IT'S NOT THE PEOPLE'S CHOICE TO MAKE

Once again the media is telling us that they have chosen our next president and vice president. Already happened, it says. “You partisan yahoos don’t even need to vote. It’s not the People’s choice. It’s ours.

“You nincompoops have such short memories but try and think back to 2000 and 2004. We chose the candidate then too. How’d that work out for you? We do it softly, we do it with lies and threats, we do it rough and for your amusement we do it with misogyny.”

Remember all the flutter about the cost of John Edward’s haircut? It was only because it could be used to derogate women – the media loved calling him “The Breck Girl. But nothing was ever said about the thousand$ spent on his suits, ties, and shirts or how they looked on him.

Hillary’s clothing, body and hair was constantly commented on, usually in a derogatory fashion. If it wasn’t the tut-tuts about cleavage it was the nasty bits about her pantsuits and the male’s reason for why she wore them instead of a dress they could look up under. http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/05/13/8917?page=1

Joe Biden is seldom even noticed; even when he makes a gaffe that would sink any other Party’s candidate like stone. Some mention has been made of his facial makeovers and hair plugs in the more gossipy blogs/columns. Even his monumental gaffes are not criticized – the media only hear the ones allegedly made by Governor Palin or Senator McCain.

Same with Obama’s clothing – for men it’s just suits and ties. Of course the perfect one must and does dress with perfection. So who mentions his $1,500 suits and makes nasty comments about him spending all that money? And even suggest what he may be hiding with custom made suits.

And woe on anyone who mentions the clever way he is fooling you with the slight whitening of his hair at the temples. Gives him an older, experienced look to those who have not seen the changes gradually made with a little white powder. [Oops, this may land me in gitmo.]

Sarah Palin’s new wardrobe has been fueling the hate engines for days now. Led, of course, by a media that spends most of its time looking for something to crap on her with, but little is made of the $520 Ferragamo shoes worn by McCain, although the talk-show host like to blather on about them.

To many women obey the cultural edict to lighten up when constantly faced with the barrage of hateful misogyny and sexism that was and still is aimed at Senator Clinton and their own gender.

Many more even join in now as the hate-crime-inducing drivel is spewed out against Governor Palin. The idea that SNL and The Daily Show can make such hideous fun of womankind is worse than deplorable. It is criminal and it incites violence and disrespect for all women. http://www.philly.com/inquirer/currents/20081026_Palin_deserves_our_respect.html

Women have just got to wake up to the fact that sexism and misogyny is no more humorous or acceptable or harmless than making fun of lynching, nappy-headed-hos or Uncle Toms.

“Just slit her throat, lock her in a car boot, and drive the car into river in West Virginia.
“Ain’t gonna let no whore screw with the man
“And a Drive-By Won’t Be Out of the Question. What goes around, comes around. The stupid fucking bitch !!
“Talk About WHITE TRASH that bitch better keep looking over her shoulder.”
This is just a few examples of what Obama supporters said about Hillary Clinton.

"[W]hatever else the current generation of feminists - and particularly the Third Wave feminists - have accomplished, the battle to diminish the cultural acceptability of sexism and misogyny is being lost. Lighten up is not a successful strategy. Lighten up is no strategy at all. . . We must commit ourselves to an innovative and energetic campaign to change our culture. The way things look now, we're not just losing a battle about sexism in this election - we're losing the whole damn war."
-- Ciccina, The Lurking Canary

ON THE ROAD TO DESTRUCTION - AGAIN?

We must admit that we believed it possible that the Obomacons were right and we were wrong about The One, his character and his judgment. Even David Gergen, noting BO’s fall in the polls, advised the obvious.

“If he were to surprise the country — and the press — by naming Hillary Clinton as his running mate, he could turn the race upside down. Making the announcement in Springfield this Saturday, drawing from Lincoln’s experience in assembling a “team of rivals” (the glorious book by Doris Kearns Goodwin), would be transformative. No one else would so galvanize the Democrats, bring a fighter to his side, and send a clear message that an Obama administration would bring experience to solving problems both at home and abroad. Has anyone looked what happened to jobs and wages under Bush vs. Clinton? The comparison is startling. And remember that a quarter of Hillary’s voters still haven’t “come home” to the Democratic column.”
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2008/08/20/obama-in-need-of-a-game-changer/

Now we have no doubts. Despite our hope, that he would be honest, intelligent and confident enough to choose as his running mate the woman who, if the rules had been followed, would have won the Democratic Primary instead of him, he followed his own craven image.

Brotherhood prevailed to once again shut a woman out from what she had earned. “This is all about the old white guys staying in power. They needed a front man -- enter the neophyte, incompetent Obama -- this is a new kind of politics? This is change we can believe in?” - Oft repeated blog comment

For surely if you compare the nasty things Biden has said of BO in the debates and TV interviews to what Hillary was and still is, roundly criticized for, Biden’s were definitely racist, more critical of BO’s judgment and experience; and they are on video.

"I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy. I mean, that's a storybook, man." – Joe Biden

Biden saying in debate that Barack isn't ready to be president, Biden saying in interview that McCain would be a good President and he would support him or serve with him as VP if asked.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R...h? v=RDVUPqoowf8

Biden also voted for and supported the Iraqi war. Oh, and he dropped out early after getting around 25000 votes.
Hillary won the popular vote: (ABC news)
Hillary: 17,785,009
Obama: 17,479,990
If the Rules Committee had not halved the votes in Florida and Michigan, Hillary would have netted 100 delegates from Florida and 73 from Michigan. If Obama had gotten none from Michigan (he took his name off the ballot to placate Iowa), and not given him delegates he had not earned, Hillary would have had 1725 delegates at the end of the primaries and Obama 1707. She would have won the pledged delegates. http://noquarterusa.net/blog/

“Thank you, Egalia for bringing up the Clarence Thomas hearings. I would highly recommend the book Strange Justice, written shortly after the hearings. Joe Biden was the ‘guy’ in charge of those hearings. He kept several other women witnesses sitting & waiting in a hotel room - women who would have testified to the same sort of behavior that Anita Hill - courageously - related to the committee. Those women were never questioned and Clarence Thomas was appointed to the Supreme Court. -- Connie Graham

Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones “One true friend” Geeklove
http://tinyurl.com/6jr5ot

Odd choices in Obama’s career by J. R. Dunn
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/08/the_odd_choices_in_barack_obam.html
Barack Obama will be defeated. Seriously and convincingly defeated. Not due to racism, not due to the forces of reaction, not even due to Karl Rove sending out mind rays over the national cable system. He will lose for one reason above all, one that has been overlooked in any analysis that I've yet seen. Barack Obama will lose because he is a flake.
I'm using the term in its generally accepted sense. A flake is not only a screwup, but someone who truly excels in making bizarre errors and creating incredibly convoluted disasters. A flake is a "fool with energy", as the Russian proverb puts it. ("A fool is a terrible thing to have around, but a fool with energy is a nightmare".)

Irony from Riverdaughter – concerning how women are expected to act:
“But most importantly, it is Hillary Clinton’s responsibility to put all of her policy experience, political expertise, energy and professionalism at Barack Obama’s disposal and allow all of her accomplishments to be relevant only in reference to him, in order to shore up his abysmally sinking poll numbers and save his ass in November. This is a task for which she is uniquely qualified since she would have been able to win the White House without much assistance at all. This makes her obligation to him even stronger since she has the mojo that he lacks. But it is her joy to become the plaster that holds his crumbling foundation in place. And when her task is finished, she will modestly step back in to the shadows while she privately beams with pride at her creation. It is what we all live for.
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SNAKE OIL SALESMAN [SOS]

It’s official now, as it has been proclaimed from on high. We are now the United States of Omerica.

The following is excerpted from a hilarious posting by the Times of London:

“And it came to pass, in the eighth year of the reign of the evil Bush the Younger (The Ignorant), when the whole land from the Arabian desert to the shores of the Great Lakes had been laid barren, that a Child appeared in the wilderness.

The Child was blessed in looks and intellect. Scion of a simple family, offspring of a miraculous union, grandson of a typical white person and an African peasant. And yea, as he grew, the Child walked in the path of righteousness, with only the occasional detour into the odd weed and a little blow.

When he was twelve years old, they found him in the temple in the City of Chicago, arguing the finer points of community organization with the Prophet Jeremiah and the Elders. And the Elders were astonished at what they heard and said among themselves: “Verily, who is this Child that he opens our hearts and minds to the audacity of hope?”…

It ends with this paragraph as BO meets with the male leaders of Britain:

“…And suddenly, with the men appeared the archangel Gabriel and the whole host of the heavenly choir, ranks of cherubim and seraphim, all praising God and singing: “Yes, We Can.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/gerard_baker/article4392846.ece

Sure, it’s a spoof but it has an eery tone of warning [SOS!], suggesting that if we looked beyond the hype of the BO campaign and the infatuation of the media we would see the snake oil salesman made famous in countless Westerns. With the oratorical, persuasive talents these guys had, they could sell ice boxes to Eskimos.

We can all imagine the image of the covered wagon with a banner touting “Dr. Whoever’s Magical Elixir that will cure everything from snake bite to warts; broken bones to the itch.”

The Doctor was a whiz bang orator; words flowed convincingly and powerfully from his tongue. Crowds gathered around his wagon to hear him spout the benefits of his magic potion. He had a cure for ever ill and nary a record backing up or proving that his cures would work

Dr. Whoever’s fraud was only unmasked when someone caught him filling his bottles from a spring and adding a ground-up plant residue for color. Then all his claims of omnipotence were hooted at by the citizens he had defrauded.

Poor old Dr. Whoever didn’t have a complicit team of enablers in a global media and the backing of a corporate entity dedicated to the advancement of fraud to drown out the truth. It was devoid of what BO has today - an utterly dedicated, misogynistic O’DNC blindly backing him just to prevent a woman from becoming president.

Hillary was loudly castigated when she presented the truth about BO. She said that both she and McCain had a record of accomplishments and BO had a speech he delivered a few years ago. So far there has been nothing brought forward that counters that truth and sexism flourishes in Omerica.

And it’s not only Democrats. Republicans also swing to the sexism beat. Just check out the examples of sexism in this man’s short response to a Massachusetts bill, introduced by a woman, to “ensure [that] laws written from now on contain gender neutral phrases such as ‘he/she’ and ‘his/her’".

“I think it’s (expletive),” said Rep. Robert Hargraves (R-Groton) of the law. “Everybody knows the word ‘he’ is generic. It’s generic in the Bible. It’s generic in the Constitution. There’s no intent to demean the fairer sex.”

Gee, does that mean he and others like him see women as the slaves they were in Biblical times and when the Constitution was written. Like, for example, not able to own property, hold office, vote??? And OMG! Certainly not become president of the United States of Omerica!

"[I]n the United States, many people who consider themselves progressives still view anything to do with women as secondary. They fail to recognize what regressives do: that the ranking of male over female is a basic model children learn early on for equating difference with superiority or inferiority, with dominating or being dominated -- a model that can then easily be generalized to different races, religions, ethnicities, and nations." --Riane Eisler
http://www.alternet.org/reproductivejustice/90859/?ses=fb3af8f9b90fde1114d92470cf5c533c
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BLAZING STRADDLES

In the space of only a few days, a 12 year-old Vermont girl was reported missing, frantically searched for and finally found dead. Internet’s, My Space, was implicated; a sex ring preying on young girls was suggested and the girl’s uncle was revealed as a serial sex offender and charged with kidnapping. The investigation continues.

Lots of sadness and tears; lots of hand wringing and questioning of the judicial system as the investigation continues but really nothing new, no insight. No one speaks of why we train our girls to be victims; needing and wanting the attention of a male to give them significance.

Men’s religion has played a major role in the subjugation of and crimes against women – this is still going on and is a major reason why church and state must be kept separate.

Bruce Ware — a Southern Baptist scholar – argued that one reason that men abuse their wives is because women rebel against their husband’s God-given authority: “‘And husbands on their parts, because they’re sinners, now respond to that threat to their authority either by being abusive, which is of course one of the ways men can respond when their authority is challenged - -or, more commonly, to become passive, acquiescent, and simply not asserting the leadership they ought to as men in their homes and in churches,’ Ware said from the pulpit of Denton Bible Church in Denton, Texas.”

