by Cody Lyon
     In the end, despite the joy of Obama's landslide, millions of gay people found themselves feeling let down, left behind, it was as this vote was a referendum on all gay people, as if the inclusive mosaic the election seemed to paint along with the supposed more compassionate and progressive tidal wave the election signaled, did not fully include them.  

Now make me do it.

FDR told activists in his own party, "I agree with you, I want to do it, now make me do it."

Franklin Roosevelt was also famous for not staying bought, after he took huge amounts of money from the special interests of his day.  Modern politicians of either party would never do this after accepting thinly veiled bribes.  They stay bought, because they know the next election is coming up, and people will find ways to be nice to them after they are out of office and don't need to worry about campaign finance laws.

I voted for Obama, but I don't think he can fix everything unless Americans tell him how.  He'll have good advisors, but unless advisors read new things they may recycle the same old ideas.  I think the Democrats have better ideas than the Republicans, but I don't think they're quite ready for what's coming to Americans in the next few years.

by CODY LYON
If it weren't for the particularly nasty tone or incessantly misleading words contained in an October 20 opine by Linda Harvey in the conservative "World Net Daily", any response to Mission America's typically insecure, filth laced and fright filled hyperbole wouldn't be worthy of time or effort.

But, in this case, a word or two, perhaps even a counter attack are warranted because, in her latest poisonous diatribe, Harvey not only spews lies about one of the LGBT community's most respected organizations, the Gay Lesbian and Straight Education Network, or GLSEN, but also attempts to link her lies to the candidacy of Democratic Presidential Candidate Barack Obama.

McCain campaign on McCain:

"There was one man who was presidential tonight, that man was John McCain."

Let's see ... McCain never looked at Obama during the debate.

Not looking at your opponent is "presidential?"

This very much was the "don't talk to your enemies - don't look them in the eye" foreign policy expert practicing his "presidential" craft for a nationwide audience.

McCain campaign continues:

In April Thomas Sowell, a respected conservative scholar, wrote an insidious column undercutting Barack Obama and attacking preemptively the presumptive stupidity and gullibility of an American electorate that would elect him President simply to make a little history. (http://www.townhall.com/col umnists/ThomasSowell/2008/0 4/29/an_old_newness )  

This would not be particularly noteworthy were Sowell not an African American, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, a "conservative think tank" located on the campus of Stanford University, one of the nation's leading research universities.  Over the years, Hoover salved the wounds and offered succor to some deeply troubled (and in trouble too) conservatives, among them former House Speaker Newt Gingrich,  and the architect of the U.S. disaster in Iraq, who Germany has indicted for war crimes, the former   Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld.

Like them, Sowell seems to be exceedingly bright: Howard-to-Harvard, A.B.; MA from Columbia, Ph.D. from Chicago, a full three degrees above the G.E.D. he earned in the Marine Corps after quitting high school and fleeing North Carolina at age 17.  Although a self-described "libertarian," like the zealous conservatives who surround him Sowell unhesitatingly massages information to suit his purposes.  His transparently partisan "think pieces" are routinely fraught with half-truths and re-heated reporting. Critics might say that some essays cast him as a bit of an "Uncle Tom," never mind the term itself is often recklessly misapplied and as last week as, Sowell would say, "affirmative action" is.

by Mikhail Lyubansky

This is heresy I know, since most of the White majority likes to pretend that it's colorblind, but race needs to be part of the calculus in the November election for all voters. Of course, it was never not going to be part of the equation. And race is certainly part of the explicit discourse for Black voters, as it always is. My point is that it's high time white folks join in the discussion and acknowledge that it matters. Because it does.

Here's what's at stake in November: For the first time in history, there is a real possibility that "The Man" won't be White. The implications will take years to sort out, but here are some very early thoughts about why the candidate's race is important enough to influence our vote. Because the implications of a Black President are somewhat different for different identity groups, I break it down accordingly. But, and make no mistake about this, all other things being equal, having a Black President would benefit all Americans -- well almost all.

What motivation do they have to change the system by which they've thrived? McCain, Clinton, and Obama must serve the interests of the corrupt corporate class -- or else they would be marginalized.

Here in this crumbling empire once known as the American Republic, here in a nation that, at present, for all practical purposes, only produces Cheetos and killer drones, whose architecture is being winnowed down to thriving rural meth houses and foreclosed upon suburban mchouses, whose corrupt corporate culture has bequeathed upon our suffering planet dying oceans and the hyper-caffeinated tsunami of Red Bull Capitalism -- the essential question confronts us -- how does one retain (not retail) one's humanity amid the catastrophic machinery and inane accoutrement of our age?

by Cody Lyon

Vote because you can. Vote, because it matters and just so happens to be your right, some might say your duty, as an active citizen of these beautiful United States. Vote, because in the end, you'll respect yourself more if you participate in the process. Vote, since it could make a difference in some precincts where the tallies might be very close. Vote because almost every person in this country has relatives and ancestors who at one time in our nation's history, couldn't, simply because of their gender or race. Fortunately for all of us, they fought the hard fight, won the right, and now, we can all vote.

Vote because like working out, it makes you feel good and look better and you never know who you'll run into at the polls and perhaps you'll find someone like you, someone who actually cares.

Vote, and remember that in November, you'll need to vote again.

