically engineered foods, repeal the USA PATRIOT Act, and provide tax relief to working class families.

Kucinich has been honored by Public Citizen, the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth and the League of Conservation Voters as a champion of clean air, clean water and an unspoiled earth. Kucinich has twice been an official United States delegate to the United Nations Convention on Climate Change (1998, 2004) and attend the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, South Africa.

In his district, Kucinich has been recognized by the Greater Cleveland AFL-CIO as a tireless advocate for the social and economic interests of his community.

Kucinich led the effort to save Cleveland’s 90 year-old steel industry and the thousands of jobs and retiree benefits it provides. While hundreds of community hospitals have been closed throughout the country, Kucinich led a community-based effort to reopened two Cleveland neighborhood hospitals.

Kucinich worked with the nation’s largest railroads to create a merger agreement that improved rail safety while diverting a heavy volume of train traffic away from heavily populated residential areas of his district.

In Cleveland, Kucinich has been honored by the Cleveland AFL-CIO, the Ohio PTA, the NASA Glenn Research Center, the Salvation Army, the United States Post Office, the Department of Veterans Affairs, Ohio Department of Jobs and Family Services, Ohio’s Boys Town, and the Human Rights Campaign.

Kucinich is a current member of The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts of the United States (IATSE), an AFL-CIO affiliated union.”

Ok, now that we know Dennis is not a dilettante i guess we can go ahead and vote for him."



I would like to thank Manila Ryce of the Largest Minority for the video link.

Bring The Magic Back To The White House!

Bill Moyers Goes After the Media

August 6, 2007: We Will Never Forget

A video you may never forget.
At least I hope not.

This video is by John Harrison.

Our New Poll Is Up!

Please take a moment to vote!

You will find it in the right hand column.

Troops Tell MoveOn They Support Their Ad

Dear MoveOn member,

Yesterday, an amazing thing happened. After the Senate's shameful vote, and after President Bush called MoveOn "disgusting,"1 our email started to fill up with messages like this one:

I'm currently in Iraq. I do not agree with this war, and if I did support this war, it would not matter. You have the RIGHT to speak the truth. We KNOW that you support us. Thank you for speaking out for being our voice. We do not have a voice. We are overshooted by those who say that we soldiers do not support organizations like MoveOn. WE DO.

YOU ARE OUR voice.

And then came the donations. By midnight, over 12,000 people had donated $500,000—more than we've raised any day this year—for our new ad calling out the Republicans who blocked adequate rest for troops headed back to Iraq.

The message from MoveOn members was loud and clear: Don't back down. Take the fight back to the issues that matter.

So today we're shooting for a very ambitious goal: Reach $1 million so we can dramatically expand the campaign we launched yesterday going after politicians who support this awful war. Can you chip in $25 toward our goal?

https://pol.moveon.org/donate/mcconnell.html?id=11275-7646360-tS0h8G&t=2
All day, messages from vets and military family members kept pouring into our email, many of them aimed at the Senate:

I have given a son to this country. My brother, my father, my uncle have all served honorably and bravely. I am a loyal American. I am outraged and sick to death of the tactics this administration uses to try to silence dissent to a war that is unjust, built and maintained on lies, political power, and greed. I was content to let others fight more loudly, but no more.
–Sharyn W., NC

I am a prior soldier who served in Iraq for 13 months, and am now an expecting mom with a husband who is deployed in Baghdad. I don't think I can ever forgive the Bush administration for the lies that tricked America into this war and hurt my family so badly. I am ashamed of those American politicians who would condemn an organization for practicing the Freedom of Speech that so many soldiers have died for.
–Danielle B., OH

As a US Navy veteran and an Iraq war veteran of over a year I want to ask, What has happened to us? What has happened to our voice? Where is this country going with stopping free speech and free press? ... Every time I think of the long nights I had in Anbar remembering what I was fighting for, well here it is....
–Ahmad H., LA

These folks have made sacrifices many of us can't imagine. Their charge to us was clear: keep speaking the truth about how President Bush and the Republicans have betrayed our trust.

