Sunday, November 24, 2013

Israel has no right stating the agreement is a "Historic Mistake."

There are times when I believe Israel isn't at all interested in peace. This is one of those times.

Supporters of President Hassan Rouhani of Iran welcomed the foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, in Tehran as he arrived from Switzerland.



John McCain must be working overtime. Where is the CIA? We are NOT going to fight another war in the Mideast. NOT !

November 23, 2013

BEIRUT — Seven Syrian Islamist rebel groups (click here) announced Friday that they’d combine operations in the face of a fierce offensive by troops loyal to President Bashar Assad, a move that would turn the disparate groups into the largest anti-Assad faction. 

The groups said their new affiliation would be called the Islamic Front and would aim to replace Assad’s government with an Islamic state. 

Two of the anti-Assad movement’s most effective forces, the Nusra Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, both of which are al-Qaeda affiliates, weren’t named as part of the new coalition. But the new grouping left the door open to cooperating with them. 

“The Islamic Front is an independent military and social force that is aimed at bringing down Assad’s regime in Syria and at replacing it with a just Islamic state,” the groups said in a statement. 

The Islamic Front would be composed of the largest rebel fighting force in the north, Liwa Tawhid, and the most powerful faction fighting in Damascus, Jaysh Islam. The other groups that agreed to the new unit are Ahrar al-Sham, Liwa al-Haq, Ansar al-Sham and Suqour al-Sham, as well as a smaller Kurdish group, the Kurdish Islamic Front. 

An official from the new group said the negotiations to form the new command had taken seven months.

Amad Essa al-Sheikh, the head of the Consultative Council of the new Islamic Front, said the goal of integrating the factions was to bring about “a paradigm shift in the armed rebellion by closing ranks and mobilizing them to become the real alternative to the dying regime.”

Strange isn't it? We are still paying the price for a President with a personal agenda for corporate America.


By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 18, 2006


Just after the lightning takeover of Baghdad (click here) by U.S. forces three years ago, an unusual two-page document spewed out of a fax machine at the Near East bureau of the State Department. It was a proposal from Iran for a broad dialogue with the United States, and the fax suggested everything was on the table -- including full cooperation on nuclear programs, acceptance of Israel and the termination of Iranian support for Palestinian militant groups.


But top Bush administration officials, convinced the Iranian government was on the verge of collapse, belittled the initiative. Instead, they formally complained to the Swiss ambassador who had sent the fax with a cover letter certifying it as a genuine proposal supported by key power centers in Iran, former administration officials said.

Last month, the Bush administration abruptly shifted policy and agreed to join talks previously led by European countries over Iran's nuclear program. But several former administration officials say the United States missed an opportunity in 2003 at a time when American strength seemed at its height -- and Iran did not have a functioning nuclear program or a gusher of oil revenue from soaring energy demand....

It all looks like politics to me.

A couple of things. Bill Maher was funny when he stated, "The Council of Elders, when is the Council of Elves going to show up?"



Afghan President Hamid Karzai leaves after the last day of the Loya Jirga, in Kabul November 24, 2013. 
CREDIT: REUTERS/OMAR SOBHANI


KABUL
Sun Nov 24, 2013 3:31pm EST

(Reuters) - An assembly of Afghan elders endorsed a crucial security deal on Sunday to enable U.S. troops to operate in the country beyond next year, but President Hamid Karzai left the matter up in the air by refusing to say whether he would sign it into law.
The gathering, known as the Loya Jirga, had been convened by the president to debate the pact outlines the legal terms of continued U.S. military presence in Afghanistan. It voted in favour and advised Karzai sign it promptly.
But Karzai, in his final remarks to the four-day meeting, said he would not sign it until after a presidential election due next April....
Now, let me get this right. The Loya Jirga stated the USA is to stay one more year in Afghanistan and wants to have Karzai immediately sign an agreement with the USA. 
Yet, Karzai states he won't sign it until after the elections next year. Now, that sounds like nothing more than USA politics where legislators are held responsible for their vote. That is all this is. There is nothing to say a change in government in Afghanistan won't end the USA involvement either. Karzai has been the leader in Afghanistan since 2001 and influential in the country long before that. So, I don't know why there is talk about troops until 2024, unless they are their for the $1 Trillion in rare earth minerals. If that is the case, then the American people have another Halliburton and they can hire their own security guards. 
Don't think for one minute any monies obtained from mining Afghanistan will come to the USA Treasury. It won't happen.
Karzai has plans for the nation, he just isn't going to let on as to what those plans are, except, he needs the USA to insure the central authority is intact.
I don't think so.

...Medicare costs have actually grown a little more slowly...Free Market Economy with a welfare state...A Socialized Democracy...

It is THE TRUTH the wealthy hate. They hate the fact the USA's free market economy deprives many Americans of their birthright promise. It was true for a time when the USA was a primarily agrarian society. Everyone worked their land and produced a product. Some for subsistence and some for market. But, the limit of an agrarian society became obvious. 

There are examples in small African nations that have not progressed beyond agrarian societies where families cannot sustain themselves any longer. Population growth is inevitable as a process of life. But, it is unrealistic to believe land can provide a slice for every person born. As the populations of the nations of the world grow, it is inevitable cities become the place where life happens.

But, that is off topic to some extent. As the Industrial Revolution revealed itself, people moved to cities to work and earn a living. It took time to receive living wages then, too. Unions were the vehicles of change that provided workers with safe working conditions and a living wage. But, the CEOs of the industries became greedy and unable to increase the variety of their products and hence their profits were not increasing to make them happy. As a result they outsourced to cheap labor in other countries, both victimizing the laborers there that would derive them of a vital Middle Class while at the same time depriving their consumers in the USA of an income.

The economics of supply and demand apply to growing populations. But, not at the rate most corporations want their profits to grow. A baby in a family of three has it's siblings clothing handed down and toys can be shared, so there is no sincere equal growth in population and economy. As a result there will be people that will fall out of the economy with no real viable income to sustain them. Thus, there is a welfare state no matter how much a democracy with a free market economy grows or attempts to employ all it's citizens. The idea all people will work at any point in time in any free market economy is unrealistic. A democracy has to provide for a welfare state within it's borders. It is the responsibility of the nation to uphold the dignity of it's citizens. And there is the reality, it can happen to you. 

In the USA, there is a dangerous trend toward intolerance of the unemployed, underemployed and underpaid. I don't know if it an extension of racism and/or a replacement for racism, but, the poor are being scapegoated to the reason for slow economic growth. That isn't it. As we are witnessing with Walmart, corporate greed is the problem, but, yet Wall Street is not being held to their responsibility.

I recently had a conversation with a die hard Libertarian and it was plainly obvious he would allow people to die of poverty as if they earned it. The fact people were dying without health insurance never bothered his conscience. To his estimation those that had that hardship took the wrong path in life and this was now their reality and why should anyone have to save them from it.

To quote the English evangelical preacher and martyr, John Bradford (circa 1510–1555). - "There but for the grace of God, goes I." 

When moving forward in the USA with laws and programs, it has to be realized there is always the poor. It is the obligation of the nation to provide all people with an education to improve their status. Realizing that means we have to get the health care system right. We have to get the educational system right. We have to have a clear vision of the future so insure our citizens are employed with safe work places and good wages. The fact an entire generation was left out of the picture could not have been a mistake, so much as it being disregarded, except, as recruits into a forever war.

Dr. Paul Krugman is unafraid of the reality of a USA economy. He knows there is a truth to poverty and where it lies. So, it is time to listen to the Nobel Laureates and not the Radio Talk Shows that seek power over people and regard poverty as a state of deserved status. The ONLY reason the Right Wing is seeking the populous aspects of The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is because the law was passed and they can make a campaign issue of it now. That was their goal in not voting for any of it. They wanted to use it as a tool for elections. So, would the nation be somewhat provided for if the Democrats didn't pass the law? No. It would never have happened. There would be no focus and no legislation and people would be denied benefits and die without a country caring about it. Ah, the risks of a profit motive government.

Who do you actually believe when it comes to economics? It is time to put the laymen in their place and realize there are those that can actually lead the way. Limbaugh, Hannity, FOX are all laymen earning a living by encouraging suffering. When is that going to be put in it's place as outrageously unkind? Never? We are suppose to accept these people speaking down to Americans as if we are dirt to be swept away?

