Boulder council to take up 'corporate personhood' referendum - Colorado Daily
Cowles: Supreme Court 'undid a hundred years of precedent and electoral reform' on campaign finance
By Heath Urie Camera Staff Writer
Posted: 06/21/2011 03:19:39 PM MDT
Macon Cowles ( Macon Cowles )
The Boulder City Council will decide whether to put a referendum on the November ballot that calls for amending the U.S. Constitution to abolish "corporate personhood" after all.
Despite being turned down for discussion during the council's May 17 meeting, Councilman Macon Cowles plans to ask the group to put the measure on the ballot during the leaders' meeting on July 19 -- when the council is planning to give initial approval to several potential ballot measures.
"Corporate personhood" refers to last year's U.S. Supreme Court decision in the case of Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission, in which the justices ruled that corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money on political campaigns because the spending is a form of protected free speech.
Cowles, an attorney, wants Boulder's referendum to clarify that money is not constitutionally protected free speech and that corporations should not have all the rights that people do.
"The Supreme Court's decision in the Citizens United case undid a hundred years of precedent and electoral reform by unleashing corporate treasuries to spend as much as they want to influence the outcome of elections," Cowles wrote in an e-mail to the Camera on Tuesday. "... I believe that Boulder voters should speak to this issue."
Cowles' request is the result of a grassroots effort among Boulder members of Move to Amend -- a national organization dedicated to amending the U.S. Constitution to undo corporate personhood.
"What we're looking for is a deep transformation in our society that says that money will no longer dictate what happens in politics," said Judy Lubow, co-chair of the Boulder County Democratic Party's Grassroots Action Team and a member of Move to Amend.
Read more: http://www.coloradodaily.com/ci_18323929#ixzz1Q6VuuLXJ
Coloradodaily.com
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Don't Be a Sucker
1947 film put out by the Department of War showing how the citizens of a sociaty are divided against each other.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Are We Ruled by Second-String Psychopaths?
Are We Ruled by Second-String Psychopaths?
Published on Sunday, June 5, 2011 by CommonDreams.org
The Rise of the Second-String Psychopaths
by David Schwartz
The great writer Kurt Vonnegut titled his final book A Man without a Country. He was the man; the country was the United States of America. Vonnegut felt that his country had disappeared right under his – and the Constitution’s – feet, through what he called “the sleaziest, low-comedy Keystone Cops-style coup d’état imaginable.” He was talking about the Bush administration. Were Vonnegut still alive in the post-Bush era, he would not have felt that his country had returned.
How had our country disappeared? Vonnegut proposed that among the contributing factors was that it had been invaded – as if by the Martians – by people with a particularly frightening mental illness. People with this illness were termed psychopaths. (The term nowadays is anti-social personality disorder.) These are terms for people who are smart, personable, and engaging, but who have no consciences. They are not guided by a sense of right or wrong. They seem to be unaffected by the feelings of others, including feelings of distress caused by their actions. Straying from a decent way of treating people, or violating ethical codes causes no anxiety, the anxiety which is what causes the rest of us to moderate our more greedy impulses. If most children feel anxiety when they are pilfering the forbidden cookie jar, psychopaths feel just fine. They can devour the cookies, shatter the jar as evidence and stuff it in the trash can. When accused, they can argue with apparent sincerity that the cookie jar has been missing for at least a week. There suffer no remorse, no guilt, no shame. They are free to do anything, no matter how harmful.
Psychopaths can be very tricky to recognize. As psychiatrist Dr. Hervey Cleckly wrote in his classic The Mask of Sanity in 1941, psychopaths are not technically insane. They don’t have a psychosis, like schizophrenia. They are experts in appearing normal. They can act the role of a caring, concerned executive, even though they actually do not seem to experience such feelings. If they hurt somebody, they don’t modify their behavior.
The United States corporate and government spheres have become, Vonnegut suggested, a perfect habitat for psychopaths. What has allowed so many psychopaths to rise so high in corporations, and then government, he wrote,
“is that they are so decisive. They are going to do something every fuckin’ day and they are not afraid. Unlike normal people, they are never filled with doubts, for the simple reason that they don’t give a fuck what happens next. Simply can’t. Do this! Do that! Mobilize the reserves! Privatize the public schools! Attack Iraq! Cut health care! Tap everybody’s telephone! Cut taxes on the rich!"
