MONTHLY STATEMENT

HOW'M I DOING?

Our State Of The Unionist Message

It's been two months now. We're still here. We did OK aound Election Day, thanks to the American Street, Kevin Hayden's blog. Whenever he posts our link on his front page, we get a huge surge in traffic. Generally, though, things have died down since the Bushies pulled their second coup.

Yeah, its depressing. But it just means we have to redouble our efforts. Bush is not now, never was, and never will be legitimate. It's a waste of time trying to prove that. There is no paper trail, except the ones crooked Republicans control. So we need to focus on reforming the electoral system. No more paperless voting. No more intimidation, discarded votes, disenfranchisement.

We need to get it together, literally. We've been too loose, too isolated, too separated. We need to pull together. We're recommending reestablishment of the old Democratic Party Clubhouses, as a system of organizing and contact points for continuous, structured action on all issues. Check the link, at the end of this post.

As to this little blog, if we can make a contribution, we'll keep it going. We're not much further along than we were a month ago. We're looking for ways to remedy that. We need a better commenting system, better coverage on the various blog-search engines, and more connections to blogging groups. Oh, and a new skin, or template. This one sucks. If anyone has any suggestions, please email us at the address below.

Thanks to Maria, Cul, and their regular posters Sandy, Richard and Karlo, for reading, encouraging, and linking to this blog. (Check out their blogs, the first ones LINKED at the bottom of the home page.) Thanks to them and to the creators of the other blogs we've been permitted to post on, or been linked by: Dave Marco, Kevin Hayden, John Aravosis, Atrios, and Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, all of whose blogs are linked, below. Dave Donnelly of George W. Buy seems to have gone off the 'Net for the time being, but we'll put his blog back on our list as soon as it resurfaces. We recently joined the Progressive Blog Alliance, but their blogrolling link doesn't work here, and we're not listed on it anywhere else. Gotta fix that. Anyway, thanks, to the nice folks at the PBA. So much for ass-kissing. Ptui!

Gee. I feel like Sally Field. And I didn't even WIN anything. Well, maybe next month. We'll give it another thirty days, I guess. But that's it if it doesn't pick up. Not that we want to end up like Kos, or Atrios. They have too many readers & commenters to keep in touch with. But we do need some more commenters. If you're not an asshole, please send some comments our way. Our current system is just designed to keep out flaming freeper trolls and other right-wing assholes, not EVERYBODY. We're working on it. Sort of. In the meantime, join BLOGGER/ blogspot, or send us an email. We'll post it. Honest. And we won't give your email addy to Pat Robertson, either. Though you should be getting those critical Teletubbies updates from JesusCorp.



"SCREW THE INTERNET: REOPEN THE CLUBHOUSES"

TO POST A COMMENT: CLICK ON "COMMENTS," "Post a Comment" or "# of COMMENTS" just below the SOCIAL BOOKMARKING LINKS (Digg, Delicious, etc), about three inches down from here. Please do comment. Thank you.

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Suggestion Box & Tip Jar We would like to make over this blog to make it easier to access, to read and to comment on. We would also like to serve our readers better by providing more of what you need and want to see. All serious suggestions will be considered. We hope to move to our own domain in the near future, and we would like to ask for your financial assistance in doing that, and in upgrading our hardware & software. Small one-time donations and larger long-term subscriptions are welcome. Exclusive advertising is also available. If you think we are wasting our time in doing all this, please let us know. If you wish to help us, now is the time. As always, negative bullsh*t from right-wing trolls will be sh*tcanned. Thank you to everyone else. Please send feedback & PayPal contributions to cosanostradamusATexciteDOTcom. Thanks.

SUPPORT OUR TROOPS: BRING THEM ALL HOME ALIVE, NOW!

REMEMBERING KENNEDY

JOHN FITZGERALD KENNEDY

Thirty-Fifth President of the
United States of America
1961-1963

born Brookline, Massachusetts, 29 MAY 1917
assassinated Dallas, Texas, 22 NOV 1963

I was just a little Irish-Catholic kid when the first Irish Catholic was elected President of the United States. I grew up watching his brilliant press conferences. Those were the days when we had a bright, articulate, congenial man of the people in the White House, who was not afraid to speak to us, directly. Those were the days when everything seemed possible, and when we could believe our government was dedicated to doing good in the world. It was a good time to be a young kid. My life changed forever when he was murdered.

