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When I first heard Hillary's statements about "hard working Americans (vs lazy Americans) and White voters without college degrees (student loans have dried up?)
supporting her above Obama, I gasped..Hillary! Is this the same women married to the First BLack President??

Who's Blogging» Links to this article
By Eugene Robinson
Friday, May 9, 2008; Page A27

From the beginning, Hillary Clinton has campaigned as if the Democratic nomination were hers by divine right. That's why she is falling short -- and that's why she should be persuaded to quit now, rather than later, before her majestic sense of entitlement splits the party along racial lines.

Sara Robinson, who also writes about the FLDS, has a new article explaining the historical context of Rev. Jeremiah Wright's theology and why conservatives are so eager to take him down. First, you have to understand the evangelical concept of the "prosperity gospel," also called the "Word of Faith." The following explanation is from Sarah Posner:

to paraphrase Tom Caine..."These are the times that try men's souls. The electioneering soldier and the lapel-pin patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country."

The polidiots are proposing a summer gas-tax holiday to appeal to the electorate. Yes, gas prices have risen to hurtful levels. Why not give us a break on gas taxes?

Well,the current uptick in oil prices doesn't reflect a tight supply - it reflects speculation triggered by the news from Nigeria & Britain on temporary supply problems (pipeline attack, strike). However, given a gas-tax decrease, people will then drive more this summer, and this increased demand will guarantee even worse prices come fall(or post-election...since we could expect any tax holiday to extend through election day in November).

Another in the series on the FLDS from Sara Robinson, who usually blogs at Orcinus. This article looks at the FLDS from the perspective of a 12-point checklist put out by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service that helps governments determine when religious or political groups have crossed the line and become dangerous (Campaign for America's Future):

7. Crimes of Intimidation — Groups heading toward violent confrontation usually start with threats and petty violence against members and outsiders who dare to cross them. (Occasionally, these people end up dead — which only makes them a useful warning to others.) Knowing that they can intimidate and silence people raises the leader's sense of invincibility and teaches him that violence works. Both lessons raise the odds he'll resort to more violence more quickly in the future. It also makes life much harder for investigators gathering new information on the group as the risk level rises.

For FLDS members, the cultural atmosphere has always been one of dawn-to-dusk intimidation. As noted, men who don't comply will simply lose everything. Women risk being sent away from their families, reassigned to other households or colonies, or committed to mental hospitals. Children have no choices about marriage, work, or education. Whatever the Prophet says, goes — and God have mercy on you if you dare to refuse.

The New Times account strongly suggests that Warren Jeffs was rapidly ratcheting up the overall level of intimidation within the group — and hinting strongly at violence — before he was arrested. His growing paranoia led him to purge dozens of men from the church as suspected enemies, banishing them and seizing their wives on a scale no prophet had dared attempt before. Removing him from the picture may have slowed the group's acceleration toward violent confrontation; but if he comes back — or another leader takes up these same themes — the group could once again move into the danger zone. After all: they live their lives on the edge of that line.

Score: 4 out of 5

Sara Robinson at Orcinus is starting a series about the FLDS that includes reporting from Jon Krakauer's Under the Banner of Heaven and the new book The Secret Lives of Saints by Daphne Bramham. Here's Sara's series so far; check back at Orcinus periodically for more.

• Are FLDS women brainwashed?
• The Secret Lives of Saints
• What We're Not Talking About, Part I: Other Issues With the FLDS

One of the things we need to understand is just how the FLDS managed to stay so far under the radar for so long — and what twisted consequences were allowed to follow from that lack of oversight. Bramham shows that they did a stunningly effective job of building their own self-sufficient infrastructure of community institutions — hospitals, police forces, courts, financial trusts, schools, and employers — that allowed the church to function without interacting with the outside world any more than necessary. Most of the group's institutions were designed to mimic and supplant outside authority well enough to keep the group (and especially its treatment of women and children) hidden from the prying eyes of outsiders. And, for 60 years, those who were responsible for providing higher-level oversight for all these institutions have almost always been somehow induced to look the other way. [...]

Like African-Americans in the slavery era, women who tried to run were captured by these police and returned to their husbands for punishment — or taken to the hospital for the dreaded mental health evaluation. The police force's main job is to be the muscle that enforces the Prophet's control of the entire community. When the Prophet decides that a man no longer deserves his home, these are the cops who enforce the eviction. Appealing to the FLDS judges has been useless: due process as we understand it doesn't even enter into the conversation.

There is progress on this front. The state of Utah began to move against the Hildale police force in 2005, revoking the certification of its polygamous chief. Sam Roundy admitted that he'd investigated over 25 sexual abuse cases in the past decade — including one that involved the rape of an eight-year-old — and never reported it to child protection authorities. (He pleaded ignorance of all mandated reporter laws.) However, Roundy was replaced with another polygamous officer who immediately sent Warren Jeffs a letter pledging his loyalty, and I found no word that he's left office since. Later that year, the Utah Supreme Court also disbarred the local polygamous judge, which paved the way for reform of the local courts.

But the Saints are now in many places besides Utah; and officials in these other states shouldn't be surprised if they try to hijack cops and courts and replicate this system wherever they go. In Utah, decades of failure to attend to this effectively deprived tens of thousands of people of their civil rights. It can't be allowed to happen again.

From Rochelle Kaplan; Democratic Activist in utah:

Hi all,

Kathryn Kolbert, the amazing woman who is the new head of the PFAW, is coming to SLC, en route to SF

We decided to rent the back room of Squatters downtown, beginning at 6 PM on Sunday, April 13, so progressives could meet her and learn more about People for the American Way.

It was founded by Norman Lear.

http://www.pfaw.org/pfaw/general/

Read the rest of this entry...

http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/detail/4rvjs

This Saturday at 1:00 at THE Woodshed (sleaszy bar across the street from downtown Sears)

SPRING INTO ACTION FOR OBAMA

We were just talking about supporting other groups who are having events for Sentor Obama,Here's a good start!
(I think)

Anyone want to go with me?
Sheryl

Topic: Hillary Clinton is going to "throw" the race, True or False? Discuss amoungst yourselves.

(I'm feeling verklempt.)

http://www.politico.com/

Southern Dem warns party to avert disaster
Jonathan Martin, Mike Allen
Wed Mar 26, 5:50 AM ET

Democrats are increasingly nervous about their party’s protracted nomination fight, and some prominent figures are publicly warning that the party needs to act fast to avoid disaster.

Chief among these voices is Phil Bredesen, the two-term governor of Tennessee who is uncommitted to either Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) or Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.).

In an interview this week with Politico, Bredesen said flatly that if the contentious slog continues until the Democrats’ late-August convention in Denver, the party would have a vastly diminished chance of recapturing the White House. [...]

Bredesen also joined House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) in warning that superdelegates should not overturn the outcome from primaries and caucuses.

If Obama were denied the nomination by Democratic insiders after winning the party’s popular vote, Bredesen said, “There would be hell to pay in the party for a long time to come.”

I hosted a MoveOn calling party for Senator Obama tonight. The calls were to Texas, where many of the voters did not realize the voting process rules..vote in primary then to a cacus.
Very positive experience; networked with many of the attendees to work on local elections!
Met some great people who "have never done this before!"

This party supports the idea that Senator Obama is truly encouraging a grass roots movement; it is really working.