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The fringe right wing of movement conservatism is dangerous.
Glenn Beck jokes about poisoning Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, and gets to keep his show.
Congressman David Scott had a 4-foot swastika painted over a sign in front of his office.
Congressman Scott is black.
Watch Rachel Maddow in the video above, and be careful.
And speak the TRUTH in the face of these violent, desparate lies.
I’ve had it with the fringe right-wing health-insurance-industry-paid screaming white lunatics screaming at congressional town hall meetings. Homeland Security needs to keep an eye on these nuts and their racist-driven attacks.
Calmer minds are prevailing in the media. The UK’s The Guardian has begun taking these arguments to task. Even the United Steel Workers are standing up to unmask the lunatic fringe doing the bidding of the for-profit health insurance industry:
Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley has claimed that U.S. Sen. Ted Kennedy, 77, would not be treated for his brain tumor if he was in Britain because he is too old.
The newspaper reports that this is just not true, according to Britain’s Department of Health. “There is no ban on anyone of any age receiving any treatment,” said a spokesman. “Whether to prescribe drugs or recommend surgery is rightly a clinical decision taken on a case by case basis.”
An e-mail circulating in the U.S. claims that in England, anyone over 59 years old cannot receive heart repairs, stents or bypass because it is not covered as being too expensive and not needed. The Guardian reports that this is totally untrue.
“Growing numbers of patients over 65 with heart conditions are having surgery, including valve repairs and heart bypass surgery,” says Professor Peter Weissberg, the British Heart Foundation’s (BHF) medical director. For example, the average age at which people have a bypass operation has risen from 58 in 1991 to 66 in 2008.
San Francisco-based thinktank Pacific Research Institute has been saying that in Britain, breast cancer kills 46 percent of patients, compared with 25 percent in the U.S. They claim prostate cancer kills 57 percent of the Britons it strikes, compared with 25 percent of American victims; and that Britain’s heart attack fatality rate was 19.5 percent higher than America’s in 2005.
Breast cancer does claim more lives, proportionally, in the U.K. than in the U.S., but no where near the difference some claim, according to the 2002 database run by the World Health Organisation’s cancer advisers. For example, 19.2 of every 100,000 Americans die of breast cancer disease, compared to 24 percent in Britain. With heart attacks, 40 percent of Britons who suffer one die from it compared to 38 percent in the States.
And there’s more.
The violent and threatening thugs are not mainstream America. They are servants of the health insurance industry, and they are getting dangerous, bringing firearms to congressional town hall meetings.
And it turns out everything they say is laughably unscientific and false.
It didn’t take long for the Sun-Times’ Neil Hayes to put Chicago Blackhawks’ Patrick Kane in his place. At 20-years-old, Kane is facing a felony charge allegedly over a $0.20 dispute with a 62-year-old Buffalo cab driver. According to police, the driver claims he was roughed up enough to have had his glasses broken.
Now one of the franchise’s poster boys, one of the ‘‘core’’ players the team is determined to build around, is arrested for roughing up a cabbie who couldn’t produce exact change after Kane gave him $15 for a $13.80 fare. That’s right, Hawks fans, your millionaire, high-scoring forward — who is due a lucrative contract after next season — is accused of becoming unhinged when a cab driver couldn’t find two dimes to rub together.
Let’s hope there are facts in this story that have yet to surface and will cast Kane in a less humiliating light. Otherwise, this could be the most worrisome offseason development of all for the Hawks. If true, how can anyone defend such idiotic behavior from someone so prominent in the organization?
Only two things can prevent Kane, Jonathan Toews, Kris Versteeg and other young players from becoming cornerstones: injuries or their inability to mature on and off the ice. That Kane would be accused of something so asinine does not mean that this will be the first of many such incidents. Kane has been a model citizen to this point, as far as anyone knows, and probably deserves the benefit of the doubt for that reason. The Hawks declined to comment publicly until more facts are known. Kane’s mother, when contacted by the Sun-Times, did the same, which is probably wise. But this is not a good sign.
No, it’s not a good sign. The Blackhawks need to comment. The ‘Hawks need to tell us that this type of alleged behavior is not fitting for a member of their organization. The ‘Hawks need to send a message loud and clear to other young people — and adults — that this is not the way to handle a petty dispute.
“No comment” isn’t enough.
Hayes again:
The bottom line is, good as he is, Kane has to improve markedly for he and the Hawks to be the player and team they aspire to be. There are better ways to build strength, toughness and refine his all-around game than playing enforcer with cab drivers three times his age at 4 a.m. after a night on the town.
Kane reportedly has entered a plea of not guilty. If this case goes to trial, those who believe he is less star than product of NHL rule changes meant to encourage more speed and scoring might suggest he show the jury his career highlights to prove he is incapable of causing bodily harm. Then again, he could’ve avoided the whole ugly episode had he uttered three simple words that every millionaire athlete should use in such situations: Keep the change.
Absolutely.
Look, young people act stupidly sometimes. So do adults. But a millionaire allegedly roughing up a cab driver over $0.20 takes entitlement to a whole new level.
Step up, kid. You’re not the man yet.
Chicago Blackhawks’ star winger Patrick Kane faces felony robbery and other charges over an alleged dispute with a cab driver over $0.20.
That is not a misprint. The dispute was allegedly over $0.20 US currency.
Blackhawks star winger Patrick Kane was arrested early this morning in his hometown of Buffalo and faces robbery and other charges after allegedly assaulting a cab driver and failing to pay the fare, according to a report in the Buffalo News.
Kane, 20, and a relative, James M. Kane, 21, believed to be his cousin, are alleged to have punched the cab driver and taken back money they had given him after the driver told them he didn’t have 20 cents in coins to give them change, according to the report.
The police told the newspaper the fare was $13.80 and the two Kanes had paid the driver $15. The newspaper is reporting the cab driver told police he was punched in the face, grabbed by his throat and had his glasses broken in the altercation.
An attorney for both entered a plea of not guilty.
I wonder how much that cab ride will end up costing him now.
Anyone know his salary?
Call it a sign of the times, but the Tall Grass Arts Association is sure to get your attention with this year’s advertisement for the Park Forest Art Fair:
That’s okay. Just visit the Art Fair this year.
Click here for more on this year’s festivities.
Dahr Jamail and Jason Coppola are concerned about your kids. Is Hasbro really recruiting your kids for a career in the military?
First, let me say this: I am not anti-military, or anti-military service. I admire and respect those who serve this country, often ordered into ungodly situations by politicians mad with power.
Award-winning journalist and Associate Editor of the Nation Institute’s Tomdispatch.comNick Turse writes in his book “The Complex: How the Military Invades Our Everyday Lives“: “As a product of the 1980s G.I. Joe generation, I can attest to the seductive power of those three inch action figures in selling the military to young boys.”
In an interview with Truthout, Turse observed, “Only later would I learn just how enmeshed G.I. Joe’s manufacturer, Hasbro, was with the military. One instance of this close association came to me in 2003 when the Department of Defense shared the specifications for their Future Force Warriorconcept with the toy company, even before awarding the contract to General Dynamics. More important to the military these days are its ties to video game manufacturers. The latter turn tax-payer-funded combat simulators into first-person shooters that, in effect, pre-train youngsters in small-unit military tactics and irregular warfare.”
Turse also talks of the Microsoft Xbox game “Close Combat: First to Fight,” which was originally a training tool developed for the US Marine Corps by civilian contractor Destineer Studios. His book reveals that the game “was created under the direction of more than 40 active-duty Marines, fresh from the frontlines of combat in the Middle East [who] worked side-by-side with the development team to put the exact tactics they used in combat into “First Fight.”
“… The game is typical of a recently emerging trend that has melded the video game industry (and entertainment industries more broadly) with the US military in a set of symbiotic relationships that literally immerse civilian gamers in a virtual world of war while training soldiers using the hottest gaming technology available. It’s the creation of a digital cradle-to-grave concept in which games created by or for the military are used as recruiting tools and also, as it were, to pre-train youngsters. Then, when they are old enough to enlist, these kids find themselves using video game-like controllers to pilot real military vehicles and are taught tactics and are trained in strategy using specially designed video games and commercially available, off-the-shelf games that have been drafted into service by the military. That civilian-created, military-aided training tool was then recycled into a civilian first-person shooter, rated ‘T’ for “teen,” with a marine on the game’s packaging and a blurb that exclaims, “Based on a training tool developed for the United States Marines.”
“First to Fight” is but one of many video games that the US military has availed itself of on an extensive scale to indoctrinate, desensitize, dehumanize and ultimately recruit young people into the vocation of legitimized violence in the name of heroism and patriotism.
It is worth your time to stop by and check out the rest of the article.
Remember, your children only get one shot at life.
That’s it. Final solution.
Fix the health care system with one simple bill that eliminates the requirement that all Medicare participants be 65 years-of-age or older. Just open Medicare for everyone.
Problem solved.
Get over it already. If the Republican-coveted insurance companies want to survive, they’ll have to be competitive.
Personally, I don’t think they have it in them.
So, forget about them.
Open Medicare for everyone.
Problem solved.
I learned recently that tap water is more regulated than bottled water. I had never thought twice about reaching for a plastic bottle, and always tried to make sure the plastic bottle ended up in the recycling bin.
It turns out there may be reason to be concerned about the bottled water industry. Members of Congress, at any rate, have questions.
An Environmental Working Group (EWG) investigation of almost 200 popular bottled water brands found less than 2 percent disclose the water’s source, how the water has been purified and what chemical pollutants each bottle of water may contain. Just 2 of the 188 individual brands EWG analyzed disclosed those three basic facts about their water.
Full report found here: http://www.ewg.org/health/report/bottledwater-scorecard
Jane Houlihan, EWG Senior Vice President for Research, discussed the findings of the 18-month long study in testimony today before a congressional oversight hearing on the gaps in government regulation of the bottled water industry.
Some of the more interesting discoveries were that mainstream brands such as Sam’s Club and Walgreen’s scored relatively high marks, while waters marketed as elite, including Perrier, S. Pellegrino and the Whole Foods store brand, flunked because they provided almost no meaningful information for consumers.
Why the glaring lack of disclosure? Houlihan said that bottled water companies enjoy a regulatory holiday under the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, which give beverage corporations complete latitude to choose what, if any, information about their water they divulge to customers. [emphasis added]
Beverage corporations get to choose what, if ny, information about their water they divulge to customers?
This sentence stood out on the EWG Web site:
None of the top 10 U.S. domestic bottled water brands label specific water sources and treatment methods for all their products.
My solution? Drop the bottle and fill up a glass at the sink.
Few filmmakers define an era, a genre and a place like John Hughes did with his ’80s comedies often set on Chicago’s North Shore.
He may not have been a critic’s darling, but his name became synonymous with a brand of comedy in which young, rebellious, yet good-at-heart characters battle an establishment that seemed to rankle the filmmaker as well. Films such as “The Breakfast Club,” “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and “Home Alone” took on an iconic status, all while his productions revitalized the local film industry and launched scores of careers.
A reclusive figure who in recent years lived in part on a farm in Harvard, Ill., Hughes, 59, died Thursday of a heart attack while walking in Manhattan, his spokeswoman Michelle Bega said. She said the filmmaker was visiting family in New York.
The man launched so many careers. But, in many respects, his death represents the end of an era. And so young.
Sorry to see him go.
Rich East High School in Park Forest needs your support. The school always seems to be the last priorty for School District 227. Hopefully that will change with the election of recent Rich East grad Alyssa Hernandez.
A group of dedicated community members have formed a Booster Club to support the school.
Excitement is building this new school year for the Rich East High School Community in Park Forest, IL. The PTSO and the Booster Club have joined together to form the Rockets Booster Club.
Already over 100 members have signed up.
The Rockets Booster Club announced the newly formed union at the Rich Township Board meeting at the District Office in Olympia Fields, IL on August 6, 2009.
Anyone interested in becoming involved is asked to call the Director of Recruitment, Donna Helton-Taylor at 708.747.9156 or taylor156 (at)comcast.com.
The Rockets Booster Club meet the second Monday of every month in the Rich East Media Center at 6:30 p.m. All Rich Township Community members are welcome. Membership is only $10.00.
Rich East High School was the first school in what would later become School District 227. For years now, I’ve heard former teachers and alumni lament what was, and hope for what could be again.
Do your part. Support the Rockets Booster Club.