• choicelady : Goodnight everyone who may be reading – peaceful times for your weekend. See you all next week!

  • choicelady : Good night Murph – please know how valuable you are to keeping hope alive, even in this sad discussion. You bring clear insights into the world, and I for one thank you! Sleep well – you’ve earned it!

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Good night CL, funk, and anyone else in this corner of the blogosphere.

  • choicelady : Yes – that’s the protection of the FDIC – for the BANKS, not for us. But you’re right – Medicare and Social Security would be gutted to bail out the banks and bankers, and all social programs would end to ‘balance the budget’. And we’d go to war. I don’t think we will see peace again in my lifetime, and my old age is gonna suck a wad. But it might not happen – one never really knows. We shall see. But we ALSO shall work like a dog to have this NOT happen!

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL…yes call it for the night. I needed to vent and this was a good place to do it. Still, I hope we can figure out how to win in a game where the dice are loaded, the cards are marked and the wheel is fixed.

  • choicelady : Well, Murph – this is deeply sad, and I’m sorry you had to tough it out with your group, but it is eye opening, and I hope we can salvage SOMETHING out of this. But what say you now that it’s 10 pm here and much later there (midnight?) Shall we call it an evening? I just hate closing on such a downer!

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Choice…I suspect that the wall street risk takers would be happy to roll the dice again knowing that a GOP government will bail them out again….dip into the Social Security trust fund, pile up the debt even further…In 1929 lots of the big wigs took their own lives….not this time…they have figure how to Fail Big with failure for themselves…..

  • choicelady : Patsy – good night, dear friend. Sweet dreams!

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Patsy keep up the ground game and working toward change on mind at a time….you are doing your part and more.

  • choicelady : Murph – but if they get control, we WILL have a major depression. It’s inevitable. It will be a nightmare. We are just getting the necessary regulations in place, and if they go, the JP Morgan debacle will be routine. I predict that by the end of 2013 we will have economic meltdown. It’s all too fragile for that NOT to happen. And it will all be their fault. To quote Bette Davis – fasten your seatbelts. It’s going to be a bumpy night.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL…oddly I think Obama is playing his cards to win but banking them in case of a loss. I think he intends to be a force post 2012 no matter what. He might well be the voice of truth leading the popular revolution we may need. Why do I say that? He is staking out very courageous positions and holding tough ground. Like Truman…I would rather be right (correct) than be president….I think O may agree with you.

  • PatsyT : Thanks for the support guys… I’ll be checking in more often Love to you all I have to say goodnight. You all all the Best!

  • choicelady : Murph – I so hope you’re wrong! I will say that if the House and Senate are going over to GOP, I really want to lose the presidency. I do NOT want this president to be blamed for what Congress does. I know Clinton survived, and maybe it would be better for the veto on killing the things I’m looking forward to surviving on – Medicare and Social Security – but I REALLY do not want him to be blamed for their outrageous behavior. And voters did not turn them out for YEARS after that, even after Newt shut down the government. So maybe better to lose it all in 2012 and hope for better sense in 2016 – except we DO need a better SCOTUS to get rid of Citizens. It’s incredibly worrisome!

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Choice..the Walker race costs are a drop in the billionaire and mega millionaire bucket. Remember, they know that a GOP victory will pay back their investment in spades. This is a strategy….up front investments lead to huge profits. There are billions more to spend.

  • PatsyT : Guys I have not been around much because of all of the ground game stuff we are doing. But I do a bit of lurking and reading here.

  • choicelady : Patsy – you are doing amazing things down there! Keep up the good work!

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Choice- your call to arms certainly makes sense to me. Sadly I do not think the call, whenever it is being sounded, is being heard. We are increasingly nonliterate, tied to our entertainment vessels, lured by distraction, and gulled/cullied by lies, that no matter how they are challenged, go on and on and on….Romney’s catching up to Obama is yet another sad proof of this.

  • PatsyT : Hey, I have a new description I am Anti Nuclear “Accident” – Choice and Funk, We are Making Great Progress! Yes It is painstakingly slow but when things start to click momentum takes over! We have so many things going on at once!

  • choicelady : funk – oh wow – that’s a biggie for any kid! Congratulations! Happy birthday to him, and good luck to you on surviving both the party and teen years! Sleep well- you will need the rest!

  • funksands : btw, Patsy, it was awesome seeing you. Hope you are well.

  • choicelady : Murph – you may be right about the petrie dish, but it also may be where they shoot their wad. If they win and Walker remains, they also may not have as many resources as they would have had. We beat the crap out of them before in WI and in OH, and even with Citizens money, it’s not possible for them to win everything everywhere, not EVEN in Purple states.

  • funksands : I gotta roll guys 13th birthday party for my son tomorrow! Have a great weekend! Murph, take a couple days off and recharge yourself. Get out into the woods for a couple days.

  • funksands : Patsy, he’s bought and paid for by finance, but he’s a real life candidate who isn’t an eggplant like Perry or sociopath like Romney

  • choicelady : Murph – some of it is just stupidity. Been there, dealt with that. But some is Fifth Columnists. We have to stop listening to them! We know it on the top – Arianna, Hamsher, etc. – but we need to understand it on our level as well. This is what happened to the Spanish Civil War people who were inflitrated by the Franco loyalists and were set against one another. Do not let them win! They are ALWAYS the naysayers. ALWAYS. In ’92 the pro choice folks were infiltrated by RW people posing as extreme radicals. We saw them for what they were and busted their game. We would NOT succumb to their push toward violence, and we took over the younger ones, made them laugh, treated them really well, and they stopped listening to the leaders. It went GREAT, and we all have to do that. There are too many people convinced of their own superiority, too, but the negativists in OWS are and were likely infiltrators – one of them I knew here in Sacto, and therefore I KNOW the RW had infiltrated here. It went nowhere so fine, but it is something to pay attention to.

  • PatsyT : funk, I hear ya, but from here on the west coast he seemed like a gimmick for many of us especially compared to Warren.

  • funksands : Murph, WI is very disturbing. Even more disturbing that the DNC isn’t throwing every spare dollar they have to win a winnable race. The RNC knows they can lose it, but the DNC don’t seem like they realize they can win it. This is, IMO, the 2nd most important race in the nation this year.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL…I hear your passion and I agree with what needs to be done, but Wisconsin seems to me to be a petrie dish…and the culture growing there is telling me and many others that the formula that has won for us before is being taken apart at every level and it is money that makes this all possible.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL…who do the Faux Progressives work for…are they the organizational version of the creations who prowl the big blogs claiming they were dems, or progressives, or pro obama but no longer are. Occupy has experienced the infiltration of its ranks by those who talk the progressive talk but sow the seeds of discord.

  • choicelady : Murph – the coup is NOT inevitable unless we all sit back as we did before. We have to keep working, talking, tweeting, doing everything we can. Walk precincts as we did before. We CAN win more than we will ever win by sitting it out. That’s what progressives do – get discouraged and sit it out. That cannot happen!

  • funksands : CL, I couldn’t agree more. This is a fight to the death. The sooner people see that the less “purist” they become.

  • funksands : Patsy, he was a very popular state senator before running for his seat. He has an incredibly compelling personal story as well.

  • choicelady : funk – Patsy’s situation is VERY discouraging on one level. She follows ME and my anti-nuke activism in CA in the 1970s. But it’s beginning to WIN, and Patsy is really making a difference. I can’t say the Dems will pull it out, but I do know this is NOT the time to get discouraged. That’s why I HATE the faux progressives who insist Obama is “killing civil liberties” etc. It’s a LIE, and I cannot figure out why they keep insisting on the drumbeat. Do they REALLY think the old DSoc meme of make it so bad we will finally overthrow the corporate shills and take charge? It never works. NEVER.

  • funksands : Murph, I can’t disagree with your statement. THAT movement also has spent years gaining steam and momentum. It has it and derailing and stopping it is going to take some time.

  • PatsyT : Brown rode around in a pick up truck and that won over the voters in Mass?

  • MurphTheSurf3 : funk….I accept that about social movements but I am more and more convinced that the GOP of the 80’s set us on a path of poorer and poorer schools, zero based real economic growth, the transfer of wealth from the middle to the upper class, the tying of the GOP to ultra-U.S. partisan positioning, and getting it all financed at the highest possible levels. Now it is financed at levels beyond any limitation. The coup is for real.

  • funksands : Murph, Brown was extremely popular in Mass before he won his seat. That helps. Warren may be known to everyone in the know, but is still establishing her name brand with the state.

  • choicelady : Patsy – I do agree, polls are not trustworthy. The problem is that it CAN discourage people from working for the candidate if it looks like a loser. So we have to be smarter than that.

  • funksands : Occupy used social media to quickly capture the imagination and organize, but the challenges to a movement like this are similar to every movement. Look at Patsy’s situation with the nuclear industry as an example.