So we're going to expand our ad campaign—keep it on the air longer and run it against other politicians who helped block adequate rest time for our troops. Can you chip in $25 to do it?

https://pol.moveon.org/donate/mcconnell.html?id=11275-7646360-tS0h8G&t=3

And still the messages kept coming ...

I've had three nephews serve since 2002, one of whom was killed in Anbar Province. I have a fourth nephew at Quantico training. I want this war over before he is deployed and before any more of our soldiers are sacrificed.
–Michele R., NE

Three members of my family are military. Two Marines have served in Iraq and an Army Lt. is deploying in November. If we had all spoken out when the administration used General Powell perhaps we would not be in this mess.
–Carol B., PA
As a Marine I served for many reasons but one of them was to allow people the freedom of speech, whether I agreed with it or not. Wearing a uniform does not mean someone isn't a shill, is spewing propaganda, and downright lies. MoveOn has every right to buy an ad and say what they want about a public figure. This administration has lied to us, deceived us, misled us and when posed with a challenge this is how they respond?
–Keith G., VA

The Senate won't pass a policy to end the war or even to make sure our troops in the field have enough rest time between deployments, but they hold votes to crack down on millions of Americans who are upset about the war?

Well—it isn't going to work. We put together a hard-hitting ad that highlights how Republicans failed our troops and if we can raise enough money today, we'll air it across the country. Please help if you can:

https://pol.moveon.org/donate/mcconnell.html?id=11275-7646360-tS0h8G&t=4

For all of us on the MoveOn staff, this week was a bit of a rollercoaster—MoveOn was attacked by nearly the entire Republican party, while too many Democrats ran for the hills. But what kept us going were messages like these—and the incredible privilege we feel to serve all 3.2 million Americans in MoveOn.org.

When the story is written of how the Iraq war ended, you will be the heroes. Thank you.

–Eli, Adam G., Adam R., Anna, Carrie, Daniel, Erik, Ilyse, Jennifer, Joan, Justin, Karin, Laura, Marika, Matt, Natalie, Nita, Noah, Tanya, Tom & Wes
MoveOn.org Political Action
Friday, September 21st, 2007


Support our member-driven organization: MoveOn.org Political Action is entirely funded by our 3.2 million members. We have no corporate contributors, no foundation grants, no money from unions. Our tiny staff ensures that small contributions go a long way. If you'd like to support our work, you can give now at:

http://political.moveon.org/donate/email.html?id=11275-7646360-tS0h8G&t=6


PAID FOR BY MOVEON.ORG POLITICAL ACTION, http://pol.moveon.org/
Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.

Rest in Peace Little Man

Trevor July 10, 2007 to September 18, 2007










Janet's Great Grandson went into cardiac arrest last week and was pronounced brain dead this morning. He is presently awaiting donor recipients.

He leaves behind a grieving family and will be deeply missed.

His life was the definition of innocence.

How Real is this Movie?

I spent two hours watching ZEITGEIST.

My question is how much of this is true?

Perhaps The Texas Lawyer Tried To Get In His Way?

A Simple Love Song To George W. Bush

190,000 US Weapons 'Disappear In Iraq'

One Hundred And Ten Thousand of these:


">

"According to the GAO, the US supplied Iraqi soldiers and police with 185,000 AK-47 assault rifles and 170,000 pistols between 2003 and September 2005. But the report said the Pentagon had lost track of 110,000 rifles and 80,000 pistols. It said the defence[sic] department could also not account for 135,000 pieces of body armour and 115,000 helmets."

MSNBC

Winning Hearts and Minds While Stealing Them Blind

What We Dance To (But Shouldn't)

Senator Russ Feingold on Meet the Press

Lies...Just One of Many Reasons...

War Made Easy

Part One



Part Two



Part Three



Part Four



Part Five



War Made Easy

If Only.........

If only the man that wrote these words could have been our President. Instead we got a total failure that can't even string two words together. We got a dictator who believes he's above the law.