Where’s Wally?

More on WDEL’s switch up.  Sorry to elaborate but you see, they are the reason I decided to settle in Delaware.  I have never been opposed to anyone expressing their views.. I have always been opposed to being forced to listen to ONLY one view.

And the former is what WDEL used to offer… Daily I got two viewpoints, morning and afternoon… Sometimes they merged. Sometimes they didn’t.  Ironically they merged on local issues for the most part; on national issues, … umm. not so much.

And the latter is what they offer now.

Now those of us who live in the real world (conservatives by their creed, don’t) know that the only thing consistent is change… So though it is with heavy heart that probably the only person in this nation who could get ahead of me and tell me stuff I didn’t already know, is no longer at WDEL, the pragmatic acceptance says that a new reality is upon us.

We can use it; or be ignored by it.

I listened to Susan Monday for a while this morning.  Even though she tried to get calls from upstate, they didn’t come… Her topic was Trump… and whether we thought he was “presidential enough”, basically she was playing right out of the Rubio playbook which would immediately disinterest the entire New Castle County.

Calls came in from Lewes, Milford, Milton, Frankford, Salisbury all sticking to the topic. There was no Liz.

And that’s when it hit.  As a state we are very different top to bottom. We always joke about it. We’ve been doing it for generations.. and with this listener trying to sit through this morning’s program like one would a corporate dog and pony show meeting, it became apparent real quick, just how different we are…

It was made stark reality by the station’s insistence of calling the station, ALL-STATE radio to advertise it was statewide, and not local.  Today’s show may have been carried statewide, but it certainly wasn’t listened to… state wide….

Then I remembered something.  During the golden years of blogging which I would rank between 2006 to 2010,  one of the greatest things about it was that we had an all-state community.  We all commented on each others blogs, north and south.  And we were loose cannons,… pretty much calling each other stupid for not agreeing with us, and it was lots of fun.

But what emerged from all that was an understanding of why they thought the way they did… If it wasn’t logical, we saw it was emotional.  It it wasn’t practical, we saw it was deeply embedded in how they were raised… Did I say it was fun?

But, over time in the back and forth and back and forth, if an idea was lacking in currency it quietly disappeared. For example, global warming which caused some of the most heated conversations, over time won convert after convert over to the side that humans need to do something.   It wasn’t a miracle of persuasion. It was the preponderance of the evidence.

The current went the other way with guns. Those originally wanting to ban ALL guns are nowhere to be found today. Again due to the preponderance of evidence.

It is with sadness that the civility found in the printed words flying back and forth, cannot be found in spoken words replacing them.  There is probably a reason for that; one primarily being that the world of written word allows us to take words back from between uttering them and them being communicated.  Not so with speech.

But the thought did occur to me today that these people below the canal live in their own little world where their own little world view makes sense.  The only way they will grow and expand their knowledge is for them to hear from different perspectives; perspectives which make them realize that they are living on a island and the appearance of water rising higher every year around them is no illusion. There are things out there they need to know.

So it does make sense then for Al Mascitti’s supporters to call the station and explain things as they are, to engage Susan in conversation. It does not make sense for them to boycott the show in deference to Al.  Especially when it comes to communicating that the entire problem we have with America today is not because we have a black president who most of America elected because they thought he was pretty awesome….. it is because most of those in Congress refused to do their Constitutionally mandated job because doing so, would make that black president look even more awesome.  We have broken national government;  it is entirely the Republican’s fault.

Constantly bringing up this fact repeatedly would make those who have only heard one line across the last eight years, that line that Obama has been an ineffective president, actually have to confront the fact that THEY were the ones who throttled government down to a standstill by voting Republican, and therefore THEY are the ones responsible for all our recent tribulations..  one being Donald Trump.

Reminders that facts make a difference.

So to keep Al’s legacy alive, perhaps it is fitting to call Susan Monday to say you represent the top half of the state, and then ask her your question…. politely.

Hello! We, up north, were wondering why you purposefully are avoiding the REAL issues?

• Issues like allowing the wealthy to make up new rules that steal all the middle classes’ money.
• Issues like crippling unions so none of us get paid anything close to what we are worth.
• Issues like underfunding government  so much it hurts all of us.
• Issues like allowing hidden money into elections, forcing politicians to be bought so they then pay their purchasers back with our tax money.
• Issues like saddling our children with huge levels of college debt we didn’t have when we bought our first house.
• Issues like not doing anything to stop carbon pollution.

 

It would be in WDEL’s interest to allow as many as possible of those liberal calls from the North to go through… So it would indeed be ALL STATE radio. For across the last two days, I have yet to see any reason why anyone north of the canal would listen at that frequency between 9 and 12 weekday mornings.

Sooner or later Northern big money cows are going to realize all those advertising dollars spent across that time frame are wasted.  I don’t think any of the current WDEL 101.7 advertisers get even one dollar of return on their investment from listeners living south of Dagsboro…

 

 

 

 

 

Delaware Republicans Support Segregation In Sussex County

It is very simple.  If one Republican supports segregation, and the Republican Party does not expunge him from its party, obviously the Head of The Republican Party then automatically inherits the problem and becomes culpable….  But there are two Republicans doing this.  And both are the principal movers of the entire Republican Party (if not name, then deed) of Sussex County.

The only outcry from the Republican Party has been a buried press release from the head here in New Castle County, which no one read…..

That can only mean the Republican Party secretly supports segregation….

Think about it.  You are with a group of people and one starts harassing someone outside your group.  They could be liberal, gay, effeminate, Hispanic, urban, whatever. It doesn’t matter.  But that someone in your group  goes off half-cocked and bullies them n public…

What do you do, sitting there holding your beer?  Do you come to that person’s defense?  “Hey, you can’t do that to them.  You need to leave us right now,  You don’t represent us! You sicken me.  In fact, I’m going to punch my fist right through your f’n head. Then when you’re down I’m going use my new cowboy boots to grind your head into tomato paste.”   (Because if you did,  The bullying would probably stop immediately, since you were becoming  the new threat.)

But probably not.  Most likely you are going to sit there, silent, pondering all your choices, and from the outside keep a stoic face so all around you, especially that person being verbally abused, will assume you are just part of the posse, going along with the sheriff doing the abusing…  If ever later questioned why you chose not to intervene, you will say  “I’m not prejudiced. I actually like “those people”.  I don’t have a part in this fight.  Of course I don’t agree with him, but I’m not going to get into a fist fight with someone I work with…. ”

And thus, through yours and your acquaintance’s  cowardice, you allow the abuse to continue.  Someone else another day, will feel the ire, and then someone else the day later, etc….  The real problem is allowed to continue. And we all know;  it is a real problem.

So when we all are held accountable, (as to why did you do nothing to stop it), despite whatever excuse we proffer it will become obvious to us that there was indeed another choice at that time which could have been made…. We could have done something….

That is why one press release read by nobody, is not enough.  Only one action and one action alone is strong enough to send the proper message that this behavior will NOT be tolerated.  That is to permanently ban Vince Phillips and Sam Wilson from any Republican Party affiliation.  That is to public excommunicate them from the Republican Party of Delaware… That is to issue a restraining order banning Vince Phillips and Sam Wilson from any function even remotely connected to the Republican Party of Delaware…..

IF the Republican Party does not take such drastic action…. they are culpable just as you or I would be if a friend of ours started demeaning a stranger in our presence.   WE WOULD BE GUILTY TOO…..

This is why, no… as in zero… self-respecting human being should donate, volunteer, or even vote for any Republican until the Republican Party has elicited some serious cost upon the perpetrators…  Considering the moral weakness previously exhibited by their current leader, I predict that will be highly unlikely….

I further predict that segregation against the “colored people”  will be continue to be openly practiced in Sussex County because it now has the unspoken  “protection” of the Republican Party.

2013

As with every year there are lost opportunities and lost grievences…  Some things that have bothered us, disappear.  Somethings that have bothered us, don’t….

This year was no different, and yet, it was very different…. If one asks oneself what was the greatest factor involving the entire year, then pulls back layer after layer until he gets the full perspective,  I think he comes to a surprising conclusion….

This year, 2013 was the tipping point.  We realized we are a third world nation when it comes to the proportion of wealth across our population….   Like global warming, this disparity was first proposed long ago.  Like global warming it was argued by the power brokers that such a proposal was only a crackpot’s theory;  it gradually gained momentum….

2013, brought that home…. In 2013, we had the party of the Teas, vote against giving New Jersey relief for Hurricane Sandy, and vote themselves relief when a little hail landed in their district…. In 2013, we had government shut itself down to stop Obamacare, then open itself without creating any change at all.   In 2013, we had unemployment benefits cut, then reinstated, and now cut again… We had food stamps cut.  We had a sequester go into effect to save $85 billion dollars….