Walmart is a global problem. It impacts any nation's GDP. The recovery is slow for a reason.

There is a video that accompanies this article. It is not the video below. I suggest anyone wanting to understand "Walmart Economics" watch this video on "Squawk Box." Thank you. 

By Stacy Mitchell
July 2, 2012

Sam Walton (click here) opened the first Wal-Mart (WMT +1.20%) store in Rogers, Ark., 50 years ago this month. Sprawled along a major thoroughfare outside the city's downtown, that inaugural store embodied many of the hallmarks that have since come to define the Wal-Mart way of doing business. Walton scoured the country for the cheapest merchandise and deftly exploited a loophole in federal law to pay his mostly female workforce less than minimum wage....

Please tell me this is not happening in my country. Please tell me the CEO of Walmart has a conscience.

Ohio is where the House Speaker lives and represents.

November 21, 2013
Hayley Peterson

A second Wal-Mart location in Ohio (click here) is holding an employee food drive for workers who are unable to afford Thanksgiving dinner.
The Wal-Mart in Franklin confirmed to Business Insider that it is asking employees to donate to other workers in need. The local Fox affiliate first reported on the drive. 
"A lot of associates can't even afford to buy a small turkey," Ricki Hahn, a seven-year employee of Wal-Mart, told the station. 
News of a similar food drive for a Wal-Mart located 200 miles away in Canton sparked outrage earlier this week. Activists say the drive proves that the retailer's wages are too low to provide for basic needs. 
Wal-Mart says the food drive has been taken out of context and that the company is proud of the wages it pays....

This is Ohio's 8th District where the House Speaker resides and represents.

Greg Kaufman
April 11, 2011
For forty years, (click here) Tina Osso has worked on food and poverty issues serving nearly all of speaker John Boehner’s 8th Congressional District of Ohio. She came to that work in 1973, when the oil embargo resulted in her losing her job, and she unexpectedly found herself in line at a food pantry, where she began volunteering.
“It changed the course of my life,” says Osso.
Ten years later, she founded the Shared Harvest Foodbank where she still serves as executive director today....
“She has her finger to the pulse of those in need in the 8th District as much as anyone, and that need is greater now than it has been in decades,” says Hamler-Fugitt.
Indeed in 2009, childhood poverty rose over six points in the Boehner district to reach 19.1 percent, or 29,173 kids. Overall, 14 percent of Boehner’s constituents live below the federal poverty line of $22,400 per year for a family of four. Shared Harvest’s work has more than doubled—it distributed approximately 7 million pounds of food in 2007, and 16 million pounds in 2010....
As of July 31, 2013 173 stores
Supercenters 135
Discount Stores 9
Sam's Club 29 

Wednesday October 2, 2013 8:15 AM
By Collin Binkley and Jessica Wehrman
Washington — The 27 eighth-graders (click here) St. Agatha Catholic School who made the long journey from Columbus to Washington, D.C., this week had hoped for a memorable trip, but it’s safe to say this wasn’t what they had in mind.
A government shutdown meant the Upper Arlington school’s class had to scrap its original itinerary, which was carefully planned while the students raised $14,000 through yard sales, baby-sitting, selling an impressive amount of chocolate and other fundraisers.
Out went the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum — a shame, because the students had spent much of their time researching the Holocaust in the days leading up to their trip....

Nationalize the portion of profits from these Big Box Stores that would cover the food stamps and Medicaid their employees are provided by the American people. If more than 50% of Walmart and McDonald's employees are on food stamps and Medicaid, then nationalize 50% of the profits from these companies to reimburse the USA Treasury. I mean it.

Nationalize the "Cheap Market Stores."

This is "Supervalu." It is a 'Cheap Market' store, no different than Walmart.

SUPERVALU® (click here) is a grocery  industry leader, serving customers through more than 3,400 owned, licensed, franchised and affiliated stores across the country. Our roots are in supply chain and wholesale distribution; in subsequent years we've grown to include traditional and hard discount grocery retail formats. Today we proudly provide millions of customers with the best products on the shelves: national brands and our high-quality and affordable private label products. Superior service, engrained in our culture, sets us apart from the competition and provides the experience our customers expect.
Below is the stock price of Supervalu. The graph starts with February 2013 and ends with December 2013. The graph falls short as it is not December or the end of the year yet. You don't have to take my word for it, click here. 