Vote,and keep in mind that whoever the person you support in this race will face a formidable candidate in November and that candidate will likely do whatever they can including the utilization of their party. The opposition party and its supporters will pull any number of tricks to de-rail your candidate. It will not be the kind exchange of ideas we've seen so far, the kissing of cousins, not the snip and snaps over issues or the mildly insulting rhetoric who said who and what did what, instead, rest assured, it could, most likely will, get very ugly, and who ever you vote for, must be strong enough to withstand sharp, well informed attacks as well as dirty tricks of those who engage in well funded swiftboat tactics. Your candidate must be able to use their intellect to respond with volleys of their own, that simply deflate the cheaper tactics we've seen in past general elections.

Regardless, hold on to vision, keep hope in your heart, believe in your system, realize that government can do good things for people and vote and vote and vote.

Go Vote with November in the back of your mind, then move it to the front and vote to win.

A respected national newspaper recently reported that Presidential candidate W. Mitt Romney's decision to suspend advertising in South Carolina and Florida "laid bare the dire condition of his run for the White House..."

Then Romney won going away in Michigan; a win that injected caffeine into his Postum and added more green to his already bulky bankroll.

The topic below was originally posted in my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal, as well as The Peace Tree, the Independent Bloggers Alliance and Worldwide Sawdust.

One autumn evening several years ago, I needed to blow off steam after a stressful day at work. I was fed up the way employees often are in their jobs. You know that toxic feeling when your superiors are overpaid while contributing little to the effort other than gratuitous criticism, while those on your pay grade won't bust a nut to get the job done because they know you will? How often have you felt that way? I felt underpaid, under-appreciated, was mad as hell and ready to drown my anger in beer. It was self-pity really as plenty of people in this world had it far worse than me but I wasn't in a perspective mood.

So I walked about forty blocks south from my day job in mid-town Manhattan to clear my head until coming across a dive bar with sports on television and hardly any patrons. Perfect, that's just what I wanted. Typically, I'm not the sort to talk with strangers and certainly wasn't looking for any conversation this night. Somehow, I became engrossed in a three-way conversation with two middle-aged registered nurses. We talked about how friends, families, communities and countries gloss over pain and misdeeds through symbolism and empty platitudes.

The American people are very dissatisfied with the present state of affairs in their country. Polls taken in July revealed that less than 20 percent of Americans approve of the direction in which the United States is going. Furthermore, they are not naive as to the reason for this wrong direction: well over half the citizenry understands that a few billionaire tycoons have rigged our political system and media in order to advance their unfettered global business interests.

The Sun

Former Sen. John Edwards, left, Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama during the Democratic presidential primary debate in Manchester, N.H., June 3, 2007.

I sort of watched last night's debate, when the bloviation reached the painfully embarrassing level I would switch channels in favor of a program about the physics of the Sun, about which it may not be possible to bloviate.

Switching back and forth between those two particular shows created a kind of auditory strobe effect, in one moment the undeniable reality of the physical processes taking place on the Sun, in the next the equally undeniable bullshit taking place in a suburb of our solar system known as New Hampshire.

One self serving statement followed another, charges of timidity and lack of leadership leveled by Edwards against Clinton and Obama, charges of being 41/2 years late with leadership leveled against Edwards by Obama.

I had just returned from the Sun when those barbs were hurled and it struck me that it was possible that no one on the stage possessed the ability to lead a rifle squad down the street to buy a newspaper.

They all had their moments I suppose but during one orbit I heard Clinton say:

"The differences among us are minor, the differences between us and the Republicans are major. And I don't want anybody in America to be confused."

From "Democrats Focus on Iraq In Contentious Second Debate" by  Anne Kornblut and Dan Balz at The Washington Post

That was a bit of truth because, although I might have to hold my nose to vote for her and others on the stage last night, I am not capable of the kind of confusion that would lead me to vote Republican.

In her truthiness however, Ms Clinton neglected to mention the incredible similarities between the Democrats and the Republicans in their insatiable eagerness to sell out to the highest corporate bidder.

Iraq and health care seemed to take up most of the debate and I don't remember hearing a word about campaign and ethics reform, no mention of the lizards of K Street and their influence in preventing the delivery of Health care and prescription drugs as well as their influence in going to war and prolonging it.

To be fair though, it may have come up while I was eight light minutes away.

Newspaper articles across the nation today make it seem as if the VA is doing some of the veterans they screwed over in the past few decades a favor, while increasing their workload and it will hurt the "new vets" because Congress forced this, they should be ashamed of themselves.

Below is a copy of my letter to the Editor of the New Jersey paper. See for yourself if the VA is really helping the veterans or just sticking it to them again.

Letter

Your article on the VA makes it sound as a staff shortage caused the problems of Low pay. The simple fact is that VA Regional Offices have a lot of wiggle room on many of the cases they decide, let's use the big one for the example PTSD. That is in the press a lot, and it is a subject I have personal familiarity with, as I have it.

The shrinks and social workers do the write ups on every visit, they make notes, on things like your wife is wearing a shirt that says F.T .Army or BUCHITS or anything else that they feel like, such as the veteran states that if we don't do this he is going down the hall and call his Congress person or Senator. Stuff that has no place in a medical record. They assign what they call GAF scores, an assessment of how your are functioning at that given hour, to their observations. The score's range from 0-100, most veteran get scores that range from 30 which is not good to scores in the 70's which means yes he has issues, but the veteran is handling it really well.

Remember when John McCain was considered to be one of the cool not-so-partisan Republicans?  Well those days are over.  He is not only becoming more and more of a partisan apparatchik every day, but he is revealing himself to be a supercilious weasel and a jerk as well.

Let's look at Senator Obama's good faith effort to engage McCain in dialogue on the question of lobbying reform: