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In Memory of Fergie

I never met Fergie, nor, for that matter, our beloved PPO, her husband. But they have filled my life and her passing is real. None of us here will forget her, and we send PPO our love and best wishes for the strength to get through this awful, hard, dark time without her. We love you, PPO. We are here. Blessed be.

» Posted By choicelady On October 12, 2021 @ 2:48 pm

Trump Luncheon With Queen Ruined As Entire Beef Wellington Disappears

I bow to your powers of observation!

» Posted By choicelady On June 6, 2019 @ 10:09 am

Great to see YOU, cat!!!

» Posted By choicelady On June 6, 2019 @ 10:08 am

I think it was staff. Mr. T. wouldn’t be caught dead eating something other than fast food. He’s terrified of being poisoned. He’s probably got a point there, though with many guests coming, he was pretty safe. What I’m burning to know is what the Palace chef served instead? Mr. T. is not a nice guest. I imagine he demanded his Big Mac no matter what. He’s the only head of state who could throw a conniption fit over not getting his fast food fave. And upon that the security of the free world is teetering.

There’s a story going around that with all the changes in common law that have occurred since the Glorious Revolution of 1688, nobody has actually ascertained whether the Queen’s right to behead a recalcitrant and duplicitous enemy has been revoked. I suspect the Queen took great solace in the possibility it has not been.

I’m with her on that.

» Posted By choicelady On June 4, 2019 @ 10:05 pm

The Cynical Charade of “Pro-Life” Politicians

I agree – the vision is ours to uphold family stability, restore reliable economic and justice rights to people. Repair IS the work of reminding people that their peace of mind rests on wise policies we once had. We can have far better regulation of corporations. We can take up Hillary’s tax plan to give cuts to any company that shares PROFITS with those who made those profits. We can provide solid funding for police, firefighters, teachers, infrastructure. We can have peace of mind crossing bridges and safety in eliminating potholes and poor road surfaces. We can emphasize community policing rather than militarization, good screening of candidates so there are no rogue cops anymore. We can make sure our teachers have substantive information, not just test oriented plans.

We probably can’t restore a lot of manufacturing, at least not quickly, but we can most decidedly change the tax laws that make it more profitable in the very short term to close factories for the tax money obtained in write downs and instead encourage staying in business with expanded hiring as the goal for tax benefits. We can encourage employee ownership – ESOPs or cooperatives – to prevent closures. All of that requires, first and foremost, that we end the massive tax cuts for the rich and corporations that do nothing for our nation and for only themselves. We can roll back taxes on the middle class, restore the employee oriented tax deductions plus those for state and local taxes, charitable deductions.

Restoration IS the future if we give details on how much people are being hurt now and how much better off they CAN be with a return to family and community oriented policies, not those for the 1%.

Those are visions both of a better past AND an excellent future.

And anyone pitching M4A DAMNED better well have facts in hand about cost and coverage because I’ve worked on single payer far too long not to know how details matter. I see no one doing the research on what system actually works best: Canada? UK’s national health system? Many EU nations’ multipayer systems? ACA with a public option? Let’s do the MATH and compare benefits and find the hell OUT before jumping off that cliff, no parachute.

We can do these things. We can show that the promise to “Make America Great” has failed the people. We can do this.

» Posted By choicelady On May 29, 2019 @ 10:06 am

Hey Sue =- Well said! Good to see you, and great to read your views!

» Posted By choicelady On May 28, 2019 @ 8:23 pm

From many years on the streets helping women get access to clinic services, I got to see what “pro life” means, and it’s nothing about life at all. It’s anger, control, dominance by those we rightfully call Dominionists. They have zero morality, worship power and money, and could not care less about babies, children, or any human beings once born. I never met a body of people more devoted to evil than those folks.

Trump is their savior – his plans and court appointments seek to give Dominion over the rest of us with their evil and vile ideology. It won’t prevail, BUT it will require absolute fidelity from us all to make sure that we win in 2020. We will have ONE task at that point – regaining democracy and the rule of law via the Constitution. Whoever wins has ONE task – restoring it all. We cannot be looking primarily to new issues. We have to repair what was damaged, shore up Constitutional rights, regain world credibility, calm the waters of hate and extremism. Whoever does that will be unpopular, will be a fixer not a promoter of new ideas, will take time and won’t be hasty. And probably will be a one term president because of it all.