We had the news media lead fake scandals… when the biggest scandal should be, how is Fox and CNN and CBS still able to call themselves news organizations?  We had the IRS scandal… despite that they dealt evenhandedly with groups of both political persuasions.  We had the Benghazi hearings… Much ado over absolutely nothing… For when it came down to why those four died, all fingers point to that very Congressional committee led by Republican Darrell Issa, which cut well over $100 million in funds that were specifically designated to secure advanced unsecured places of that type.

But when we had a real scandal, which was illuminated by Snowden, all the media shied away.  Calling him a traitor for releasing the documents…  As more came out, Americans began to really fully grasp the totalitarian phase our nation’s government was just on the threshold of achieving….

In 2013 we had civil right voting laws thrown out by the Supreme Court, and instantly all those dark ugly human traits those laws previously regulated, took over and sprang out into the open…

We had a rational push for gun control, that bumped into the irrational group against it.  We did not win the first battle… WE did make considerable ground and showed the NRA was led by psychotic bloodthirsty killers, both nationally and locally….

And the unions… are all bought out… from the top down.   Only those on the very bottom in our service industries, the Wal*marts, McDonalds, and retail outlets, who have nothing to lose, are bravely carrying the fight forward… They are on the right track…

Our sole problem in America is that out of every dollar that trades hands in our economy…. 50 cents of it gets sucked out by the top 1%….  The rest of America is economically playing with a half deck…50 cents on the dollar.  No wonder job growth is slower than it should be?

If you invested, you love this year….  The year’s DJIA started at 13,000 and is now at 16,500….  25% yield….   For every $100,000 you had in stocks… you just made $25,000….

We now realize this was at the expense of the QE 3.  The Federal Government is lending the large brokerage houses all the money they wanted at zero interest, and instead of creating jobs, it went right into the stock market, chasing prices and making them higher….  When that free money begins costing the brokerage houses… those investments are going to deflate.

Most of America no longer has money in the market.  The market is primarily owned by those at the top.

And education?  We had corporate America exposed for trying their hand at teaching little children and failing miserably.   Just as Corporate enterprises have now destroyed Facebook,  television news, and are now destroying Twitter, the same forces demolished education.   An attack on the public school system aimed to demolish it and install a privately owned system, is well underway….   It was all just theoretical until 2013.

The prime problem  behind all of these?

It took a new Pope to make it mainstream… To tie all these individual threads into one rope.  As he spoke, people turned to look at each other and said, ” Wow, why didn’t we see it before?”

When one homeless person dies on the streets it  is not news.  But the DOW drops two points, it is THE news….

What 2013 did, was bring to light that we were not a nation beset by little battles…  Loss of labor unions, stymieing of minimum wage, fierce lobbying against Obamacare, a court controlled by corporate interests, lobbyists writing all our nation’s bills,  What 2013 did was bring to light that all our “think tank” research, was pure propaganda, not research.   What 2013 did, was show us just how much power and wealth lie in the hands of very few people…. roughly 100,000…… with most of that being held by a core of 1000 individuals…. Meaning 314,899,999 of the rest of us are out in the cold…

2013 showed us that the happiest people in the world, are those where wealth is more equally shared…  to be happy, one has to tax heavily…  A sharper sense of wealth is gleaned from looking at happy societies…  Where there is enough wealth to be shared, it is…  It makes little sense to pursue the opposite  tack.  To let those with money have it at no cost, and charge the masses heavily for their use of it…

2013, is the turning of the tide… Now when someone says low taxes are job creators they are viciously humiliated and never dare mention such again. Now when someone says trickle down economics work, we now know they are secretly praising how well it works for those at the top.

2013….  We know.

2014…. No Tea Party.  No Republicans.  No Third Way.   Only by mandating that the wealthy who got rich over nothing, pay their fair share and everyone else’s fair share too, can we again create an economy and a nation that thrives from the bottom up…

2014 is the battle year.  This is where those few at the top will throw billions into protecting the trillions they’ve made from our assets…  But… they only have 1% of the population… The question is whether they can mobilize their toadies to vote and suppress the rest as they have successfully done in the past… when in truth, we were still half asleep….

The rallying cry for the 99% needs to be this:  the 1% needs to do more for our nation!.  We should not be ashamed to mention marginal income (including capital gains) tax rates over 50%, 60%, 70%… at least for the short term, until our economic war is over!  That is not too much! Most livable nations have such.  and the USA itself had such during our grandparent’s time, back when it was easy to go out and find a job….  we had more demand for jobs than we had people….

Income equality is the lens with which all items need to be viewed….  What that means is that with every question, every line item, every debate, this question gets asked…. “What does this proposal do to reverse income equality?”  If it does nothing, it is not good…

What does controlling guns do for income equality?  What do charter schools do for income equality?  What does cutting taxes on Delaware’s 1% do for income equality?  What does making the Port of Wilmington non-union do for economic equality?  What does creating NO-prevailing wage zones in Delaware, do for economic equality?  What does opening Beaver Valley to development do for income equality?  What does raising minimum wage do for economic equality?  What does Common Core do for income equality?  What does opening Family Court to the public do for income equality?  What does building a power plant that runs 24/7 on the brown fields of Newark, do for income equality?  What does building a new Wawa in Newark, do for income equality?

I acknowledge some of those are stretches but that is what having a prime filter does.  One looks at everything through that perspective….  It is one thing to bash the governor for a luckluster economy in his state…. Republicans do that too often, and offer neither specifics, or alternatives.   It is another to bash the governor for ignoring 99% of Delawareans’ needs, or  990,000 people, to the benefit of 10,000, or 1%…..  That is legitimate….

Hurting the 1% to the benefit of the 99% will cause 99 times more economic activity in this state.  99% of our citizens will buy more….  If those 1% continue to make more money off our localized spending, then at least they are earning their income honestly for a change….

Perhaps what is missing, is a retort, the kind that becomes a mantra……. When the Chamber of Commerce steps up to a microphone and says, …. “we pay most of the taxes in this state, we should not pay more…”.

The proper response hitherto missing, should be…. ” Then pay your employees more money, so they can help you share that burden…”

2013:  the arrow was released… 2014 is when it impacts its target,….

(This came out last spring. Most of you have seen this.  If by chance you haven’t, be prepared to have your mind blown. If you’ve become jaded since the last showing, prepare to have your mind blown again.)

Late Night Geek Report:

It is clearer now that the biggest benefactors for the NSA spying were commercial enterprises. The Obama administration went along with the Bush plan and accelerated it, primarily to give American companies a heads up, and keep jobs here.  It worked too.

One can’t argue with success. But one can find how American businesses were co-opted to assist the NSA.  From the Guardian, the following, allegedly from Snowden himself.

• Microsoft helped the NSA to circumvent its encryption to address concerns that the agency would be unable to intercept web chats on the new Outlook.com portal;

• The agency already had pre-encryption stage access to email on Outlook.com, including Hotmail;

• The company worked with the FBI this year to allow the NSA easier access via Prism to its cloud storage service SkyDrive, which now has more than 250 million users worldwide;

• Microsoft also worked with the FBI’s Data Intercept Unit to “understand” potential issues with a feature in Outlook.com that allows users to create email aliases;

• In July last year, nine months after Microsoft bought Skype, the NSA boasted that a new capability had tripled the amount of Skype video calls being collected through Prism;

• Material collected through Prism is routinely shared with the FBI and CIA, with one NSA document describing the program as a “team sport”.

it is revealing that the beneficiaries of the Patriot Act and probably one of the reasons it has been intact long after terrorism faded offshore, are the exact same who are suing each other left and right, using the anti-piracy laws as their barrage.  It appears that laws are not for people anymore; they are for corporations.  It is corporations who want the US to fund listening posts for every American word and sentence.

The only way to fix that, is to divide the corporations Teddy-Roosevelt-style, thereby giving We, the People a little more clout.  …

Afternoon Reminder: Go Vote In School Elections!

Of course you forgot… It’s a school board election…

But because of the corporate attempt to stock our school boards, this is one necessary vote.

Unless you LOVE corporations running your kids into a hole in the ground… you need to vote Minnehan in Christina School district.

For other districts go here…

There Is A Good Reason Our Children Are Failing In Schools.

On this link, there is a test question that hit the schools in New York State and the questions regarding that story.

Simply put, if you don’t take the time to do this test, ( 5 minutes) you should not have any say in education.

Once you see this, you cannot have any qualms as to why our children are failing….