(Continue at Website)
Published on Sunday, June 5, 2011 by CommonDreams.org
The Rise of the Second-String Psychopaths
by David Schwartz
The great writer Kurt Vonnegut titled his final book A Man without a Country. He was the man; the country was the United States of America. Vonnegut felt that his country had disappeared right under his – and the Constitution’s – feet, through what he called “the sleaziest, low-comedy Keystone Cops-style coup d’état imaginable.” He was talking about the Bush administration. Were Vonnegut still alive in the post-Bush era, he would not have felt that his country had returned.
How had our country disappeared? Vonnegut proposed that among the contributing factors was that it had been invaded – as if by the Martians – by people with a particularly frightening mental illness. People with this illness were termed psychopaths. (The term nowadays is anti-social personality disorder.) These are terms for people who are smart, personable, and engaging, but who have no consciences. They are not guided by a sense of right or wrong. They seem to be unaffected by the feelings of others, including feelings of distress caused by their actions. Straying from a decent way of treating people, or violating ethical codes causes no anxiety, the anxiety which is what causes the rest of us to moderate our more greedy impulses. If most children feel anxiety when they are pilfering the forbidden cookie jar, psychopaths feel just fine. They can devour the cookies, shatter the jar as evidence and stuff it in the trash can. When accused, they can argue with apparent sincerity that the cookie jar has been missing for at least a week. There suffer no remorse, no guilt, no shame. They are free to do anything, no matter how harmful.
Psychopaths can be very tricky to recognize. As psychiatrist Dr. Hervey Cleckly wrote in his classic The Mask of Sanity in 1941, psychopaths are not technically insane. They don’t have a psychosis, like schizophrenia. They are experts in appearing normal. They can act the role of a caring, concerned executive, even though they actually do not seem to experience such feelings. If they hurt somebody, they don’t modify their behavior.
The United States corporate and government spheres have become, Vonnegut suggested, a perfect habitat for psychopaths. What has allowed so many psychopaths to rise so high in corporations, and then government, he wrote,
“is that they are so decisive. They are going to do something every fuckin’ day and they are not afraid. Unlike normal people, they are never filled with doubts, for the simple reason that they don’t give a fuck what happens next. Simply can’t. Do this! Do that! Mobilize the reserves! Privatize the public schools! Attack Iraq! Cut health care! Tap everybody’s telephone! Cut taxes on the rich!"
(Continue at Website)
Thursday, June 16, 2011
YouTube - Stepping Stones
This is my friend Monty who I meet at the Boulder Homeless Shelter last year and we have been friends ever since. A group up in Longmont did this video with him describing what it is like to be homeless and on the streets.
Nebraska Nuclear Power Plant Threatened by Flooding | Gather
Nebraska Nuclear Power Plant Threatened by Flooding | Gather
Nebraska Nuclear Power Plant Threatened by Flooding
June 16, 2011 02:20 PM EDT
Flood waters from the swollen Missouri River are surrounding the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant in Nebraska, and the status has been classified as "notification of an unusual event," a low-level emergency.
While officials insist that there has been no release of radioactive material, the situation is very frightening. Every nuclear power plant is vulnerable to natural disasters and has the potential to create a devastating catastrophe, as is currently playing out in Japan in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami. Citizens are rightly concerned that the Fort Calhoun plant could be breached by flood waters, causing radioactivity to be released.
The Omaha Public Power District (OPPD) has denied rumors regarding the situation, including the rumor that the Fort Calhoun plant is actually at a level 4 emergency. A no-fly zone has been set up by the FAA around the plant, causing concern that it is because radioactivity has been released into the air. According to OPPD, the flight restrictions are in place because of the flooding. But this raises the question, why would flooding cause them to restrict planes from flying over a certain area? In spite of these assurances about the safety of the nuclear power plant, public concern remains high.
Nebraska Nuclear Power Plant Threatened by Flooding
June 16, 2011 02:20 PM EDT
Flood waters from the swollen Missouri River are surrounding the Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant in Nebraska, and the status has been classified as "notification of an unusual event," a low-level emergency.
While officials insist that there has been no release of radioactive material, the situation is very frightening. Every nuclear power plant is vulnerable to natural disasters and has the potential to create a devastating catastrophe, as is currently playing out in Japan in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami. Citizens are rightly concerned that the Fort Calhoun plant could be breached by flood waters, causing radioactivity to be released.
The Omaha Public Power District (OPPD) has denied rumors regarding the situation, including the rumor that the Fort Calhoun plant is actually at a level 4 emergency. A no-fly zone has been set up by the FAA around the plant, causing concern that it is because radioactivity has been released into the air. According to OPPD, the flight restrictions are in place because of the flooding. But this raises the question, why would flooding cause them to restrict planes from flying over a certain area? In spite of these assurances about the safety of the nuclear power plant, public concern remains high.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
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