The Schmooze Award

Just want to interrupt to say please read Brad Blog for news about the Holt Bill. Also, thanks for the award! I am writing from Belize, where we are on vacation with the kids and father-in-law. We are in the most beautiful place, Ambergris Caye. Went to Altun Ha, the Mayan ruins, and to Maruba Jungle Spa, in the middle of the jungle. Went scuba diving and snorkeling with sharks and sting-rays.



Also here are some photos of famed pop artist/Warhold protege Steve Kaufman (top) and actor Chris McDonald (bottom) at the Mrs. United States pageant in Vegas. We were all judges.

Schmoozing is the natural ability “to converse casually, especially in order to gain an advantage or make a social connection.” Good schmoozers effortlessly weave their way in and out of the blogosphere, leaving friendly trails and smiles, happily making new friends along the way. They don’t limit their visits to only the rich and successful, but spend some time to say hello to new blogs as well. Bloggers who accept the award should then each pass it on to five blogs of their choice.

We have gained many new regular commenters here on Lydia's blog, and it's nice to have them come to schmooze with Lydia and become another blogging friend. Two such friends with wonderful blogs of their own, have separately bestowed the popular Schmooze Award of which I will name 5 more to pass the award onto.

Thank you Tomcat of the widly popular Politics Plus and also to the popular Betmo of Life's Journey for the award, and for your comments here on Lydia's blog.

The people that this award will be passed to have become regulars here on Lydia's blog and elsewhere, and they each have excellent blogs of their own. It's hard to choose five people, with so many making a presence on various blogs.

Mirth of Liberally Mirth has a popular blog which can be attributed to Mirth's daily visits on various blogs, that bring many to want to visit hers.

Chuck and Karen of Divided States of Bushmerika2 make their way around dozens of blogs, and really do have the art of schmoozing down pat.

Tom Harper of Who Hijacked Our Country has been appearing on many blogs including this one, leaving his thoughts on the issues of the day. Check out his blog, it's a good one.

Jim of An Average American Patriot makes his way to various blogs commenting on the way our country is headed. Check out his blog.

The very popular Lynn of Zelleblog seems to be everywhere making comments as well as writing some great articles for her blog. Check her blog out.

Don't forget to listen to the Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk Show Saturday at 9:00 AM PST. Each week they have well known guests, lively commentary and your phone calls.

Is Bush Smarter Than Bill Gates or Warren Buffett

Please read the article from Warren Buffett. It is very telling.

Guest post by Mike

Republicans often accuse Progressives of not being successful, or of even hating the success of others and wanting to unfairly penalize them. They also accuse Progressives of not knowing what is best for the economy or society as a whole, they claim to know more than us how run the economy.

So I ask if we are talking economics or success in business or just plain being smart who would YOU rather listen to, some of the most brilliant and successful businessmen in the world like Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, George Soros, Ted Turner etc......who say they don't WANT or NEED tax free dividends or tax cuts and it would benefit the economy and society FAR MORE and be FAR MORE fair to give them to the poor and middle class; or would you rather listen to GWB and Dick Cheney a couple of ne'er-do-wells, who failed at most everything they have ever done and have been dead wrong about essentially EVERYTHING.

According to GWB, its fair for a billionaire to pay less than 1/10 the percentage of his income in taxes as a working class person struggling to raise a family...............Oh, one more thing the economy has consistently done MUCH better under Democratic administrations in almost every measurable metric, so it would seem it is the Democrats who REALLY know what is best.

"The taxes I pay to the federal government are roughly the same proportion of my income about 30% as that paid by the receptionist in our office. My case is not atypical, my earnings,like those of many rich people, are a mix of capital gains and ordinary income nor is it affected by tax shelters (I've never used any).

As it works out, I pay a somewhat higher rate for my combination of salary, investment and capital gain income than our receptionist does. But she pays a far higher portion of her income in payroll taxes than I do. She's not complaining: Both of us know we were lucky to be born in America.

Now the Senate says that dividends should be tax free to recipients. Suppose this measure goes through and the directors of Berkshire Hathaway (which doesn't now pay a dividend) therefore decide to pay $1 billion in dividends next year. Owning 31 percent of Berkshire, I would receive $310 million in additional income, owe not another dime in federal tax, and see my tax rate plunge to 3 percent. And our receptionist? She'd still be paying about 30%,which means she would be contributing about 10 times the proportion of her income that I would to such government pursuits as fighting terrorism, waging wars and supporting the elderly. Let me repeat the point: Her overall federal tax rate would be 10 times what my rate would be.

When I was young, President Kennedy asked us to "pay any price, bear any burden" for our country. Against that challenge, the 3 percent overall federal tax rate I would pay if a Berkshire dividend were to be tax free seems a bit light. Administration officials say that the $310 million suddenly added to my wallet would stimulate the economy because I would invest it and thereby create jobs. But they conveniently forget that if Berkshire kept the money, it would invest that same amount, creating jobs as well.

The Senate's plan invites corporations indeed,virtually commands them to contort their behavior in a major way. Overall, it's hard to conceive of anything sillier than the schedule the Senate has laid out.

Indeed, the first President Bush had a name for such activities: "voodoo economics." The manipulation of enactment and sunset dates of tax changes is Enron-style accounting, and a Congress that has recently demanded honest corporate numbers should now look hard at its own practices. Proponents of cutting tax rates on dividends argue that the move will stimulate the economy.

A large amount of stimulus,of course, should already be on the way from the huge and growing deficit the government is now running. I have no strong views on whether more action on this front is warranted. But if it is, don't cut the taxes of people with huge portfolios of stocks held directly. (Small investors owning stock held through 401(k)s are already tax favored.)

Instead, give reductions to those who both need and will spend the money gained. Enact a Social Security tax "holiday" or give a flat sum rebate to people with low incomes. Putting $1,000 in the pockets of 310,000 families with urgent needs is going to provide far more stimulus to the economy than putting the same $310 million in my pockets. When you listen to tax cut rhetoric, remember that giving one class of tax payer a "break" requires now or down the line that an equivalent burden be imposed on other parties.

In other words, if I get a break, someone else pays. Government can't deliver a free lunch to the country as a whole. It can, however, determine who pays for lunch. And last week the Senate handed the bill to the wrong party. Supporters of making dividends tax free like to paint critics as promoters of class warfare. The fact is, however, that their proposal promotes class welfare. For my class."

Warren Buffett

More Tears Than Laughs in Sicko by Michael Moore

A young child gets sick with an imminently treatable virus; her temperature soars to 104° yet the hospital refuses to treat her. She has a seizure, followed by cardiac arrest. Still no medical care. Eventually, she dies. Was this little girl an impoverished Haitian? A rural African or better yet, an inner city kid from Detroit? No, she was a white American with health insurance whose carrier insisted that she be transported to another hospital within the network. How could that happen?

In his finest film to date, Michael Moore provides a devastating critique of the US health care system, or the lack thereof. He opens the movie by talking about the 50 million Americans who don't have any health insurance but quickly moves on to focus on the remaining 250 million who are insured, largely by health maintenance organizations whose sole goal is profit at any expense.

Moore traces the origin of the HMO to a highly inflammatory conversation that President Nixon had with an aide back in 1971 whereby Nixon announced that it would be a terrible idea for government to expand its role in health care but a wonderful prospect if it were to be privatized. And so we find ourselves in the sorry state that we have today where people work their asses off, believing that they will be protected if they get sick but in fact, they are routinely denied coverage and/or benefits by HMOs for any reason under the sun. Pre-existing conditions can disqualify people from getting insurance. Failure to disclose a benign and ridiculous problem such as an ordinary yeast infection led Blue Cross to stop payment on a hospital bill for a distraught woman with endometriosis who had been faithfully paying her Blue Cross premiums.

Moore contrasts the American system with that of other countries and points out that the United States is the only Western industrialized country that lacks a universal health care system. He visits Canada, Britain, and France -- and even Cuba, in a particularly daring, in-your-face maneuver that only he could pull off -- concluding that they are vastly superior to the US.

What Moore doesn't mention is that most of the countries above, as well as Australia and New Zealand, have a parallel private system. He tends to glorify Canada with his selective perspective and interviewing techniques, dismissing news reports about long waiting lists for procedures and lack of proper equipment in Canada as being sheer propaganda; he interviews Canadians in Windsor, Ontario who claimed that they had only been waiting for 20 minutes or so to see a doctor.

Having had the advantage of living in the US for 26 years and the remainder of my 28 years in Canada, I can say with confidence that any time I've had to go to the emergency room in Ottawa, I've waited four to eight hours. I also waited 18 months for a hip replacement that I needed at the age of 47 as a result of a car accident; and there is a marked shortage of MRI machines in Canada's capital. As a result, a small private system has emerged in Québec where people go across the line to pay $700 for their MRI so as to discover a tumor before it metastasizes. Canadians also pay for medications, physiotherapy and dental care, although these services are subsidized for those with low income.

Despite these minor problems with the Canadian system, I would choose it hands-down any day of the week over American health care. Canadian Medicare is unquestionably better which is why it wouldn't have hurt Moore at all to have made a more balanced presentation of the facts.

Aside from the outstanding medical care that Michael Moore managed to subversively obtain for some 9/11 workers in Cuba, the country that stood above all others in his analysis was France -- 35 hour work weeks, five weeks paid vacation per year even for part-time workers, full universal health care, nannies who are sent out by the government to help new mothers (and even do their laundry!), excellent subsidized day care, and romantic couples kissing in parks along with families relaxing, so unlike their American counterparts, filled with road rage as they drive home after their backbreaking 10 hour day to pick up some fast food at Kentucky Fried Chicken. The French have it all, including the pastries.

What Moore doesn't address is the recent election in France. Why was the left-wing government voted out and replaced by a strong right-winger if everyone was so happy with their idyllic situation?

Lastly, Moore asks what's wrong with the American government. I ask what's wrong with the American people. They're only 435 members of the House of Representatives, 50 members of Congress and a handful of people in the White House. If there's power in numbers, the people have it. Why aren't they using it? When did they become so complacent? Why aren't they marching in the streets, holding dead children in their arms and missing fingers that they couldn't afford to reattach? Has the Bush regime rendered them all terrified? But the problem predates Bush by a long shot and didn't seem to improve during the eight years that Clinton/Gore had in office.

Don't buy the argument that the government can't afford universal health care -- according to the Associated Press, US taxpayers are spending an estimated $10 billion a month in Iraq. Ouch.

I loved Sicko and I'll see it again on DVD so I can pause, rewind and reflect on the horrors of the American health care plan. No one says it better than Moore and I've been a fan of all of his movies, however, he always has his POV (point of view) and it wouldn't hurt him to balance things out just a tiny bit. That won't prevent me from giving this documentary a five-star plus rating but I didn't find it as funny as others did. Sarcastic, yes. Black humor? Definitely. Laugh-out-loud funny? Hmmm. I missed that! But don't you miss this brilliant, acerbic exposé.

Review by Sigrid Macdonald

Sigrid is a friend of mine that has written an amazing book titled D'Amour Road which you can learn more about by going to her blog at D'Amour Road

MRS. UNITED STATES * Out of the Ordinary

"The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart."
- Helen Keller

The Winner! Mrs. Michigan Stephanie Hunt


Mrs. Michigan Stephanie Hunt, the first black woman to win Mrs. United States, has a child with a rare disease, and she works tirelessly to raise funds for the RTS foundation. She also weighed over 250 pounds one year ago, having lost 100 pounds in one year. This is an amazing American woman.

The Silverton Lodge & Casino

I just want to take a moment to acknowledge the amazing women I've met this week. I have the honor of being a judge in the MRS. UNITED STATES pageant here in Las Vegas at the elegant Silverton Hotel, which reminds me of being in a grand lodge in Lake Tahoe. Check out these extraordinary creatures at: MRS. UNITED STATES

This is not an ordinary beauty pageant. These women are remarkable for the struggles they've each gone through and their committment to helping the world and their communities through volunteer work. Many have suffered enormous odds, while juggling careers and taking care of families. Some have adopted special needs children, some have struggled with abuse, abandonment, autisim and infertility — and others are taking care of spouses with PTSD. All of them are magnificent women, and all are married. Some have written books and inspire others through being good role models. One is a member of the National Guard. Two of these women are expecting their first child! The age range is 20 to 60. And what I appreciated the most is that some of these women have defied age; they are in better shape and more beautiful over 50.

I had tears in my eyes during their interviews. Not only are they GORGEOUS, but deeply compassionate and intelligent.

Thursday night were the finals and we chose one woman out of 54, representing every state in America plus Guam and the Virgin Islands. Wednesday night we had the difficult job of judging swim suit and evening gown competition. They all have great bodies, but some of them have better abs after having children!

The inimitable Chris Rafael of the Really Spectacular Company produced the event. I love the people I'm meeting. Shannon Devine is Mrs. United States 2006; she's gorgeous, hilarious and down-to-earth. Tony Newton from E-Channel, Talk Soup, VH-1 and Price is Right is the host, and the other celebrity judges are Chris McDonald (Thelma and Lousie; Happy Gilmore) Steve Kaufman, the world-famous pop artist; Lindsay Clubine from "Deal or No Deal;" Andrea Preuss, Mrs. United States 2003; Howard Jochsberger, Boyd Gaming Commission, Benson Lee, Esq.

I want to mention Mrs. Vermont, who needs to get her message out there. For the past three years she has been nursing her husband, who came back from Iraq with PTSD. She has been supporting the family while her husband suffers through night tremors and incapacitating problems. Here is her bio:

Dr. Stephanie Mills is the wife of Sgt. Bradley Mills and the mother of two beautiful daughters, Brooke (8) and Emilee (5). Her family has endured the stress and heartache of Bradley''s 13 month Iraq deployment over three years ago. Stephanie is a volunteer and spokesperson for the national Adopt-A-Platoon Organization and since her husband''s return, Stephanie has founded the Community HEART Program, promoting the importance of "Helping All Returning Troops" and raising awareness of PTSD. Please ADOPT A PLATOON!

Don't forget the Basham and Cornell Progressive Talk Show on Saturday at 9:00 AM PST. You always hear lively talk, excellent guests and your calls are taken.

Darklords, Dunces and Dictators!

Guest post by Mike


Darklords, Dunces and Dictators! Truth oftentimes mirrors or is stranger than fiction, this article will compare history to fiction to illustrate the similarities both in motives and actions between historical and fictional darklords, dunces and dictators.

An interesting commonality when examining evildoers is the theory that evil may start out with fair motives before the all consuming desire for power to exert their will and control and dominate others eats them up and becomes the sole objective. Now keep in mind when I say "fair motives" I DON'T mean benevolent or good intentions that benefit society as a whole, what I do mean is that originally the motivations were more likely self serving and megalomanical in nature such as seizing power to do what these people felt was right or beneficial to themselves rather than genocidal or nihilistic. Hitler for instance most likely didn't ORIGINALLY intend on committing genocide by throwing people in ovens and gas chambers but the quest for total power lead him to those twisted actions eventually.

Lets examine this theory first by looking at one of my all time favorite authors Tolkien. Tolkien states that the Darklord Sauron was not wholly evil in his beginning, in fact Tolkien states that at the beginning of the second age Sauron's motives, the rehabilitation and reorganization of Middle-Earth were indeed fair, however his arrogance and desire for the power to control and effect how that change and reorganization were carried out eventually consumed him and metastasized into something very different, the desire to exert his will and control and dominate other's.

I think this is a very common theme, for the rise of dictators/darklords, although we will likely never KNOW definitively I would speculate that Bush, Cheney and the Neo Con's original intentions weren't to torture, destroy the US Constitution or get bogged down in an almost 5 year and counting unwinnable quagmire in foreign lands............