The point is October 2013. On October 1, 2013 the stock price remained static, however, as the cut in Food Stamps settled in across the USA, the stock price fell and continued to fall. It hasn't recovered yet.

The Democrats need to listen to this mess on FOX radio.

To begin, I have heard FOX commentators simply lie about the law. One stated the law is unconstitutional. They are lying because there are still folks in their audience that believe the lies.

Talk about a fishing mission. This FOX commentator wants to find the populous aspect of the PPACA and ask the GOP to stand on it as an election rant. The way I see it, there is no reason to believe any GOP when it comes to health care. They have never effectively dealt with it, they have no plan to deal with and and repealing is their answer.

Brian kicked off the show with SENATOR JOE MANCHIN (D-WV) (click here) and wasted no time getting the Senator’s opinion on Obamacare and the rumors of a single-payer system. Manchin said he is not a supporter of universal healthcare because market-driven systems have always worked.  “You have to give me incentives to stay healthy…I need to have rewards and incentives and I need to have penalties if I don’t—that’s the market driven system that has always worked here!”  Sounds great!  So, Manchin for President?!  Nope!  When asked, he told Brian, “I like being ‘America’s Governor!’  I like that Governor term real well!”

The health care industry is changed forever with or without the PPACA. As a matter of fact, given the fact they are applying the principles of the law there won't be protections anymore if the law is repealed. So there won't be refunds if the premiums collected by an insurance company exceed 85% of their costs. They'll keep and simply go back to their old practices. So, the law has to stand.

But, in the second taped program where Karl Rove is stating all kinds of accolades and ambitions for future elections, he is seeking to claim gains are possible in Democratic elections. Every candidate is going to have to decide how correct Rove is, but, also realize he had ZERO success in 2012. 

If I were a Congressman or woman running for election in 2014, I'd be sure my constituents knew they had a friend in an office willing to take complaints and act on them to correct the course of folks unable or unwilling to find a good policy. I'd be sure there was at least one staff member that could navigate the new law and system to obtain affordable insurance. Good service to constituents usually results in people appreciative of the effort and outcome.

Rove also believes the health care issue will get worse. I think California has proved him wrong already. I sincerely believe the rollout by the current HHS Secretary reflects her ability to accomplish the best outcomes. She needs to be replaced and citizens happier than they are now.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will go forward. It will make a huge difference in our country.

45,000 American deaths associated with lack of insurance (click here)


Fri September 18, 2009
By Madison Park, CNN
(CNN) -- A freelance cameraman's appendix ruptured and by the time he was admitted to surgery, it was too late. A self-employed mother of two is found dead in bed from undiagnosed heart disease. A 26-year-old aspiring fashion designer collapsed in her bathroom after feeling unusually fatigued for days.
What all three of these people have in common is that they experienced symptoms, but didn't seek care because they were uninsured and they worried about the hospital expense, according to their families. All three died.
Research released this week in the American Journal of Public Health estimates that 45,000 deaths per year in the United States are associated with the lack of health insurance. If a person is uninsured, "it means you're at mortal risk," said one of the authors, Dr. David Himmelstein, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School....
Loss of Americans when it could have been prevented due to the financial status of an industry is not and CANNOT be acceptable. These people were important for many reasons, but, if any of the them had children their deaths will profoundly effect the outcome of those children.

What are we doing to our country if children are losing parents? And what if that was a single parent family? What do those children do then? 

As a nation we have a strong interest in insuring our people taken care of and adding to the quality of life of all Americans. We can honorably say we are doing the best we can for everyone. Heath care cannot completely be based in capitalism. It is not possible. The jobs market has become far too turbulent to think at some point in time in any career a person runs a risk of lacking health care and what if that happens at the very time when they need it most?

The argument by the GOP is often a person can go to an emergency room for care. That is not completely accurate. If one has lump in their breast that is not an emergency room visit. The ERs in the country will not accept the fact a lump is an emergency and will tell anyone with that complaint to seek a physician to evaluate it. The only time cancer patients without insurance are admitted to a hospital is when they are end stage and dying; whether the person realizes it or not.

