*Written by Rob Rimes.

Today is a great day for liberty. As I write this it is January 18^th, 2012 and the Internet is ablaze with anger towards SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act). Not only was The Swash down in protest of these dastardly bills but Internet giants Wikipedia and Reddit were down as well. Shit, even Google participated in this blackout with a unique graphic on their page that lead to information about these two horrible laws and what you can do to fight them.

I was more than ecstatic today when I signed into my Facebook account and was overwhelmed by all the people who blacked out their own photos and had status updates and links protesting SOPA and PIPA plastered all over the home page. The impact of this protest is literally reaching further than any other online protest I’ve ever witnessed or been a part of. In fact, in just a few short hours, the tide has turned and the pimps pushing this law are now starting to run like the two-faced pandering bastards they are. I guess when you shine a little light the cockroaches scatter.

One of my favorite punching bags, Marco Rubio – the Republican senator form my home state of Florida, was a co-sponsor on one of these evil bills but he has now come out against it. This is because Rubio is a dickbag, a panderer and a wolf in Tea Party clothing. This “noble” act doesn’t excuse the fact that he co-sponsored PIPA and was also a champion for the insanely tyrannical NDAA bill, which just passed recently. Don’t get excited and let Rubio fool you, when this dies down, he’ll help reintroduce the bill with a few modifications and continue on his fascist path.

Conservative darling Paul Ryan just wrote this status update on his Facebook:

The Internet is one of the most magnificent expressions of freedom and free enterprise in history. It should stay that way. While H.R. 3261, the Stop Online Piracy Act, attempts to address a legitimate problem, I believe it creates the precedent and possibility for undue regulation, censorship and legal abuse. I do not support H.R. 3261 in its current form and will oppose the legislation should it come before the full House.

While that sounds all fine and dandy, Mr. Ryan doesn’t fully oppose the idea of the bill and chances are, if it was tweaked and the opposition towards it died down, he may just very well vote for it.

Senators Jim DeMint, Robert Menendez and others have come out against this tyranny. Another co-sponsor, Arizona congressman Ben Quayle has withdrawn his support. Freedom fighter and libertarian leaning Michigan congressman Justin Amash continues to speak out against this, as does Kentucky senator Rand Paul and his father, Texas congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul.

The opposition to these bills has grown so quickly in the last several hours that six Republican senators wrote a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. The letter states:

We have increasingly heard from a large number of constituents and other stakeholders with vocal concerns about possible unintended consequences of the proposed legislation, including breaches in cybersecurity, damaging the integrity of the Internet, costly and burdensome litigation, and dilution of First Amendment rights.

For those of you who have been in the dark, I’ll break down what these bills are. In a nutshell, what they are supposed to do is to protect copyrighted material and eliminate piracy. What they actually do is a different story.

Basically, these bills give the entertainment industry the power to censor the Internet and breed a whole new type of crony capitalism while forcing us into a digital police state. You see, private corporations want to be able to choose what can and cannot be censored on the Internet. These corporations are trying to protect their property, which is understandable, and since the Internet is a bastion for downloading music and movies, they want to be able to tighten their grip and control how the whole system works. Considering that many of the sources for this copyrighted material exists outside of United States jurisdiction, these laws are being put in place to give the government and their corporate buddies an easier way at stopping copyright infringement. Again, that is understandable but the methods about doing this are just awful.

The first thing that this does is it gives the power to United States based ISPs (Internet Service Providers) to have special access at blocking infringing domain names. This also gives companies the power to sue websites, bloggers or whoever until they remove links or information directing Internet users to anything that they deem as infringed upon property.

Secondly, the government and their corporate pals would also be given the power to cut off funds to any websites that they believe are infringing on copyrights. Essentially, they can forcibly cancel infringing websites accounts with financial services and advertisers.

Now even though this all may seem somewhat proactive, one has to look at what actually constitutes copyright infringement. The description that they provide is so broad that if you technically upload a video to YouTube and there happens to be a piece of a song playing in the background, even if it’s just on the radio while you’re talking to the camera unaware of it, you have just infringed on copyrighted material and could face some serious penalties. This is just a small example but think of all the things you come across on the Internet on a daily basis that could technically be considered as copyright infringement. Violations are pretty much fucking everywhere! Hell, the whole Internet is a violation!

Besides all that, if there is a will there is a way. These laws won’t stop Internet users from finding music and movies to download illegally. In fact, even if a URL is blocked, an Internet user can still access the site via its IP address. Hell, this might start a revolution in web browsing and millions of digital pirates will be navigating the Net with IPs as opposed to typical URLs.

Another thing to mention is that these laws are incredibly bad for business. Essentially, they will cripple and stifle startups as corporations will have the power to sue any company that they feel isn’t properly protecting their interests. In a classic case of crony capitalism or corporatism, this allows the giants to stay on top, where they can look down and crush any growing company that may become a viable competitor for their business. Basically, these bills will create and perpetuate monopolies. When large corporations have the power to bankrupt new search engines and social networking sites, there really isn’t room for growth or innovation. We might as well just go back to the days of dark dingy uninspiring chat rooms.