  • choicelady : Murph – Warren needs NEEDS to emphasize her blue collar roots. That’s critical in MA. Lived there, understand that. That is authentic with her, and she needs to ground her populism in her life history. Brown can’t touch her – he’s more elite than she is IF she tells that story.

  • funksands : Murph, every significant social and economic movement has taken a long time to gain traction before significant change took place. The Porter’s Union threatened march on DC was in 1941, the Civil Rights act happened over 20 years later.

  • PatsyT : Choice, Don’t you think that like they (The Billionaire Class) can buy Ad time for their super pacs they can just as easily buy groups to do their “polling”?

  • choicelady : Patsy – the ricketss guy is being told to drop the Rev. Wright stuff. It’s OLD news, and it won’t work. Rev. Wright said about TWO things that were controversial – they can’t get much more than that. It plays NOT to the indies but to the converted, and I’m not concerned about that. Romney has NO record other than plant closures. WE’ve not even seen the full court Dem press yet.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL…day to day they shift BUT in terms of Warren’s qualifications, positions, campaign style, gender, dem bona fides….she should be miles ahead…..nope.. ..this is Mass….How?

  • PatsyT : Murph, I feel like the news is only part news or almost news or faux news or FOX!

  • choicelady : I just looked at the Warren v Brown polls – they are unbelievable in their disparate predictions, and in the largest survey of POLLS (not the poll results themselves) they have huge disparities! The most reliable is PPP and it consistently has Warren up by 5. That’s as of 5/7. The differences are bizarre, so they are none of them reliable. Overall it’s about 50-50 as to who wins. I’d not put money on ANY of that!

  • PatsyT : All I know is some guy with rickets plans on attacking Pres Obama and Romney still has not apologized to all of the dogs in the country.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : Hey Patsy….CL and I are tussling over the meaning of the news. Scroll down if you want to catch up, or just weigh in.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL In the red states, which are predisposed to hate Obama and the Dems there is an automatic mindset that nothing good can come from either….so they accept the lies. In the Blue states the message is not coherent. We Dems…herds of cats…..so fearful of being lockstepped….

  • PatsyT : I am so glad you guys are following all Prez stuff … I have been out of it

  • choicelady : PATSY! How are you? Glad you’re here!

  • choicelady : Murph – that may work. Can’t say it won’t.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL….a new ad blitz running in Wi…shows Walker bragging about his job performance when Wi. is hemorrhaging jobs…a few tricks with numbers, glitzy production values and huge media buys validate the lie

  • choicelady : But the message on jobs is NOT resonating as a GOP victory.

  • PatsyT : Hi Guys … I’ll read for a bit to catch up….

  • choicelady : Murph – you may be right, but I don’t think that’s the real story yet. Maybe so, but I don’t see it that way from what I’m reading around the country. It’s still a crap shoot. If we win the presidency but lose both houses, it will end the GOP because they will destroy us. If there are progressives who think that’s BETTER, that it will prompt revolution, well, we’ve been down this path before and it never EVER worked.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : The GOP govs in the red states are making it clear that it is THEY and the GOP that have wrought this miracle…and they are winning the PR game in that. Warren is tied or behind in 7 of 10 polls.

  • choicelady : Well if college kids think Obama is to blame for the lack of jobs, tonight’s report from Iowa, Texas, and several other Red states made a lie out of that. Rachel Maddow’s show had video of governor after governor in Red states bragging to grads about how many JOBS there were in their states! That’s undermining the “no jobs” issue. As for Warren, I see different polls that have her ahead. I’m sorry about WI – I did not realize it was so bad – but I think that’s NOT the state of the nation. I’m seeing way too many other stories about what is happening, and I think it’s a very mixed bag.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL…assume OBama wins…what does he do with a GOP House and Senate? GOP governors and state assemblies….ou r overwhelming feeling tonight was that a billionaire led coup is underway. It began in 2000 with the theft of an election, got side tracked in 2008 because of a badly run war and is now being nudged back into place.

  • choicelady : Murph – the presidential race is far less in the GOP bag than the congressional ones. I really do NOT think that is the issue, but local and congressional races are.

  • MurphTheSurf3 : CL 11 states have now put laws into place that make it very hard for college students to register (college ids are not sufficient, college addresses are not permanent address so they must go home to vote, a huge upsurge in conservative feeling on campus naively focused on the graduate job market as an obama problem). Look at Warren in Mass. Despite error after error by Brown, she can do no more than tie.