I think they were energy men who KNEW peak oil was fast approaching, they also KNEW our economic and military dominance is predicated on cheap oil, and that Iraq and Iran were just about the ONLY countries with relatively untapped oil and gas reserves that could be increased significantly. In fact Iraq probably has the cheapest oil reserves in the world and Iran has enormous natural gas reserves and could probably almost double oil output with significant investment, all that was needed was the implementation of the Neo Con plan to overthrow the USA hostile governments and install puppet governments loyal to them and we not only would we have cheap oil to keep our economy humming for almost 2 decades, but American oil companies and those in league with them could reap vast fortunes developing and buying those reserves and rewriting the laws to give our oil companies favorable contracts. ........problem is it didn't go as planned and now the desire to dominate and exert our will in ANY way possible has superceded the original plan.

The original plan was to usher in another 20 year economic boom by insuring our access to cheap oil, they also wanted to continue Reagan's work to maintain our military dominance, and continue the erosion of safety nets and regulations protecting the working class, and permanently rig the system in favor of the wealthy. Essentially they wanted to undo the NEW DEAL, abolish Social Security, destroy unions and neuter regulatory agencies like the SEC, FCC, FDA, EPA, OSHA......etc.

Similarly, although we will never truly KNOW, although Hitler despised the Jews I think in the beginning, his original plan was not the nihilistic and genocidal extermination of a race, but rather to restore Germany's former economic and military power and pride and extricate it from the yoke of harsh, punitive war reparations. I think his seething hatred and racial prejudices combined with his megalomanical obsession with exerting his will and dominating and controlling others consumed him and transformed him in to the monster we read about today.

Lets move on to the movies, in Revenge of The Sith, when Padme is witnessing the rise of the Empire, Palpatine who manipulated the republic into war to seize and cement absolute power via dictatorship, triumphantly proclaims himself emperor and Padme says "so this is how democracy dies with thunderous applause" . It chillingly reminded me of how people cheered as the heinous Patriot Act was railroaded through Congress to give the "DECIDER" special "war powers" that further eroded the checks and balances and started the transformation of our country to a police state and dictatorship.

Another "interesting" Star Wars comparison is Dick Cheney stating he is President of the Senate and thus does not fall under, nor is he subject to Executive Orders and oversight.............kinda reminds you of Emperor Palpatine shrieking "I AM THE SENATE" or cackling "unlimited power" as he implements his coup to hijack the republic and seize ultimate power.

Anakin Skywalker is another perfect example of fair motives being corrupted and replaced with the all consuming and nihilistic obsession for the power to implement the desired changes. Anakins original desire was for the power to protect the ones he loved, end the war and restore order and justice to the universe...........eventually his obsession with power transformed him into the very thing he despised and opposed.

Fortunately if we follow this theme to its logical conclusion evil always turns on itself and defeats itself, its arrogance often blinds it. Sauron never imagined any one would even attempt to destroy the ring, the irony here is that it wasn't one of the good guys that actually destroyed the ring, it was evil that turned on itself that destroyed the ring and laid the mighty Sauron and his evil empire low, it was Gollem's greed and obsession that led to Sauron's demise. Same for Hitler, it was his arrogance that caused him to overextend himself in Russia, and hastened his demise. similarly Evil once again turned on itself when Darth Vader turned on the emperor and destroyed himself and his master. Arrogance and the megalomanical perception of omnipotence and obsession with unrivaled and untouchable power led all of the previous dark lords, and dictators to the same ruinous path to the void and the nothingness and irrelevance that awaits them.

Now that we covered the darklords and dictators its time to focus on the dunces...........GWB and the Neo Cons will be brought down by their own incompetence, pompous arrogance and perceived omnipotence, exactly WHAT will bring them down is the question of the century........lets see we have attorneygate, Iraqgate, Spygate, Libbygate, and most recently Commutationgate, that is clearly a plan to further obstruct justice by providing Libby an EXCUSE to not have to testify and likely implicate GWB and Cheney in the Plame civil suit while his appeal is going on etc..............too many more to list! I'd like to hear your opinions on what will bring about the demise of the Bush Administration


Image by Stephen Pitt Cartoons

WHEN TORTURE IS OUTLAWED...