The scariest thing that these laws will do is tamper with the Internet as a whole from the backend. By messing around with the Internet’s vast registry of domain names we could very well end up with a World Wide Web that is less stable and less secure. At the end of the day, these laws won’t stop piracy, as they claim and they will just create an environment for a new type of corporatism while leaving the Internet less secure and less reliable than it has ever been.

The Internet has already become a playground for government and corporate meddling. Hell, they already have laws in place to protect copyright infringement yet they want to push the envelope as far as they can. As of right now, the government and corporations already have the power to block any site just off of one infringing link. Social media giants like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube and others are now forced to censor their users because if they don’t, they become liable for the material their users upload and could be forced to shut down. On top of that, an ordinary Internet user could already be sentenced to prison for up to five years just for posting any copyrighted material – this includes someone like Tay Zonday who became an Internet sensation for singing pop song covers.

This situation is incredibly fucked up and it is just one more battle in a long line or tyrannous laws that the government is trying to impose on us. Just add this ingredient to the same bowl of tyranny punch that already consists of the PATRIOT Act, NDAA, indefinite detention, Homeland Security, the TSA, previous Internet censorship, FEMA, etc. The list goes on and on and hopefully people’s distrust in government has grown to the point that all future legislation the tyrants bring forth will be scrutinized and passionately opposed as much as SOPA and PIPA.

In the end, we’ve got to chain these bastards’ feet to the grill and turn up the fire until they do what we say because frankly, that’s their damn job.

The White House plans to ask Congress by the end of the week for an increase in the government’s debt ceiling to allow the United States to pay its bills on time, according to a senior Treasury Department official on Tuesday.

The approval is expected to go through without a challenge, given that Congress is in recess until later in January and the request is in line with an agreement to keep the U.S. government funded into 2013.

The debt is projected to fall within $100 billion of the current cap by December 30, when the United States has $82 billion in interest on its debt and payments such as Social Security coming due. President Barack Obama is expected to ask for authority to increase the borrowing limit by $1.2 trillion, part of the spending authority that was negotiated between Congress and the White House this summer.

Under the agreement struck in August during the showdown over the government’s debt limit, the cap is automatically raised unless Congress votes to block the debt-ceiling extension. Lawmakers have 15 days within receiving the request to vote, which is largely symbolic because the president can veto it and Congress would be unlikely to muster the two-thirds majority to override it. Moreover, the U.S. House of Representatives also is in recess until January 17.

The deal called for raising the debt ceiling by $2.1 trillion to serve the nation’s borrowing needs into 2013 and also included mandatory cuts to the federal budget deficit. Since then, the extension has been increased twice by a total of $900 billion.

The debt limit currently stands at $15.194 trillion and would increase to $16.394 trillion with the request.

(Reporting By Margaret Chadbourn; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)

Source: Reuters.

“The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the US Government cannot pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies. Increasing America’s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that, “the buck stops here.’ Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.”

-Senator Barack H. Obama, March 2006

*Taken from Geekologie.

Seen here sporting the handsome visage of Mark Twain Sir Robert Borden, the Bank of Canada’s governor Mark Carney (who’s made out with the bearded lady before but won’t admit it) shows off the country’s new plastic $100 bill. The $100 will be the first of the bills (Canada’s — several other countries already have plastic/hybrid bills) to be rolled out in polymer form this November, with $50′s to follow next March, and the rest to be out by the end of 2013 (if we survive that long).

The polymer bank notes are more durable than paper money. The Bank of Canada expects the new bills to last 2.5 times longer than the paper ones.
They’re also harder to fake than paper money. Some of the security features built into the new notes include raised ink, hidden numbers and metallic images in see-through windows.

The bills feel smooth and slightly waxy. They don’t crumple easily, but they do crease when you try, and they don’t seem to tear in half.

They don’t tear in half?! But how am I supposed to perform my ‘ripped bill repairs itself’ magic trick? *calling manager* They’re on to me — cancel the Canadian portion of my magic tour, STAT!

Get ready for more plastic in your wallet; Canada switching to polymer bills[yahoonews]

Thanks to Ken, who’s pissed Canadian rappers won’t be able to rhyme about “gettin’ that paper” anymore. Wait — CANADA HAS RAPPERS?! “Yeah, Snow.”Ahhhhhh. A licky boom-boom down!

*Written by Rob Rimes.

*This article is broken into five parts with each being released a few days apart. This is due to the size of the article. Here is PART I, PART II & PART III.

5. Stage Four – Lyndon B. Johnson and the Great Society:

“I am concerned about the whole man. I am concerned about what the people, using their government as an instrument and a tool, can do toward building the whole man, which will mean a better society and a better world.” – Lyndon Baines Johnson

Lyndon B. Johnson became the 36th President of the United States of America after tragedy struck and President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. LBJ was a progressive leader that wanted to deliver just as much “change” to the United States as his predecessors, FDR and Woodrow Wilson did. Just like the last major progressive in the office before him, LBJ wanted to significantly change the landscape in America with a monster set of programs like the New Deal. LBJ called his monster the Great Society.

The Great Society was not only the second coming of the New Deal, it also borrowed many ideas from JFK’s New Frontier, which was never really implemented on a large scale due to his death just a few years into his first term. The basic make-up of the Great Society consisted of civil rights and the war on poverty, as well as programs for education, health care, the arts, transportation, consumer protection and the environment.

The first of these factors I want to look at is civil rights. To be clear, I am definitely in favor of civil rights in theory. Everyone deserves equality and no one should be discriminated against due to race, color, creed, etc. Civil rights and women’s rights were huge victories in their day. However, apart from all the fanfare and all the glory, there is a lot of tyrannical and evil bullshit. The thing I am talking about specifically is the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Now this bill was written by Republicans and most of the GOP supported it, while the Democrats were strongly opposed to it. In fact, I talk about this in greater detail in my article “Republicans: The Party of Racism?“. Essentially, the Republicans were all for civil rights, while the Democrats, today’s race baiters and favorite party of most minorities, were against them. Interesting, eh?

One Democrat seemingly saw the light however and that was Lyndon B. Johnson. LBJ adopted the Civil Rights Act as a part of the Great Society. Even though it was drafted by the opposition, LBJ wanted desperately to make sure that blacks and other races had the same rights as whites. While this is quite noble and admirable, his efforts have grown to become counterproductive. Now the liberals will sneer at that and think it is some form of right-wing propaganda that I am trying to push off but I am only concerned with the facts. The facts clearly show, that in some aspects, parts of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 have violated the Constitution and have also given a lot of minorities a sense of dependency on the federal government.

One way that it goes against the Constitution, is that it forces business owners to have to comply with a set of laws that makes it so they have to service everyone, no matter what the color of their skin is. Sure, this sounds good but if someone doesn’t like a certain group of people, should they be forced to do business with them? That goes against their individual rights and if it is their business, it goes against their property rights. I’m not turning a blind eye to bigotry, but that person, no matter how they feel, should be able to do business however they see fit. Now, that doesn’t mean that he won’t be negatively effected by his bigotry. He’d most likely loose business as word quickly spreads that he refuses to service a race that isn’t his. The government doesn’t need to regulate this, people can figure these things out for themselves. This was Barry Goldwater’s argument against the Civil Rights Act and by taking that stance, he lost the presidential election against LBJ. Nowadays, the Democrats like to paint him out as a bigot when, in reality, it was the Democrats who were the bigots of the day.

Also, as far as the unconstitutionality of the Civil rights Act goes, there is no power given to Congress that allows them to regulate employee and employer relations. This would fall under the 10th Amendment where the ability to make such laws would fall into the hands of the states themselves. Essentially, the Civil Rights Act is a violation against state’s rights in addition to the Constitution. Revisiting FDR, as governor of New York, he stated:

“..as the conduct of public utilities, of banks, of insurance, of business, of agriculture, of education, of social welfare and of a dozen other important features. In these, Washington must not be encouraged to interfere.”

If only FDR practiced as president, what he preached as governor. Too bad LBJ didn’t listen either.

Now, let’s look at the fact that the Civil Rights Act had counterproductive results. It was Congressman Ron Paul who said on the House floor:

“..contrary to the claims of the supporters of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the sponsors of HR 676, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not improve race relations or enhance freedom. Instead, the forced integration dictated by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 increased racial tensions while diminishing individual liberty.”

So, how did it do that?

Well, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 gave the federal government a huge surge in power. Their reach could literally go further than it ever had before in regards to the regulation of business at the employment management level. The government now had power of the hiring process, employee relations and customer service. In regards to this, Ron Paul said:

“The result was a massive violation of the rights of private property and contract, which are the bedrocks of free society. The federal government has no legitimate authority to infringe on the rights of private property owners to use their property as they please and to form (or not form) contracts with terms mutually agreeable to all parties. The rights of all private property owners, even those whose actions decent people find abhorrent, must be respected if we are to maintain a free society.

This expansion of federal power was based on an erroneous interpretation of the congressional power to regulate interstate commerce. The framers of the Constitution intended the interstate commerce clause to create a free trade zone among the states, not to give the federal government regulatory power over every business that has any connection with interstate commerce.”

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 did not accomplish its goals of creating racial harmony and promoting equality. You cannot regulate what is in a man’s mind. If he is a racist, you cannot legislate it out of him. If anything, this sort of action will create strong resistance, which in many cases is what has happened. People generally are good, but you can’t force them into being good. It has to be something that they are by their own accord.

Forcing employers to hire based on a racial quota is ridiculous. If you are giving minorities an extra edge then that certainly isn’t equal. Affirmative action in all its forms is racist in itself and a giant oxymoron. Ron Paul also had something to say about this aspect:

“Racial quotas have not contributed to racial harmony or advanced the goal of a color-blind society. Instead, these quotas encouraged racial balkanization, and fostered racial strife.

Of course, America has made great strides in race relations over the past forty years. However, this progress is due to changes in public attitudes and private efforts. Relations between the races have improved despite, not because of, the 1964 Civil Rights Act.”

I keep quoting Dr. Paul here because he has a way with words that eloquently portrays the reality of this controversial subject. Well, “controversial” if you seemingly oppose it.

Trying to put a price tag on the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is impossible. However, the vast majority of the programs under the umbrella of this bill have been incredibly costly over the years. The biggest cost however, has been the cost of individual liberty. If we all just got behind individual liberty and respected it, laws like this one wouldn’t even be necessary.

According to Wikipedia, “The most ambitious and controversial part of the Great Society was..” the War on Poverty. Man, seems like we’re always at “war” with someone or something, doesn’t it? I don’t want to go to war with the poor! Apparently, this wasn’t a war against the poor, it was a war to “help” the poor. Funny, how can you help the poor when wars are expensive? No one ever helped the poor with wasteful spending. Hell, wasteful spending is why many people are poor. So apart from the obvious, how was this a costly, counterproductive, horrible idea from the minds of progressives?

Well, the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 was comprised of a laundry list of programs guaran-damn-teed to end poverty in the United States. It didn’t matter to LBJ that the experts of the day were stating that poverty was on a sharp decline in America. No, no, no! LBJ had to try and meddle with it and force the turnaround quicker. Don’t these tyrants ever learn from the “good intentions” of their predecessors? No, they don’t. They don’t concern themselves with facts and data, they concern themselves with guilt and ego. In fact Johnson championed in what progressives before him had done when he declared:

“The Act does not merely expand old programs or improve what is already being done. It charts a new course. It strikes at the causes, not just the consequences of poverty. It can be a milestone in our one-hundred eighty year search for a better life for our people.”

LBJ claimed that the Economic Opportunity Act would accomplish five goals. They first goal would provide half a million underprivileged young Americans with the opportunity to develop skills, continue education, and find useful work. The second goal would give every American community the opportunity to develop a comprehensive plan to fight its own poverty—and help them to carry out their plans. The third goal would allow Americans to enlist in helping fight the War on Poverty. It was voluntary however. The fourth goal would destroy the barriers holding back workers and farmers. The final goal was the creation of the the Office of Economic Opportunity, a federal HQ for the War on Poverty. Man, all that shit sounds expensive! Why not just give the money to the people charitably, as opposed to forcibly taking it via taxpayers’ dollars and distributing it into these expensive and expansive programs? I guess having a gun to one’s head to force their charity is more romantic.

LBJ and the newly refurbished Magical Progressive Problem Solving Machine created the Welfare State. In a typical case of “unintended consequences”, the welfare system has failed miserably and created a society that is further dependent on government handouts, whether through the abuse of food stamps or unemployment benefits. Just look at how out of control unemployment is now. The government now allows people to collect unemployment checks for 99 weeks! That’s a month shy of two years! I know unemployment is bad in this country right now, but my-fucking-god, is it really going to take two years to find a job? I’ve never in my entire life been unemployed for a quarter of that time. When I was, I was too proud to take unemployment benefits. Maybe that was a mistake on my part but I still went from being homeless and penniless to making a pretty good salary and holding a pretty sweet job. If there is a will there is a way! I’ve said it again and again. However, the government takes that will away.

You se, the length of unemployment benefits allows people to be overly selective with the jobs they choose. People turn down menial hard-working jobs for little pay because they are getting little pay to sit at home to browse TMZ and play Farmville between casually scanning Monster, Craigslist and CareerBuilder. Yes, I realize the unemployment benefits are small and near impossible to make a living off of, but with all the other entitlements and handouts added in on top of that, one can live pretty phat for an unemployed person. People can debate this to death but I have seen this in action with my own eyes throughout my life. This IS what motivated me to not become one of those people. Guess who’s gotten further in life between those people and I? I did, and I was even worse off than most of them when at my lowest. We have created a nation of lazy entitled whiners because of these progressive programs. If you think I am an asshole for stating that, you are a blind idiot for not understanding the concept of “cause and effect”. Truth is, the Great Society created the Weak Society.

Another part of the Great Society was education. LBJ dropped a few new laws on us with the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the Higher Education Act and the Bilingual Education Act. With these acts came some unintended consequences born out of good intentions like every goddamned progressive invention. With the Elementary and Secondary Education Act came the Head Start program. With the Higher Education Act came the Teacher Corps.With the Bilingual Education Act came special federal aid to schools that had students with limited English speaking ability.

This bilingual idiocy has led us to a country that is overly sensitive to the needs of non-English speakers. Instead of promoting our national language, we force our citizens to conform to the needs of those who aren’t even citizens. It makes it so that immigrants to America don’t have to learn the national language. We are the only country in the world promoting such nonsense. If you, as an American, move to a foreign land and refuse to learn their language, not only will you be laughed at, but you will fall behind immensely. It is not a nation’s job to adapt to an outsider, it is an outsiders job to adapt to the nation. Maybe it is just me but that’s common sense. Our political correctness has made us a nation of pacifist pussies always trying to belittle, demoralize and demonize ourselves and our culture for the sake of those escaping their situations for the American life. Hell, we’re cheating them as much as we’re cheating ourselves here.

The Great Society also created the medical monsters Medicare and Medicaid. Just like with FDR’s Social Security plan, one doesn’t have to look too far to see how these entitlements are ruining our economy still to this day. In fact, the combination of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid took up 43 percent of our national budget in 2010! Nearly half of our federal budget goes to just these three pieces of progressive legislation! It’s fucking insanity! Problem is, even the fiscal conservatives, for the most part, refuse to give up these entitlements. What these programs are, in layman’s terms, is welfare for the senior citizen crowd. Medicare and Medicaid also opened the door to socialized health care and eventually, Obamacare. I’ll cover that in the next section of this article.

LBJ’s Great Society also thought it was necessary for the federal government to involve itself in the arts and broadcasting. Why the hell government needs to be involved in art or broadcasting is beyond me. Many liberals have tried to explain this to me but their explanations continually fall short. First of all, art is open to interpretation and what some sees as art, someone else might not. Art is subjective. So who the hell is the government to think that they can funnel tax dollars to a subjective thing? How do you quantify that even? This is why we end up with our tax dollars paying for museum exhibits of ant-covered Christs. I plan to write an article about government and art in the near future.

As far as broadcasting goes, the federal government has given us PBS and NPR. To some, mainly the lefties, this is a great thing. To those on the right or in the middle even, this is ridiculous. First of all, it would be great if government funded broadcasting was non-partisan or even bi-partisan. It is neither of these. NPR for instance, is a hardcore leftist entity. Why should someone who is opposed to that ideology have to pay for it? Hell, NPR themselves have been on record saying that they would actually do much better without government funding. Okay assholes, then why are you stealing from us then? Give us back our money and go private. As long as you’re public and taking my money, you have no right to shove socialist and progressive bullshit down my throat. Now you can argue that I don’t have to listen to it. Good point, and I don’t. But I DO have to pay for it, and that is the problem. PBS is leftist too and I don’t feel like I should have to pay for them either.

Idiot shitcock Ralph Nader wrote a stupid ass book called “Unsafe at Any Speed”. Because of that stupid ass book, the LBJ administration added some transportation legislation to the Great Society. The biggest of these progressive programs was the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act. What this law did was it empowered the federal government to establish safety standards for motor vehicles, as well as overseeing traffic safety. Once again, the progressives thought that they could do something more efficiently than the private sector. There are already several agencies that test countless things with motor vehicles and other items. Nader’s big stink against the Corvair, which was a focal point of his book, ended up being complete bullshit. The car was considered “unsafe to drive” and was pulled off the market. A few years later, the vehicle was tested to see if these claims were valid, and they weren’t. All this was created on a lie. Nader’s attack was complete bullshit and used as a catalyst to get the people to believe that we need government to protect us from those evil automakers. On this topic Milton Friedman said:

“Nowadays there are Corvair fan clubs throughout the country. Corvairs have become collectors’ items. Consumers have given their verdict on Ralph Nader and the government regulations.”

The last area of the Great Society I want to talk about is the environmental portion. Where the two Roosevelts and Wilson wanted to protect existing resources and promote conservation, LBJ took it even further. During his time in the Oval Office, he signed several environmental bills into law. These bills were the Clear Air, Water Quality and Clean Water Restoration Acts and Amendments, the Wilderness Act, the Endangered Species Preservation Act, the National Trails System Act, the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, the Land and Water Conservation Act, the Solid Waste Disposal Act, the Motor Vehicle Air Pollution Control Act, the National Historic Preservation Act, the Aircraft Noise Abatement Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. All of these bills come with their own forms of tyranny built in. Most of them have created some ridiculous laws that negatively impact economic growth. By putting the rights of a single endangered bird over the rights of thousands upon thousands of people to go into a Wal-Mart and buy their necessities is pretty fucking ludicrous. Analyzing each of these in full detail would take up a whole book. What I can say here though, is that with each of these programs comes a heavy price tag which we are still paying today. With each also comes a loss of liberty, especially individual and property rights.

There are several other aspects of the Great Society that I haven’t mentioned, but I am sure you get the idea. This being the fourth huge section in my giant article about the roots of progressivism should probably prepare you for the fact that the fifth and final part will also not have a positive ending.

Looking back at LBJ here, it is pretty apparent that his performance as POTUS was greatly influenced by the progressive masterminds before him. Because of that, LBJ’s legacy was just as tyrannical and maddening as the legacies of his predecessors. When you dump the Great Society on top of the New Deal, Wilsonian policy and Teddy Roosevelt’s programs, you are left with a giant beast risen from the ashes of liberty. The Great Society, the New Deal and all the other progressive bullshit programs did not empower people like they promised, instead they stripped great Americans of their already existing power, their resourcefulness, their drive, their pride and their self-reliance. All that was replaced with apathy, complacency and dependence on the State.

No need to worry though, there was another progressive who rose from the ashes promising “hope” and “change”. He is the subject of the fifth and final part of this article.

6. Stage Five – Barack H. Obama, Hope, Change & Health Care:

“This is the moment when we must build on the wealth that open markets have created, and share its benefits more equitably. Trade has been a cornerstone of our growth and global development. But we will not be able to sustain this growth if it favors the few, and not the many.” – Barack Hussein Obama

This article will be continued in PART V

*Taken from AP.

Dozens of bills are advancing through statehouses nationwide that would put an array of new obstacles – legal, financial and psychological – in the paths of women seeking abortions.

The tactics vary: mandatory sonograms and anti-abortion counseling, sweeping limits on insurance coverage, bans on abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy. To abortion-rights activists, they add up to the biggest political threat since the Roe v. Wade decision of 1973 that legalized abortion nationwide.

“It’s just this total onslaught,” said Elizabeth Nash, who tracks state legislation for the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive-health research organization that supports abortion rights.

What’s different this year is not the raw number of anti-abortion bills, but the fact that many of the toughest, most substantive measures have a good chance of passage due to gains by conservative Republicans in last year’s legislative and gubernatorial elections. On Tuesday, South Dakota Gov. Dennis Daugaard signed into law a bill that would impose a longest-in-the-nation waiting period of three days before women could have an abortion – and also require them to undergo counseling at pregnancy help centers that discourage abortions.

“We’re seeing an unprecedented level of bills that would have a serious impact on women’s access to abortion services that very possibly could become law,” said Rachel Sussman, senior policy analyst for the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

On the other side, anti-abortion strategists such as Mary Spaulding Balch of the National Right to Life Committee have been scrambling to keep up with legislative developments: “Until the bills get on the governors’ desks, it’s premature to claim victory. But it’s moving faster than it has in previous years. … We’re very pleased with the progress thus far.”

In a number of states, lawmakers are considering bills that would ban elective abortions after 20 or 21 weeks of pregnancy. These measures are modeled after a law approved last year in Nebraska that was based on the disputed premise that a fetus can feel pain after 20 weeks.

The Idaho Senate approved one such bill Wednesday, sending it to the House, while a similar bill won final legislative approval in the Kansas Senate. The same type of measure is pending in Oklahoma and Alabama.

In Ohio, there’s been a hearing on an even tougher measure that would outlaw abortions after the first medically detectable heartbeat – as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. At that hearing, two pregnant women underwent ultrasounds so lawmakers could see and hear the fetal hearts.

The Ohio bill and the bans on abortions after 20 weeks are direct challenges to the legal status quo, based on Supreme Court rulings that permit abortions up to the point of a fetus’ viability – approximately 24 weeks – and allow states to impose restrictions for abortions after that stage.

In Texas, a bill passed by the House would require that pregnant women have an opportunity to view a sonogram image, hear the fetal heartbeat and listen to a doctor describe the fetus. While the doctor would be obligated to provide the information, the woman could close her eyes or cover her ears, according to the bill, which doesn’t exempt victims of rape or incest.

“We don’t believe these bills will dissuade women who’ve already made their decisions,” said Donna Crane of NARAL Pro-Choice America. “What we think they will do is harass and intimidate women who don’t deserve it.”

Balch disagreed, insisting that the South Dakota bill and the sonogram measures in several states were not coercive.

“When a woman is pregnant and doesn’t want to be, the more information she has, the better,” Balch said. “That’s what these laws are trying to do – give a thoughtful pause so the mother can understand the options that are out there.”

In more than 20 states, bills have been introduced to restrict insurance coverage of abortion. In Utah, one such measures – affecting both private and public plans – has cleared both legislative chambers and been sent to Gov. Gary Herbert.

Of the various types of bills, the insurance bans could have the broadest impact, according to some abortion-rights activists.

“You could have nearly half the states where you couldn’t buy regular insurance coverage for abortion even with your own money,” Crane said. “This is having a transformational effect on the insurance industry and the way abortion is viewed.”

While routine first-trimester abortions generally cost $400 to $700, later and more complicated abortions can run into the thousands of dollars, especially if hospitalization is needed.

“A lot of these bills have an edge to them that really discounts the complications that can occur in pregnancy,” said Planned Parenthood’s Sussman. “There’s a disregard for women’s health.”

Florida is a prime battleground. With a new Republican governor, Rick Scott, who touts his anti-abortion beliefs, conservative lawmakers have introduced at least 18 bills on the topic – including proposals to require ultrasound and to ban most insurance coverage of abortion.

“That could result in tens of thousands of women losing coverage,” said Stephanie Kunkel, executive director of the Florida Association of Planned Parenthood Affiliates.

A different tactic is being tried in Virginia, where lawmakers last month passed a bill requiring abortion clinics to be regulated on the same basis as hospitals. Abortion-rights group said this could entail higher costs and force several clinics to close.

Many of the states where anti-abortion bills are advancing have new Republican governors who made campaign pledges to support such efforts.

For example, Brownback urged Kansas legislators to create a “culture of life” and is considered likely to sign the pending bill that would tighten restrictions on abortion after the 21st week of pregnancy.

The sponsor of the Idaho bill to impose a similar ban after 20 weeks, Sen. Chuck Winder, summoned out-of-state medical and legal experts to tell colleagues that a fetus at that point will suffer pain during an abortion. It’s a disputed assertion; the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists says it knows of no legitimate evidence showing a fetus can ever experience pain.

Thus far, the year-old Nebraska law banning most abortions after 20 weeks has not been challenged in court. That has emboldening abortion foes to promote versions of it in other states this year even though the nationwide norm is to allow elective abortions up to roughly 24 weeks.

Jill June of Planned Parenthood of the Heartland, which operates in Nebraska and Iowa, said she expected the 20-week ban to be challenged at some point – either in Nebraska or some other state that passes such a law.

She cited the case of Danielle Deaver, a Nebraska woman who – under the new law – was denied the option of terminating a pregnancy at 22 weeks after she learned the baby was nonviable.

Deaver ended up going into natural pre-term labor and gave birth to a girl who died after 15 minutes. She later told her story to local media, expressing hope that other legislators would consider the ramifications as they contemplated such bans.

“There will be more women like her who will be harmed if these laws continue to be passed in other states,” June said.

*Taken from the Star-Telegram.

A bipartisan group of more than 20 state lawmakers have signed on in support of measures to ban the TSA from using controversial screening procedures in Texas airports.

State Reps. David Simpson, R-Longview, and Eddie Rodriguez, D-Austin, have gotten about 20 fellow legislators to co-author bills the pair filed last week banning the use of full-body scanners and invasive pat-down searches on fliers.

The supporters include lawmakers on opposite ends of the political spectrum, including Fort Worth Democrat Lon Burnam, one of the most liberal members of the Legislature, and Tyler Republican Leo Berman, a staunch social conservative.

“You’ve got civil libertarians. You’ve got conservative Christians,” Simpson said. “One fellow legislator told me, ‘If this doesn’t fly out of committee, I don’t know what will.’”

One of the bills would ban “body imaging scanning equipment” from being installed or operated in any airport in Texas.

The other bill would add any TSA-style pat-down used “to grant access to a publicly accessible building or form of transportation” to the description of “sexual assault” in the state’s penal code.

Controversy erupted late last year when the TSA rolled out the full-body scanners at airports around the country. Those who refuse full-body scans are subject to a pat-down search that can include the crotch and chest.

Currently, Dallas/Fort Worth Airport has 15 advanced imaging machines in operation at checkpoints at all five of its terminals. Dallas Love Field does not have any scanners but the TSA expects to begin installing them there this year.

The TSA said it does not comment on pending legislation.

However, there is some question about whether the Legislature can regulate federal activities in Texas airports, particularly activities of the TSA.

Simpson believes the state can.

“Texas regulates municipal, county and regional airports. They determine what equipment goes in them,” Simpson said.

Burnam said he backed the bills because he wants a “public discussion” about airport security but that he isn’t convinced the TSA would comply if the measures passed.

“Frankly there’d be no legal way to enforce that,” Burnam said.

D/FW Airport spokesman David Magaña declined to comment on the legal issues surrounding the bills, saying only that “we’re monitoring it.”

During the controversy last year, some airports decided to look at hiring a private firm to provide airport security as San Francisco’s airport currently does. But even private security firms must abide by TSA mandates and protocols that include body scans and pat-down searches.

Similar bills banning the scanners and intrusive searches have been filed in other states, including New Hampshire.

Simpson said he experienced the new security procedures on a trip to Canada.

“We’re terrorizing innocent travelers to save us from terrorism,” Simpson said. “We’ve lost the battle if we continue to do that.”

My Two Cents: So the Pelosi-led liberal front has voted to leave early so that they can campaign against the strong Republican wave about to crash down on DC. Hey, Democrats, here’s a thought. Maybe the best way for you to campaign is to STAY in Congress and VOTE the way people want with all the issues you just brushed aside. Are you really this fucking stupid? Voting FOR the people is a much more effective way of campaigning than going home to produce more “attack ads” and to filibuster to the masses for the umpteenth time. Then again, maybe you just need some time off to recover from the train wreck that was Stephen Colbert. End Two Cents.

*Taken from Yahoo News.

WASHINGTON – Battle-weary members of Congress are coming soon to neighborhoods near you to press for re-election, more willing to campaign before angry constituents than to compromise in Washington on tax cuts, child nutrition or a federal budget.