Now the presumptive choice of the DNC and the mean street media, Zelig Obama, has announced that he will continue George Bush’s faith based initiatives – that have melded church and state together.

BO has made many promises regarding women’s rights, reproductive and otherwise but in the light of his several position changes in order to appeal to everyone, women will surely also be a casualty of his blazing straddles, outright lies and prevarications. No wonder he hasn’t clarified his core values and his beliefs, like Zelig, he has none – he just reflects whatever group he’s trying to impress.
http://www.puma08.com/2008/07/05/puma-call-to-dnc-delegates/

“[W]ho will Obama throw under the bus next? Hmmm…already under the bus: women, old people, baby boomers, the Clinton Administration, his grandmother, Rev. Wright, Fr. Phleger, Tony Rezko, Samantha Power, various and sundry other staff members, the LGBT community, Muslims, supporters of Israel, Appalachia, African American men, the Great Possum Seal, Cuban-Americans, Wesley Clark, Moveon.org, the fourth amendment, the establishment clause…who’s next?” -- (bostonboomer at The Confluence)

“Women do not get into positions of power without the aid of men in this man’s world, and neither do men. Men trade on the connections they make in fraternities, golf clubs, and strip clubs. And people want to criticize women for trading on the connections that are available to us? In the entire history of this patriarchal nation, a mere 2 percent of all Congress-members have been women. If we eliminate all the women who became Congresswomen because of their connections to husbands, that embarrassingly pitiful percentage declines considerably.” – egalia

***Don’t miss this one:

Destroying Hillary Clinton by Melissa McEwan and Maureen McCluskey
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jul/01/hillaryclinton.uselections2008
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Another blast from the past:
GenderGappers 1997 – 002

YOU MEAN WE HAD ForeMOTHERS, TOO?
After thousands of years of existence in virtual slavery, woman began to actively demand that they be considered and treated as adult human beings at around the turn of this century.

We shall generalize these dates since any of you that want specifics can easily find them on the Internet. Except for some women's studies, you won't find this taught in schools.

Our calendar is based on marking year one as the year Jesus Christ was born. It took the advent of women's scholarship and archaeological interpretation to reveal, in our current century, that there once lived a people who worshipped both Goddess and God. We now learn that these Goddess-worshipping tribes practiced gender equity -- women were High Priests and doctors; were free beings; were educated and could own property.

These tribes were peaceful and prosperous for their time. This changed when these peaceful villages were overrun by tribes who worshipped a male God exclusively. Under the rule of this God, women were condemned to a slavery that persisted for nearly all women until around the beginning of the 20th Century. Women were the property of their father, given by him to their husband to do with as he wished. They could not own property, were not considered to be educable or even to have human abilities -- all because men believed that God's word declared that woman caused the fall of man in the Garden of Eden.

This belief was enforced throughout the centuries by Paul's gospel, witch hunts, cultural and societal mandates as well as the meting out of harsh punishment if a woman stepped out of her male-god-established role. Throughout those thousands of years, most men were free to develop while women's development was suffocated.

This century has seen a massive change in the lives of women, who have so far, been given fewer than 100 years to catch up to a system that men had thousands of years to grow, use and interact with.

While most women were restricted to children and home, most men were bonding in government, education, law, fraternal organizations, military, sport, finance, uniform dress etc. Women led their lives vicariously through men, developing methods of placating and pleasing men -- and many still carry the results of that programming of thousands of years.

Some of the fiercest defenders of gender inequity are women -- women who will not or cannot seek the counsel of the Goddess within.

Whoopi Goldberg, who most would consider a liberated woman, made the following statement in a TV interview: "Black people are the only people who came to this country and were not allowed to vote."

Whoops, Whoopi - women of any skin color are people too. We have been coming to this country since the 17th Century and weren't allowed to vote either -- not until early in the 1920's (excepting a couple of state elections.)

And all our foremothers before them, before us, lie in their sacrificial graves unsung and unremembered.
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