But this is ESSENTIAL work. The RW has seen power and won’t give it up. They are willing for us to die so their vision of “life” prevails. That cannot be allowed to happen. It’s on us all to assure it does not continue.

» Posted By choicelady On May 28, 2019 @ 8:23 pm

I am not unsympathetic to people who truly do believe life begins at conception, ends at death, who, in the middle support the “least and the lost”, who uphold support for families in need, who oppose the death penalty, and who live their beliefs in positive ways. I, a very prochoice woman, have a number of beloved friends like that.

They are NOT GOP politicians.

NOTHING about the main “prolife” movement is pro life. It’s merely anti abortion. It seeks control of women despite the OBVIOUS fact that men, not women, are 100% responsible for all pregnancies. Hey guys – we can’t do it without you.

How we move on from here is through highlighting these issues. The MAJORITY of people nationwide want abortion legal and safe for women. This has to be tied to the cuts in supports for the children already here, the disregard for tiny kids in cages, the cold blooded willingness to execute felons, even those with developmental disabilities, to show the anti life drumbeat that is today’s GOP.

We will win this. The people of America WANT us to win this. So vote out the women hating curmudgeons and vote IN people who are supportive of those for whom abortion is unthinkable as well as for those who are OK with it. Support for women and children is paramount. THEN we will win this argument because we have taken the high ground for life in all its varied and wonderful forms.

» Posted By choicelady On May 28, 2019 @ 7:01 pm

Welcome to the New PlanetPOV!!!

Rejoice and be thankful! (Same here.)

» Posted By choicelady On May 27, 2019 @ 4:07 pm

That’s not like ripping the label off upholstered goods, is it? Take due care, Ad. Federal offenses have taken on a new scariness!

» Posted By choicelady On May 27, 2019 @ 4:06 pm

You both are the BEST – this is exciting! Seeing lots of people coming together for discussions is awesome, and the new design is very fine. Thanks to you both, AdLib our Founder Without Pretensions and to you, Murph for all you’ve been for us and for Yabberz folks. Welcome to new people, hi to old friends!

» Posted By choicelady On May 27, 2019 @ 12:37 pm

EXCLUSIVE: Video and Photos from The March For Our Lives in Los Angeles

WONDERFUL photos of a large, diverse, and energized populace. Thanks, AdLib. I couldn’t be there, but I am wearing my MFOL T shirt that I got expressly from the L.A. march folks.

May this movement carry on far and wide. It’s brought millions together to work for change in powerful and enduring ways!

» Posted By choicelady On March 24, 2018 @ 4:47 pm

Lobbyists…Good or Bad?

Hi AdLib-

I am ALL for using SCOTUS if we can. It would be much easier indeed.

As it now stands, foreign donations are still forbidden to candidates, but it appears not so tough to attach to a PAC, no.

SuperPAC money (or corporate money for that matter) cannot be given to candidates but that doesn’t stop PACs from arguing (supposedly independent of that candidate – no “coordination”) some issue or focus that is supportive to one at the expense of another. And I see no observable limitations on foreign donations to those c-4 PAC organizations.

What has well and truly pissed me off about CU is that it was supported by ACLU. They blithely said it would promote MORE free speech that would prompt further free speech from the rest of us. They totally overlooked how much it costs to get ads and air time out there. That was just so dumb!

Money is NOT free speech. And yes, if we can get a good SCOTUS majority, we could overturn this obscene inequality. Would be the best thing that could happen to our election system.

But whatever we do on CU, it does not have an impact on Congressional lobbying, and that is ANOTHER issue where CA-style regulations could do a great deal of good at the national level. There’s never NOT a job for us to do to get the reforms we so very much need is there?

» Posted By choicelady On August 6, 2016 @ 8:30 pm

Hi Nirek – Well, Bern took it on, but I was working it along with many groups (Common Cause etc,) YEARS before he raised the issue. Clinton had it in her platform before Bernie announced. And why not? Citizens United spending on the film WAS about her! That film is still “out there” created by dark money that is now legal. It’s playing right now at a theater near Sacramento.