I was reading comments in an online blog recently and I came across a comment by a conservative commenter in a thread about the 50 Presidential Scholar children who handed Bush a letter asking him to stop torturing. The comment was as follows.

When torture is outlawed, only outlaws will use torture!

We all have seen this quote before. Its a favorite of the RNC and the NRA for defending gun ownership rights and bumperstickers bearing these words adorn pickups throughout the south. But what kind of logic really exists in that tired slogan, particularly when applied to torture? That slogan leaves many questions, as does the act of torture itself.

For example, by that exact same logic, why bother to outlaw raping children?

After all, if raping children is outlawed, only outlaws will rape children.

Or why bother outlawing bank robbery?

After all, if robbing banks is outlawed, only outlaws will rob banks.

And why bother outlawing car jacking?

After all, if car jacking is outlawed, only outlaws will jack cars.

Or perhaps is it possible, just possible, that there are some moral absolutes? Could it be things like, raping children and beating pregnant women with tire irons, and torturing our fellow man, are just morally wrong, under any circumstances?

I’m fully aware of the old tired RNC argument that “what if someone had information that would save 10,000 lives from being killed, is torture worth it then?”. Well, in the same vein I ask, what if that same person had information that would save 10,000 lives from being killed, and the terrorist wouldn’t break under torture, but he offers to provide it if you let him rape a 6 year old girl.

Would you do that?

Would it be “worth it”, to let a 6 year old girl be raped mercilessly while you watch, so that 10,000 Americans could keep from dying today, instead of sometime down the road? And if so I ask, what kind of people are these 10,000, who would be ok with living longer if a 6 year old girl had to be raped to do it? What sort of person would be ok living under those circumstances?

Are such lives worthy of being spared? And if so, is the guy your torturing the right guy?

Is he a terrorist or an innocent college student with the same name?

Will he tell you the truth, or just tell you whatever he thinks you want to hear that will make him stop hurting you?

Will the information he has be valid, or will he be missing a peice of the puzzle?

Will you be competent and capable enough to stop it even if he does give you correct information, or will the event play out before your impotent eyes?

Is torturing helpless human beings the only way Americans can survive now?

Is tortuing helpless human beings what Americans are about?

50 Presidential Scholars who met with Mr Bush as a reward for their scholastic acheivements, asked and answered these questions for Mr Bush last week. He didn't get it.

How we, as a country answer these questions, will determine who we are, and more importantly, who we are not.

Click here to hear the scholars tell the story.

Click here to hear what Keith Olberman had to say about the 50 scholars

Thinking Blogger Award

We are happy to announce that the Lydia Cornell blog has been tagged with the "Thinking Blogger Award" by our friends Chuck and Karen at their widely popular blog The Divided States Of Bushmerika 2.

Thank you Chuck and Karen for your kind words and your regular comments on this blog. As many of you know we now have to choose 5 blogs that make us think. So many have been chosen in the past that we want to pick some that make us think, and maybe our viewers haven't discovered, or rediscovered yet.

THE RULES ARE AS FOLLOWS:
1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think.

2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme.

3. Optional: Proudly display the ‘Thinking Blogger Award’ with a link to the post that you wrote.

Last Left Turn Before Hooterville is a popular blog by good friend Alicia Morgan. Alicia writes about political matters with wisdom and humor. Alicia is an excellent writer.

Watergate Summer marks the recent return to the blogosphere of Enigma4Ever from her exile of being a whistle blower in the recent Attorneygate scandals that rocked the Bush administration. Check this site out. It is worth the read.

Morning Martini is the popular blog by our new friend Pissed off Patricia. Patricia has become a regular commenter here and her articles on her blog are worth the read.

We welcome the return of famed blogger Neal Shakespeare and his way of wit and humor that has always made us think.

Our last entry is Left of Centrist is a growing blog put out by Robert Rouse and his team of contributors. Is has updated political stories and is worth checking out.

Thank you for viewing and making your comments on the Lydia Cornell blog. Your thoughtful comments are appreciated, and look for many big additions and new features with this blog, as we bring you fresh insight into different areas of politics and life. Please come back.