Welcome! "What's Happenin'?" is a casual community diary (a daily series, 8:30 AM Eastern on weekdays, 10 AM on weekends and holidays) where we hang out and talk about the goings on here and everywhere.
We chat about our lives, our health, our families, our social circles, our pets, etc. We welcome links to your writings here on dkos or elsewhere, posts of pictures, music, etc.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
|
Good Morning!
|
Drop in
any time
day or night
to say hello.
|
It is better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
Eugene V. Debs
Good morning! This edition of What's Happenin'? is dedicated to one of my heros - Eugene Debs. No, it's not his birthday, and although he's been dead for 86 years his words ring as true today as they did during his lifetime. So in the spirit of Debs, today's WH will focus on issues that I believe Debs would be interested in, if he were alive today.
News
Crime and Punishment
http://www.aclu.org/...
Politicians over the last quarter-century have held strong to the conventional wisdom that being "tough on crime" will win elections and appease the public's appetite for safety. And for the most part, it seems Americans did feel this way (if you don't think so, just ask Michael Dukakis). To alleviate the public's overblown fear, or even to slake a thirst for retribution, our lawmakers have repeatedly deemed more private acts criminal and doled out harsher punishments for a generation. They selectively enforced these laws against the "feared" Black and brown communities, and in the end gave us a massive, unsustainable prison population unlike anything the world has ever seen.
Discrimination
http://oberlin.edu/...
Because of my recycling, the bomb squad came, the state police came. Because of my recycling, buildings were evacuated, classes were canceled, campus was closed. No. Not because of my recycling. Because of my dark body. No. Not because of my dark body. Because of his fear.
Income Inequality
http://www.salon.com/...
Some unknown but alarming number of ultra-rich Americans are now basically totally delusional and completely divorced from reality. This is now an inescapable fact, confirmed by multiple media accounts of billionaire thought and an entire special issue of the New York Times Magazine.
Presidential Elections
(He ran for POTUS 1900,1904,1908,1912 and 1920 - the last time from prison)
http://www.rollingstone.com/...
I was channel-surfing the other day, looking for something genuinely interesting on television, like maybe a repeat of the Big Ten Network's Diamond Report or video of a wrecked Nazi tugboat, when my fingers got stuck on a news channel. There, lighting up an NBC broadcast with her smile, was New Hampshire's Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte, talking about her Vice Presidential qualifications ...
Equality
Results from North Carolina - yet another example why the majority should not be voting on minority civil rights...
http://gay.americablog.com/...
So far the count is 60-40. Going to be interesting having the Democratic Convention in North Carolina in just a few months. Not to mention, are Democrats really going to decide, in September, in North Carolina, to take another swipe at gays on marriage by refusing to put marriage equality in the party platform? Bad confluence of circumstances.
http://gay.americablog.com/...
Here's ABC's Jake Tapper's excellent questioning of White House spokesman Jay Carney, re VP Biden's embrace of gay marriage and the White House's subsequent panic.
Torture
http://www.emptywheel.net/...
As you’ll recall, back in April I went on a week-long rant about the great lengths–including submitting a secret declaration from the National Security Advisor–the Obama Administration had gone to hide a short reference to the September 17, 2001 “Gloves Come Off” Memorandum of Notification. In doing so, it appears the Obama Administration hid George Tenet’s invocation of the Presidential MON that authorized the capture and detention of terrorists but which the Bush Administration used as its authorization to torture those alleged terrorists. (post 1, post 2, post 3, post 4, post 5, post 6, post 7)
Blog Posts of Interest
This is a new section in the What's Happenin' diaries that will be updated throughout the day to promote selected blog posts of interest on DailyKos and other blogs.
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/...
The problem with "states' rights" Part 745, North Carolina edition
http://www.colbertnation.com/...
Uncensored - Maurice Sendak Tribute
http://www.dailykos.com/...
The mainstream German Magazine Spiegel asks has the US mixed Economy turned into a Oligarchy?
http://news.firedoglake.com/...
Activists Want DNC Convention to Move Out of North Carolina After Amendment One Passage
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Huge Protests at BofA Shareholder Meeting Today. Pay Packages Approved, Proposals Defeated.
http://www.americablog.com/...
BREAKING: Barack Obama supports marriage equality