• It is not the teachers.
• It is not the principals.
• It is not the school boards.
• It is the test.

Btw, what score did you get?

Why is this so?

Well let’s examine what happens when a state or a school district fails?  Angry parents call their legislators. Legislators demand more tests. More tests cost more money. Legislators demand and get more money to make more tests to help analyze and to study the problem.

Our question is:  who gets rich?

• A. The Governor
• B. Mark Murphy (Delaware Head of Department of Education)
• C. Principal Skinner (on The Simpsons and all like him)
• D. The Testing organization.

What score did you get?

If every student passed the first time with flying colors, … hmmm.  I wonder how many tests there would be then?  Hmmmm.

Who Dares Fire Minerva McGonagall

Something is amiss at Hogwartz.  Under a ruling by Cornelius Fudge of the Ministry of Magic, all witches and wizards must be tested this school year for what is properly called the end of year exams. Those scores will determine if Prof. Snape, Ms. McGonagall, Ms. Trelawney, Prof. Flitwick, Ms. Potts, Hagrid and Professor Dumbledore will return to teach the following year.

It is called accountability.  if one’s students don’t pass then one must have been a terrible teacher and will not continue serving at Hogwartz in the following school year….

The tests are done on magic parchment.  When one writes with a magic quill, the writing appears on another copy parchment deep within educational department of the Ministry of Magic.  So when any student jots down an answer and seals it with a period at the end, that answer is recorded under that student’s name deep within the ministry.

There appears to be a massive shortage of magic parchment.  It is in very short supply.

So the Ministry of Magic has moved up the test and is spreading its taking over 3 months so each day a few people can take it.  That way, they say, everyone by the end of the year will have taken the test and staffing needs for the following year can be solicited.

Ms McGonagall is scheduled to have her students take the test in March……  The test is a standardized test that is meant to test a student’s entire yearly knowledge.  That includes material covered in March, and April, and May.

But if the test is in March, and the subject matter it covers will be taught two months after the test, won’t that cause Ms. McGonagall to be considered an ineffective teacher?

When this question was brought up, the head of the Ministry of Magic said: ” You figure it out somehow!   You’re magic.”

Super Pac’s November 30th Totals Are Out….

This is from open secrets.org. It has accumulated evidence throughout the election how much money superpacs have collected….

This money is just from the SuperPac’s. It does not include money given directly to the candidate…

Over all, during the election of 2012, SuperPacs collected total receipts of $663,014,402 and total independent expenditures of $680,716,540 in the 2012 cycle. Notice the $17 million deficit for which revenues still must be acquired….

Briefly put, here are the donations broken down by industry…..

Agribusiness…….. 23 million
Communication/Electronics…….. 25 million
Construction………15 million
Defense.………….14 million
Energy/Natural Resources……….29 million
Finance/Insurance/Real Estate…..65 million
Health.……………55 million
Single Issue……….60 million
Labor……………..64 million
Lawyers/Lobbyists…..16 million
Misc. Business……..38 million
Other……………..01 million
Transportation……..21 million

Keep in mind this is over and beyond what may have personally been given to the candidates and filed with the FEC….

One begins to see what’s behind some rather peculiar pieces of legislation we have had thrust upon us…. Oddly, the balance for the most part was even between Democrats and Republicans…

Republicans FAIL As A Delaware Third Party

With Sandy’s approach, words of warning went out to all campaigns.. Get your big signs down for the storm.  Feel free to put them up after the storm blows by.  Everyone got an email.

Democrats were in full force, and in New Castle County, not one Democratic sign was left standing…  By noon all  were stored for safe keeping…

There were no libertarian candidate’s signs.  As dedicated citizens, the libertarian team scoured the county and by noon, their signs were all stored for save keeping.

The one Jill Stein sign I’d seen, was gone.  Secured by the Green Party….

In fact the only signs up as darkness approached,  were those of Alex Pires, which is understandable,  it being a one man operation, and those of the Republican line up, which apparently has even fewer supporters.

It looks like Kansas,  at intersections now, with only Republicans contesting a one man operation….

If the Green Party and Libertarian party can mobilize faster than the Republican, it is time to stop calling the Republican Party a “major” party.

Even the Wizard of Oz had more going for it than today’s Delaware Republicans, who with their daily bumbles are rapidly creating a new definition of the English word pathetic.

Paul Ryan: Body Pop!