By Max Blau
Published: June 26 at 3:24 pm
...But, things turned in June 2012 after the Supreme Court (click here) left it up to states to determine whether they wanted to expand Medicaid. Some conservative state leaders, including Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal, quickly and staunchly rejected what they viewed as another growing entitlement program.
Under the Medicaid expansion, Georgia would have received about $33 billion from the federal government over the course of a decade, while paying nothing during the first three years. After that, the state would only pay 10 percent of the expansion’s overall bill. Deal says the move would ultimately cost Georgia from $2.5 billion to $4.5 billion — a small fraction of the total money, but more than he says the state can afford.
If Georgia expanded Medicaid, Grady chief executive John Haupert says it would cover more than 27,000 uninsured patients now seeking free medical treatment at the hospital. It also would have helped the hospital with an estimated $60 million economic boon....

$33 billion over ten years. Tell me that would not have turned the corner on the practice of medicine in Georgia. That level of investment in hospitals would begin the process to reduce health care costs in the USA. Because that is where the real victory lies. It is the high health care costs driving high premium costs. So, while many states realized their hospitals were over burdened with the care of the uninsured and underinsured, there are still that many more hospitals such as this in Georgia still placing a burden on the cost of health care.

I firmly believe The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is vitally needed. I also believe Americans have learned to cope ineffectively for 19 years that the transition is very difficult. Not only that, but, we have a shrinking Middle Class that is underpaid and without unions to provide for their needs to a healthy work force. A healthy work force is vital to provide the needed Middle Class which supports a vibrant economy. 

The wealthy are not the economy. It is the largest numbers of a population that provides the economy. Now, if that is a wealth class that is the largest number, then so be it. But, today, the Middle Class is suppose to be the largest numbers to provide a growing economy. Why? Not that poverty sucks, but, because poverty is nothing more than subsistence. It is not a growing economy. Poverty is putting a huge drag on the USA economy and consequently because of the impact of the USA economy on the world, the global economy is lethargic.

It could be argued that the economy under Clinton was on it's way to a far larger Wealth Class in the USA, but, that came to an end under Bush. That wealth class contributed to the treasury and to the economy and the poverty was far less than today.

The GOP politics of destroying the USA. Treason redefined as political standing.

It is reasonable to say the GOP Senate Republicans finally know what oppression, rejection and standing as a minority sincerely means.

Not merely a bad joke, is it? Bigotry and bias sincerely excludes success, doesn't it?

I suggest the Democrats and those effected by 'compromise' laws revisit them and decide if a better law can be passed since there is now a 51 vote majority. I am thinking specifically about any Immigration Reform that was tainted by extremist pressure due to the GOP. If there is a better Senate bill that can now pass, then do it. When the House passes their bill there can be reconciliation even though the House is stating there will be no bills going to reconciliation.

That reality is also a political position the Democrats can exploit. The country wants compromise. The House having a Republican majority, then they should pass the bills the way they want, as if they wouldn't anyway, but, the Senate now has a Democratic majority. If the House won't pass a bill because they refuse to go to reconciliation it only proves more leverage for Democrats in the elections of 2014 and beyond.

I sincerely believe the House's experiment with the budget this year and the debt ceiling will produce another of the same come January 2014. They found out what they wanted to know by experimenting with the country this year and will seek to go forward next year with confidence and determination to make it happen. They'll seek political exploitation at the time as well based on those begun in late 2013.

The Democrats and possibly the President should not wait for it all to transpire before calling for help from the citizens of this country. There is a proven record with the GOP and to that end lies the right to warn the country and ask for action to prevent such an impasse again.

Harry Reid I could kiss you along with more than one half the women in the USA.

This isn't about politics. It is about history. It is a fact, this is about history. 

No one wants to talk about the fact President Obama is an African American. No one wants to address the grievances the minority populations in the USA has against history. Supposedly, the nation is dissolving racism by not mentioning it. It is going to evaporate into the vapors of the country.

This is about the federal judiciary, right? Appointments, of course, there is a FED Chair that has to be confirmed, but, whether the media wants to recognize it or not, President Obama is seeking to promote African Americans in government. We have one Black Senator from New Jersey and he was only recently elected. I am sure Senator Booker was mentored to run.

Oppression is a funny thing. The laws can reflect equity among all the people, but, 'the practice' of equal opportunity is something very different. Oppression causes resignation of people, not necessarily surrender, but resignation to their own reality. To that end the USA is very guilty of ignoring the lack of equity in the USA of all the people. Why? Why the USA? Why not the media? Politics. It is the politics of the nation that causes the oppression of the 20th and 21st century.

The majority of the nation are Caucasian. Neoteny. What do you see when you look out on life? Yourself. That is what you see? What do we know about the way African Americans are viewed and why? This is where the media is at fault, but, we see difference, both physical and cultural and we see danger in our subconscious. If one accepts the fact racism has been extremely stubborn in the USA for reasons almost invisible, then one has to realize winning in politics means reaching out to the majority to win.

Every Republican in the country will state they aren't racist, but, yet they allow the extremism to stimulate voters to the polls. That has been going on for a long time given the fact it is only recent history Americans began to identify with African American authority.

CBS News
September 13, 2013

...More than 70 percent of Obama's confirmed judicial nominees (click here) during his first two years were "non-traditional," or nominees who were not white males. That far exceeds the percentages in the two-term administrations of Bill Clinton (48.1 percent) and George W. Bush (32.9 percent), according to Sheldon Goldman, author of the authoritative book "Picking Federal Judges."
"It is an absolutely remarkable diversity achievement," said Goldman, a political science professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, who is only counting judges once, even if they fit more than one category....
Now, you might say 70 of SOME of his nominees simply isn't that many anyway, but, it does prove the fact President Obama has a mission in promoting the African American Brain Trust in the USA. I don't think that is a bad thing considering the assault on Voting Rights. We have witnessed the GOP actively attempting to eliminate voters to benefit their elections. Elections I might add that assaults the Middle Class, Unions and the entities that empower minorities to accumulate wealth.
So, here we are with a successful re-election of our first African American President. By every measure that should not have happened. By every measure Barack Obama should have been a figure head and token Black to the minorities and the USA should have given him only one term. However, he proved he is brilliant and not a flash in the pan. He is loyal to the Middle Class and minorities. 
There is every estimate he is not finished lining the halls of the Judiciary with minorities. I can't wait. This is the time to correct the path in the USA. It is time to place brilliant people, like himself, in places of power to carry out the same loyalty he feels. It is not empty loyalty. The USA chronically proves it could not care less about the Middle Class and minorities. The economic collapse of 2008 is proof of the disregard to our people. Our vulnerable people. So, we need minorities though out the county to hear cases and be loyal to the law and best outcomes of people rarely placed in priority.