Democratic congressional leaders decided to call off controversial votes on taxes and President Barack Obama’s latest spending requests and instead pass a temporary bill to keep the government running through November. Some Democrats facing particularly tough re-election fights joined Republicans in protest, saying Congress should stay in session and get more done before facing voters Nov. 2.

“The Senate should be more concerned about doing what’s right for the country and less concerned about campaign season,” said Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo.

The measure to adjourn passed both chambers despite the protests. In the House, it passed by one vote — Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s — after 39 members of the Democratic majority joined Republicans in voting no.

It was a messy end to a session fraught with partisan warfare, and it’s not over. Soon after voters give their verdict, the same crew — with a few newly elected faces — will reconvene to take up a hefty list of legislation deemed toxic in the unforgiving pre-election atmosphere. Democrats will still control both chambers during the “lame duck” session.

For now, lawmakers sick of stalemate are headed home to an angry electorate.

“All 100 senators want to get out of here and get back to their states,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who is locked in a tough re-election fight against Republican Sharron Angle in Nevada.

That they preferred frustrated voters to each other says something about the heavy political lifting candidates of both parties face in the month remaining before Election Day.

An Associated Press-GfK Poll this month showed that the public is fed up with both parties. Only 38 percent approve of how congressional Democrats are handling their jobs, and just 31 percent like the way Republicans are doing theirs.

Majority Democrats facing significant losses in the House and Senate in the wake of unpopular bills to stimulate the economy and overhaul the nation’s health care laws sought to do their party no further harm on Capitol Hill.

One foot out the door, the House and Senate convened just long enough to vote on a “continuing resolution,” a stopgap measure to keep the government in operating funds for the next two months and avoid a pre-election federal shutdown.

The Senate late Wednesday approved the temporary spending bill 69-30. The House joined in several hours later with a 228-194 vote, sending it to Obama’s desk to be signed into law.

But they’re heading home without what was supposed to be the Democrats’ closing argument of the campaign: an extension of expiring Bush-era tax cuts for families making less than $250,000 and individuals making less than $200,000. Conservative and moderate Democrats joined Republicans in calling for the preservation of all the expiring cuts, even for the wealthiest Americans.

Wary of being branded tax hikers, Democrats in both houses postponed the question until a postelection session Nov. 15. If Congress takes no action by the end of the year, Americans of every income level face significantly higher tax bills. Pelosi has said the middle-class tax cuts will be passed this year.

Republicans, meanwhile, did not want to get in the way of the Democrats’ political struggles. They cast the decision to punt the tax cut debate as a vote for a tax hike, and called the Democratic majority irresponsible.

“They are turning their backs on the American people,” said House Minority Leader John Boehner.

But one self-proclaimed “noncombatant” said postponing such important issues preserved the integrity of the debate and any decision that might result.

“It would be one thing if you have a chance to pass something, then by all means have a vote,” Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., said Wednesday. “But it was pretty clear that it was going to be mutually assured destruction.”

Republicans also denounced Democrats for delaying the ethics trials of Reps. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., and Maxine Waters, D-Calif., until after the elections. Both lawmakers had said they wanted trials as soon as possible.

In the waning hours before adjournment, Democrats moved what smaller legislation they could. The end-of session agenda included:

_A legislative blueprint for NASA’s future that would extend the life of the space shuttle program for a year while backing Obama’s intent to use commercial carriers to carry humans into space. Obama will sign the measure, which passed the House on a 304-118 vote.

_The first intelligence authorization bill since 2004, with compromise language on demands by Congress for greater access to top secret intelligence. The most secret briefings will still only be provided to top congressional leaders, but members of the intelligence panels will receive a general description of the programs. The House cleared the measure for Obama.

_Legislation approved by the House, 348-79, that would allow the U.S. to seek trade sanctions against China and other nations for manipulating their currency to gain trade advantages. Quickly criticized by China, its prospects are unclear in the Senate.

_A House-passed measure, already approved by the Senate, to rename a mountain in Alaska after the late Sen. Ted Stevens, who died in a plane crash in August. South Hunter Peak, a mountain located in Denali National Park and Preserve just south of Mount McKinley, will become Stevens Peak.

A House measure to provide free health care and additional compensation to World Trade Center workers sickened in the towers’ crumbled ruins was sure to stall in the Senate.

The stopgap spending measure was kept clean of a host of add-ons sought by the Obama administration, including money for “Race to the Top” grants to better-performing schools and more than $4 billion to finance settlements of long-standing lawsuits by black farmers and American Indians against the government.

A single GOP senator, Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, was blocking the bill for black farmers and Indians and negotiations were continuing. Prospects were being helped by the addition of several measures — favored by western Republicans — to resolve Indian water claims.

The stopgap bill is a reminder of the dismal performance by Congress in doing its most basic job — passing an annual budget and the spending bills for agency operations.

Only two of a dozen annual appropriations bills have passed the House this year and none has passed the Senate as Democratic leaders have opted against lengthy floor debates and politically difficult votes on spending.