All of our lives did. But, especially the Irish Catholics. It may not seem like a big deal now, an Irish Catholic President. But the last Irish Catholic to run for President, NY Democratic Governor and working-class hero Al Smith, in 1928, had lost in large part because he was an Irish Catholic. A vicious campaign was waged against him, attacking him for BEING Catholic, and nothing more. Protestant ministers preached against Smith from the pulpit. The solidly Democratic South voted against the Democratic candidate en bloc, for the first time since the Civil War. The new medium of radio was used by Evangelicals to rail against "Rome Rule." The Klu Klux Klan held huge anti-Catholic rallies. Smith lost. Today, many Irish Catholic "Reagan Democrats," fans of Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity, seem to have forgotten that they were once targets of the Right, like blacks, Jews, gays, and so many others.

Though they have no coherent philosophy, conservatives can be said to unerringly, unthinkingly support the status quo, the leadership of it, and anything they do to retain their position. Their dog-like "loyalty," if it can be called that, also manifests itself in a willingness to attack anyone different, outside their limited experience, or perceived as threatening to the status quo. To conservatives, whatever is is perfect. Any change would be disastrous for them, somehow. This justifies their tactics, which resort first to violence, intimidation and slander of anyone who disagrees, or even fails to agree heartily, or quickly enough. They can tolerate no dissent, no argument, no questions. Their minds are made up, locked up, and incapable of adapting to new realities. They would rather die, or kill, than change with the times.

These are the people who could not accept the election of an Irish Catholic liberal Democratic Massachusetts Senator, in 1960. (Any of those descriptive terms will still set these people off.) These are the people who opposed Kennedy's every move. These are the people who killed him. Kennedy was a threat to their Sacred Status Quo. Kennedy supported workers rights, fought for civil rights, considered nuclear disarmament, and would have begun the process of detente with the Soviet Union thirty years earlier. That is why he was killed. No mystery.

The Republican campaign to slander the last genuine hero to occupy the White House, and one of the few ever, goes on today. They try to co-opt his legacy now, and Truman's, and even Roosevelt's; but they need to run JFK down, personally.

That's because there never was, and there will be a genuine conservative hero, of any sort, in the White House. Kennedy wasn't just a war hero, as recent underwater archaelogy confirms. He was, despite his wealth, a man of the people whose father had fought his way up from near the bottom, as a grandson of unwelcome immigrants. And no Kennedy ever forgot that.

This is what conservatives really hate about JFK. He was a working class hero, martyred for peace and justice, and an enemy of the status quo. From the space program, taken credit for and then abandoned by Nixon, to the Peace Corps, still bringing hope to the world after forty years of Republican assaults, John Kennedy inspired America, and the world. And the world mourned, genuinely, when he was brutally murdered.

To this day, I see cheap tapestries and faded icons to Kennedy in the homes of poor and working-class people, of all races, all over the country. There are no conservatives in such places of honour, in any honest home.

And that really galls them. Deep down, even the least educated American knows who his friends are, and who his enemies are. The Republicans are always there to remind them: Cutting aid to the poor, keeping wages down, opposing unions, and dividing America along every line they can find, or create.

Republican conservatives have nothing positive to offer. So they have to try to run down Kennedy, and all he stood for. He asked all Americans to put their country before themselves. Republicans always put Party first.

The worst they can really say is that John Kennedy MAY have slept with Marilyn Monroe. They're so out of it, they think that's a BAD thing! (I guess Nixon was jealous. Our tragic goddess of the silver screen would never have associated with such Republican trash.)

Remember John Kennedy, today, and his legacy, every day. Much of what little good there is left in the world came from him, and men and women like him. We'll not see his like again soon.



Send comments to cosanostradamus AT excite DOT com.



GINNY'S ARTWORK


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• ratboy's anvil


• By Beauty Damned


• The Dirty Ashtray


• Swerve Left


• Mirthful Ones


• Shining Light In Dark Corners


• The American Street


• americablog


• Eschaton


• daily kos

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TO POST A COMMENT: CLICK ON "COMMENTS," "Post a Comment" or "# of COMMENTS" just below the SOCIAL BOOKMARKING LINKS (Digg, Delicious, etc), about three inches down from here. Please do comment. Thank you.

IMPORTANT MESSAGE FROM YOUR BLOGGERS:

Suggestion Box & Tip Jar We would like to make over this blog to make it easier to access, to read and to comment on. We would also like to serve our readers better by providing more of what you need and want to see. All serious suggestions will be considered. We hope to move to our own domain in the near future, and we would like to ask for your financial assistance in doing that, and in upgrading our hardware & software. Small one-time donations and larger long-term subscriptions are welcome. Exclusive advertising is also available. If you think we are wasting our time in doing all this, please let us know. If you wish to help us, now is the time. As always, negative bullsh*t from right-wing trolls will be sh*tcanned. Thank you to everyone else. Please send feedback & PayPal contributions to cosanostradamusATexciteDOTcom. Thanks.

SUPPORT OUR TROOPS: BRING THEM ALL HOME ALIVE, NOW!