Todd J. Gilman
23 November 2013

“It is simply intolerable for a partisan minority to block a bipartisan majority from conducting the nation’s business,” one senator declared in the midst of ongoing partisan warfare over a president’s long-blocked judicial nominees. “It is intolerable that the standards now change depending on who is in the White House and which party is the majority party in the Senate.”
Two days later, the same senator returned to the Senate floor to promote the exact idea Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid executed last week: holding a majority vote to change Senate rules, ending the use of filibusters to block nominations.
“We are talking about treating presidents who have won national elections with the respect they deserve,” he said.
That was May 2005. On Thursday, that same senator — Texan John Cornyn, now the deputy GOP leader — denounced Reid’s maneuver as “a raw exercise of partisan political power.”
In both parties, nearly every senator in office more than five years has been both for and against the nuclear option.
Here’s a certain Democrat warning Republicans in April 2005 “to think about the implications of what has been called the nuclear option.”
Voters, he said, expect both disagreement and cooperation in Congress. But “what they do not expect is for one party, be it Republican or Democrat, to change the rules in the middle of the game so they can make all the decisions while the other party is told to sit down and keep quiet.”...
The reaction has been comical to say the least.
The Senate has been 'keeping score.' Like what? Somehow keeping score of the number of federally appointed judges by Democrats and Republicans justified the filibuster. 
I don't think so.
Keeping score, do you believe that? 370 GOP appointees and 370 Democratic appointees and more than 70 positions still open. Excuse me?
Why is there more than 70 positions open? GOP politics. Not the keeping score part either. SMALL GOVERNMENT was being imposed on the people of the USA though the judiciary. 70 courts are absent of judges. Does the judiciary work well with 70 non-functioning courts? I wouldn't think so. Not only that, but, when one looks at some of the decisions they are obviously partisan. 
If that trend continued as it was being enforced by McConnell where would our Supreme Court Justices be coming from? How do we insure having a range of choices to place in our higher courts if there are dearly few to choose from. The entire issue is hideous. The democracy we tout as free was being deprived of our judicial appointees to enforce small government and limit choices in the future to the Supreme Court. You talk about control, holy smokes.
So, Mitch McConnell obviously took advise from FOX News. "Fair and Balanced." 370 on each side of the courts. How negligent is that? How could a Congressional Senate leader actually justify his actions? He endangered the country both today and the future.
There will be nice outcomes to the Senate now. The filibuster was actually feeding the Tea Party. Of course, Ted Cruz and Rand Paul sued the Senate floor for their political constituencies, but, it is more than that. A sixty vote majority required recruiting all the Democrats and a few Republicans in order to pass legislation. That is stacking the odds against Republicans to face a primary runoff and Democrats to face a general election challenge. The Senate Vote is suppose to reflect what is considered best for the country, not pressure on Senators to carry the day and sacrifice their careers in the process.
The Senate is not suppose to be at war with each other. That is McConnell was doing. He was forcing his Republican colleagues to make silly decisions rather than decisions that benefited the country. McConnell was not only acting against the people of the nation, but, his own political party. He was forcing extremism in his own political ranks. 
Now, all the Senators can vote according to their priorities of what is important to move the nation forward. The actions by the majority of the Senate to remove the filibuster will remove the extremism currently at work in the Senate. Democrats and the Republicans willing to sign on to a bill in the face of a very hostile GOP political environment can now vote as they want to rather than as demanded of them.
So, now that it is finally done, I congratulate Senator Majority Leader Reid. He acted bravely and with commit to the future and making it a stronger country; rather than simply waving the white flag all the time to an extremist GOP unable to act in favor of the country's best outcomes. 
President Obama is a great President. He is finally ending the Civil War and placing equity in the country for minorities and women. We are lucky to have him as President.
Did I miss anything important?

Perhaps I should tell you.
It's Sunday Night



Voting Doesn't Work by Corporate Avenger (click here)

Voting doesn't work, 1-2-3 
It's time you know your enemy 
I won't pledge allegiance to hypocrisy 
Your democracy, is not for me 
So when we try to change this place 
Courtroom pulls an about face 
Fantasies of the master race 
Our elections they erase 
See once upon a time we were all free 
When we lived in tribal societies 
Peace, peace and harmony 
And everything for the good of family 
Yeah cancer people can't smoke weed 
People voted to be free 
But the facist rule decree 
Pigs arresting you and me 

(chorus) 
Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 

President this, president that 
Represent the ruling class 
One says this (this) one says that (that) 
Sounds the same, what choice is that 
See, voting doesn't work 1-2-3 
Coming from the nation of the Cherokee 
How can you choose when you don't have a choice 
How can you choose when you don't have a voice 
Yeah, interest games, their interest rates 
Secret power fueled by hate (hate) 
Fear for cash 
Cash for fear 
Greenspan is the ruler here 
Yeah, a pig is a pig 
And they took it away 
And I don't give a fuck about the things they say 
It don't mean shit to me 
Voting doesn't work it's easy to see that 

Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work. why? 
When they don't like what we say, then they stop it in the courts 

Voting doesn't work I have seen 
Along with piles of broken treaties 
Your reality produces poverty, spiritually in a nation of greed 
Well, who is working, who is not 
Think votes count, well I think not 
Doesn't matter what we say 
Things will always go their way 
Power to the people is just a fantasy 
And they sell to us as an american dream 
Power to the people is just a fantasy 
And they sell to us as an american dream 
Well your vote counts 1-2-3 
Living in democracy 
Everybody here is free 
'Cause it's built for you and it's built for me 

Voting doesn't work, why 
When they don't like what we say they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work, why 
When they don't like what we say they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work, why 
When they don't like what we say they stop it in the courts 
Voting doesn't work, why 
When they don't like what we say they stop it in the courts