Does This Sound Familiar?

"They hate what we see right here in this chamber -- a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms -- our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other...This is an evil man that we're dealing with, and I wouldn't put it past him to develop evil weapons to try to harm civilization as we know it...You're either with us or against us in the fight against terror" Bush shortly after 911

"They hate our people because it isns to try to harm civilization as we know it... decent, brave, industrious, hardworking and intelligent. They hate our views, our social policies, and our accomplishments. They hate us as a Reich and as a community. They have forced us into a struggle for life and death. We will defend ourselves accordingly. All is clear between us and our enemies." Goebbels 31 December 1939

Other Things You should know:

1. 43% of all Iraqis now live in absolute poverty according to a NY Times article this morning. 70% do not have access to adequate water, substantially worse than the 50% who did not have clean water in 2003. Two million Iraqis have been displaced from their homes.
2. On the other hand, Halliburton and subsidiary KBR have posted record profits and KBR has been paid $20 billion for its work in Iraq. Meanwhile, KBR employees have been convicted of a massive bribery network that overcharged the American taxpayer millions of dollars.
3. A one-sentence provision buried in the Senate's recently passed energy bill, inserted without debate at the urging of the nuclear power industry, makes nuclear plants eligible for tens of billions of dollars in government loan guarantees.
4. The Iraqi Parliament began a monthlong recess because of the heat without completing any of the legislative benchmarks that they have agreed are important to stabilizing the country. Too bad our soldiers can't take a break also.
5. The Bush administration wants to sell billions of dollars of weapons to Saudi Arabia, the country of origin of most of the 911 attackers.

On a Brighter Note:

Kiva.org, at their fun and easy to use website, allows internet users to make mircroloans to small entrepreneurs in the developing world - helping people to lift themselves out of poverty. I made some loans in March 2007, some of which have been completely repaid, giving me "Kiva credit". The website made it easy for me to use that money to make another loan or I could have just as easily had the money sent to me.

Betrayed Again

So, it appears the Democrats are betraying us once again - this time on election reform:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/20/washington/20vote.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

According to the abovet NY Times article, Senator Feinstein and her committee have decided they will do nothing about election reform until 2012 - it's UNBELIEVABLE!!! They've done nothing since 2004 and now they say there's not enough time.

I know some people believe that if we win by a large enough margin, we don't have to worry. However, with the candidates we have, we will be sqeaking out a narrow victory if we get one at all - and corrupt machines could make a difference like they did in Ohio. Contact your senators and let them know we won't stand for ANOTHER STOLEN ELECTION.

Stop the Filibuster

Join the Senate Democrats in standing up to the Republican's filibuster

The Democrats in Congress have finally found the courage to stand up to the threats and intimidation of the Republicans.

Today the Senate is set to vote on the Levin-Reed Amendment which requires the President to begin bringing the troops home in 120 days. If the Republicans do not allow a vote, the Senate Majority Leader Senator Harry Reid has said:

I will keep the Senate in session straight through the night. The American people deserve an open and honest debate on this war, and they deserve an up-or-down vote on this amendment to end it.

Join the Senate Democrats in standing up to the Republican's filibuster

TONIGHT MoveOn is sponsoring Citizen Filibusters all over the country to draw more attention to the Republican tactic of blocking what the Democrats are trying to do and them accusing them of being a "do nothing" party. Find a Citizen Filibuster in your area

LASTLY contact your Senators and tell them to support the Levin-Reed amendment and Bring Our Troops Home. Use the links in the green box on the right to "Write or call your senators" or use this simple tool set up by Howard Dean and the Democrats.

Michael Moore Makes Blitzer and CNN Back Down

Michael Moore was invited on CNN with Wolf Blitzer and was first shown a piece by Dr. Gupta supposedly doing a "fact check" on Moore's new movie Sicko about the need to fix our broken health care system. See the real truth about that fact check.

Then watch the two part interview by Blitzer - it's awesome.

A great book on the state of our health care is called Critical Condition by the pulitzer-prize winning investigative team of reporters, Barlett and Steele. Supported by excellent research, they make the case that the deal-makers of health care organization mergers, the CEOs, and the executives make huge profits even while their organizations are providing bad health care and going bankrupt. They explain why the poor and singly insured are charged more for the same care - often double or triple the price - because large groups negotiate lower prices. Critical Condition makes it clear why the World Health Organization now rates the US 39th in the world for health care.

Climate Crisis - VOTE on Candidates' Positions

MoveOn held houseparties all across the country last night on the climate crisis in conjunction with Al Gore's global Live Earth concerts. This Virtual Town Hall Meeting on the climate crisis was the second in a series of three VTHMs being held by MoveOn - the first was on Iraq, and the third will be on health care.

Each of the Democratic candidates (Republicans were invited to participate, but all declined) answered questions from MoveOn members about their plans to deal with our dependence on oil and the climate crisis. You can watch it all or select different parts from MoveOn's website and then VOTE for which candidate's position you think is best: http://moveon.org/

Senators Obama and Clinton are careful not to offend the oil and coal lobbyists. Senator Dodd has the most aggressive and integrated plan. See Grist's review of all the candidates here:
http://grist.org/news/maindish/2007/07/06/candidates/

Also the League of Conservation Voters has a "scorecard" on the candidates' positions on the climate crisis available from MoveOn's website here: http://pol.moveon.org/townhall/climate/townhall2.html

The climate crisis is the biggest challenge facing the world, and it has the potential to solve many other problems if handled correctly, as Senator Edwards rightly pointed out. Not only can we reverse the tide of jobs leaving this country by developing new renewable energy technologies, encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship, enabling the US to lower its green house emissions, but by doing so the US will begin to resume its place as a world leader as this vision, and these technologies, and skills are demanded by people all around the world for their own communities. Additionally, as we reduce our dependence on oil-producing countries, we can more readily become an objective, benign power broker as we deal with the complicated problems facing the Middle East and the rise of Islamic fundamentalism around the world.