Bernie focused on a few issues, one of them ‘overturning CU’, but HER broader issue isn’t just that but getting ALL the various forms of monetary influence gone.

The problem comes when you target something like CU and don’t expand the point to include issues such as that you’ve raised here. Lobbying is not campaign dollars. Those would not stop even if we did end CU operations. So I tend to lean toward anyone who sees the broader picture as she does. And SHE does because she has seen its impacts in ways Bern never did.

So yes – I have watched her target CU and the larger issues.

» Posted By choicelady On August 6, 2016 @ 11:53 am

Hi kes!

Hope you are well. Too long not talking.

I totally agree about being concerned about downticket races to get back a decent Congress. Getting rid of CU will probably take a Constitutional Amendment indeed. SCOTUS – and, I will remind everyone, ACLU – supported money as the equivalent of free speech, and we are screwed.

We public interest lobbyists actually DO make a difference, but it has a lot to do with which party is in control of each house. It’s easier at state levels – and critically important there, too – but we’re not down and out in Congress when we have rational (roll on the floor over this bunch of goons) people in each house.

My one jolly out of this is how utterly inept the Kochs’ money has been this campaign. NONE of the candidates they backed got anywhere on the presidential level.

That said, they may be far more effective at Congress and local races, so we must never take our eyes off the prize.

I hope YOU are doing OK? How and where is your amazing son? I miss hearing everyone’s updates, but I’m taking a major mental health break from blogging since REAL life is stressful enough, thank you!

Be back in the Fall to rejoin my friends here on The Planet.

In the meantime – vote early and often as we used to say in Chicago. The other side will.

Hugs-choicelady

» Posted By choicelady On August 5, 2016 @ 6:45 pm

I’d never once think AdLib or anyone would tolerate that!!!

Back in the fall when my own crises of work and world calm down.

Be well!

» Posted By choicelady On August 5, 2016 @ 6:40 pm

Good to see you, dear KT – I am declining to do much because REAL life (as opposed to online life) is highly stressful these days. I decided to eliminate everything that made me tense, and I’m not blogging much right now. I do Tweet but am the ‘fastest block in the West’ so I don’t have to engage with Trumpsters or anyone looking for a fight.

But I keep an eye on conversations, and since I’m IN the system, so to speak, I thought it a good time to pop back in.

Be well, dear heart. Always good to see you.

» Posted By choicelady On August 5, 2016 @ 6:17 pm

Hello all – decided to drop back in for this.

First, Bern did NOT move Hillary on CU. Do remember who that was ABOUT? Citizens United wanted unfettered opportunity to promote a film TRASHING HER in 2008. So if anyone gets it – it is Hillary Clinton. She was more appalled than anyone when SCOTUS (with the help of the ACLU that stupidly sided with CU advocates) ruled that unlimited spending by PACs could indeed be generated to gut all good candidates.

She was opposed to CU before Bernie was ever a twinkle in anyone’s eye.

Second – think very closely about trashing lobbyists. Why? About 1/3 of them work in the public interest. Common Cause was the first way back in the day, but almost every non profit and public interest group has one either in states or federally or both.

I am a registered lobbyist. I work for a progressive non profit and raise my voice for every issue anyone here cares about. The issue isn’t lobbying – it’s the rules of the game. CA for example forbids me and Chevron’s lobbyist from donating one penny to any candidate running in this state. We may not DELIVER campaign donations, make behested payments to legislators, may not donate to their charitable causes – nothing. We have just passed very strict rules on what legislators may accept from the organizations (distinct from us as lobbyists) No gifts. None. No fancy pants invitations to travel or box seats at a game – these are now considered corrupt.

So if states such as CA can make these laws – the nation may do so as well.

To get major reform you need a decent Congress. To get a decent Congress you have to vote Dem even if you don’t like the individual in your district. It’s the HOUSE and SENATE that will change these rules including raising the constitutional amendment we all want. No majority? Never happens.

So don’t think lobbying is the sole issue or that it has to do with CU – those are two different things. Kill all the lobbyists, you still have CU which is about campaign donations not lobbying.

We CAN get rid of the power of money in our elected officials’ lives and operation. But we need to be strategic and NOT throw the baby out with the bathwater. ONLY the water needs to go.

Nice to see everybody – be well!

» Posted By choicelady On August 5, 2016 @ 5:28 pm

Using Her SuperPAC to Attack Bernie May Hurt Hillary More Than Help Her

I guess I just took this as a matter of fact not saying anything Sanders has not already said. Maybe I’m partly influenced by various progressive groups around northern CA that of course support Sander but also openly supported Chavez and Corbyn taking it as a matter of course not anything being hidden.

I have no idea if this was intended to be a slam, but I can’t see anything here I have no seen before – openly.

» Posted By choicelady On September 17, 2015 @ 11:29 am

One question – I read the article and cannot see how it ‘smeared’ Bernie at all. Maybe I just don’t get the insider stuff, but even reading the post, I don’t see it.

» Posted By choicelady On September 16, 2015 @ 4:47 pm

How Genuine Are Hillary Clinton’s Attacks on Wall Street?

Funk – Glass-Steagall did one thing: it put the firewall between our money in our accounts and the money banks could use for their own investments. That’s it. And that’s what the Volcker Rule does in Dodd-Frank. It was adopted by the regulatory agencies in December 2013 and has begun reducing the amount of risk WE have no matter what the banks do.

Obama has NO negative record – once again, while we were all sleeping, the banks in the 90s and 2000s, made what they did LEGAL. What banks did that was not WAS prosecuted at the federal district court levels. But if anyone is to blame for 2008 it is the American people who just tuned out to the changes in the law. There is almost NOTHING – and Krugman agrees – that this administration could do. The time to act was under Bill and W – and we paid no attention until it was too damned late. YOU can call it fraud – but the vast majority of fraud was perpetrated by mortgage brokers who were unregulated, not by banks that bought the lousy loan paper. The brokers HAVE been prosecuted – I get the notices from our US Attorney about what has happened to those craven brokers here in the Eastern District of CA.

This is not on Obama for following the law. This is on us for letting it happen.

» Posted By choicelady On July 14, 2015 @ 5:44 pm

Nirek – his agenda is Obama’s accomplishments. I think Bernie is a fraud. I am bitterly disappointed in how superficial he is.

» Posted By choicelady On July 14, 2015 @ 5:37 pm

I have to disagree about Bernie. His policy proposals are what President Obama is DOING, but he gives no credit. He proposes ideas that are also in play with this administration but held up by the same damned Congress that Obama faces.

He has nothing in hand that addresses anything but generalities. His own record is pitiful – three bills passed in the Senate. Two were renaming post offices. He has NOT walked the walk, and he has no policies, only slogans. I am so fed up with his ilk I could spit. We have a chance for a real progressive maybe – and he’s not it.

I am appalled at his tin ear on race. So what if he marched with Rev. King 52 years ago? He has done NOTHING on racial justice since. He was MIA on Ferguson, NYC, and especially Charleston going so far as to interrupt a memorial service for the 9 victims on the Capitol lawn while he pounded the lectern for pension reform. That’s white effing privilege at play, and I am furious he cannot and will not give us better.

I have no idea where Hillary will be as president. I have reasons that are deeply personal to like her and reasons that are deeply worried on policy to NOT like her. But she’s far more focused than is Bernie. He either needs to grow up and stop with the rhetoric or I’m done. Until he tells us HOW we will get what he wants – and how he would build on the Obama legacy – he’s just another Emo with no substance, no capacity, no juice, no chops.

» Posted By choicelady On July 14, 2015 @ 5:36 pm

Justice Scala Upholds Injunction Ending History

I get this, AdLib – it’s indeed harder to parody them when what they really say and do is so over the top to begin with.

» Posted By choicelady On June 29, 2015 @ 6:20 pm

Hi-

Sorry to disagree – but if SCOTUS is ever subject to vote, we will have only BAD interpretations, politicized interpretations, of the law.

I can live with Roberts who sometimes sees the majesty of the law and Constitution, even when I hate things such as “toxic slime is GOOD for corporations therefore never mind YOUR well being.” He’s been good enough on issues that we care a lot about for me not to want to ‘primary the dude’.

The power of SCOTUS lies in its immunity. What we need is not votes but absolutes – you, member of the Supreme Court of the United States – will NEVER hobnob with the rich and famous. You will NOT take trips, favors, even dinners from those with a political stake in the game.

If we did that and preserved their immunity from voters, we’d have a far better judiciary.

Of course, we could elect good president and Senates, and then we’d not be having this conversation.

Term limits, reviews of the justices – not on in my book. That politicizes what should not BE political at all.

» Posted By choicelady On June 29, 2015 @ 6:19 pm

I’m with you. How could we LIVE with ourselves if Scalia had a thrombosis???

Oh. Wait. God did that in his view, so…never mind.

» Posted By choicelady On June 29, 2015 @ 6:14 pm

The Worst Defeat for the GOP Could Come if SCOTUS Hands Them a Win Against Obamacare

To be totally honest about how ACA is subsidized, it is with an ADVANCABLE tax credit. It is adjusted should your income change and you don’t report it – up or down – or your life condition changes (death, marriage or divorce, children added or gone from the home). The states could do the same – but they not only will not, they will not tie it to your income.

The reason Romneycare (and proposed exactly the same in CA under Ah-nold) the premium is based on ‘risk rates’ meaning health condition, where you live (e.g. are you poor and thus probably also a POC), and AGE. What Romney and Ah-nold care did is let those ‘free market actuarially based’ rates fly – and give you a flat subsidy. In MA it was $235, the premium for a healthy person in the mid 30s, but in CA they could see their way clear for only $200. So anyone 60 or older would have a premium of around $900 (that’s the going rate in 2008) but get a tax credit of only $200. And you’d be mandated to have that insurance, good luck to ya eating cat food to pay for it.

ACA is on a sliding percentage tied to your INCOME. That makes it incredibly more affordable. And where Romney/Ah-nold plans also added a $15,000 per person per year deductible with only 2 things at no extra cost, ACA has a family cap of $6-12,000 with preventive care and dozens of routine and even expensive procedures lying outside the need to touch the deductible. HUGE difference!

That’s what we would have in 34 states, possibly the entire nation. Oh, that thing about letting insurance compete over state lines? It’s regulated BY the state where it’s sold, so if Alabama has cheap insurance but it fails to pay and you live in Oregon, good luck on the enforcement of the promises.

Yup. The GOP “plans” are sooooo much better. Un huh.

» Posted By choicelady On June 10, 2015 @ 10:12 am

GOP to Re-Brand Child Molestation as ‘Mistaken Feelings’

I would add that had a Democrat or “mere” Protestant been at fault, all hell – by their definition – would have descended!

» Posted By choicelady On June 8, 2015 @ 4:32 pm

I think you have totally defined the GOP RW Dominionist mindset: we are ‘born again’ so can do anything we want because we TALK a good game. Actions? Well, back to that ‘saved’ thingy. Everyone else is evil, demonic, worthless. Only reason Caitlin Jenner gets no squawk from us, the GOP, is because he/she is a Republican, always was and apparently always will be. Since she is one of us…crickets. Josh is a good family man – in every sense of that term, right?

Life is good if you’re one of The Chosen. And we, the GOP, don’t mean Jews. It’s clear God made a little mistake there, and we’re setting it right. Ahhh. It’s so nice not having a whit of conscience. We’re the GOP. We don’t need to.

» Posted By choicelady On June 8, 2015 @ 2:55 pm

Obama Ally Cameron’s Conservatives Win The Day In The UK: What It Means

Labour’s Tony Blair loved Bush. Cameron loves Obama.

I was in London the day that Blair, seeking his first shot at PM at the Blackpool Labour Party convening declared that Labour would no longer give its support to labour, the people who do the work. Upon that pronouncement, that excited very little notice in British papers, Labour, IMHO, became utterly irrelevant as an alternative to much of anything.

I have no idea what to make of it all. Cameron is not Maggie, but they’re not all that progressive as to take away the stench of Maggie, but Labour is almost worse if Tony’s legacy is to be reviewed.

I have a headache.

» Posted By choicelady On May 10, 2015 @ 2:16 pm