The Big World of Li'l Treva

I created a new group, inspired by a group called "Rage and Violence Against Conservatives."  (As a general rule, real liberals do not engage in violence. Some do, but only defensively when all other options seem unavailable.)  This new group, "Rage and Violence Against Liberals," ( http://rageandviolenceagainstliberals.groups.vox.com/ )  is for the incense burning, tree-hugging, peace-nic antiwar liberals with flowers in their hair and home-made tie-die clothes that reflect the rainbow of their love for the Earth and its inhabitants.  You really don't need to burn incense, hug trees, or wear flowers in your hair and tie-die clothes to join this group, or to be a liberal.

To prevent it from being hijacked by right-wing extremists and others that hate liberals, or at least, hate most of their views, I set it as public, but by invitation only.  The group is intended to provide members with a place where they can explain how they are attacked. That's not the only reason to post to this group. There are other topics which might be of interest to members (So far, I am the only member. Boo-hoo.). Among them, anything about the various groups that are misunderstood, attacked, defamed, oppressed, etc. and various issues affecting them. (Issues that are adopted, fought for by liberal groups.)

If you are a liberal and have been subjected to maltreatment, including harassment, stalking by trolls that hate you, attempts to defame your character as a liberal, false accusations, or violence attacks, this group is a good place to document your experiences. It is also a place where you can document reports of other liberals experiences.

Please contact me if you wish to join this group. Let me know if you have any trouble accessing the page. I don't know if I must invite everybody or if you can find a link on the group page to request membership.  I thought of emailing an announcement to most people on my friends list that I thought might be interested, but I don't want to spam anybody.

Maybe, you've already viewed and heard this video, the Battle Hymn of the Billionaires For Wealth Care.  If not, I think it's a worthy download.  I have neither seen, nor heard corporate media reports covering the visit that Billionaires For Wealth Care paid to a tea baggers if you can't afford to buy health care, you deserve to suffer and die...rally.

Ben Bernanky has reason to fear the fate of the Fed...

This page provides interesting information which briefly explains portions of the historic background of the Federal Reserve and reasons why the petition to abolish the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 was created. This petition is just one effort drive to get rid of the private entity that was created under the guise of protecting our economy and became the official controlling force of our economy and currency approximately 17 years before the Great Depression that was sweeping the world cast its dark clouds on our country.

One of the best bi-partisan US House bills I've seen in my life is the one by Ron Paul (Republican, Texas) and Alan Grayson (Democratic, Florida) to audit the Federal Reserve.  The House Finance Committee recently approved this bill with an impressive bi-partisan vote of 43 - to - 26.

House Finance Committee Chairman Barney Frank (Democratic Blue Dog, Massachusetts)  opposed the bill. He urged other committee members to do the same, but 15 Democratic members of the House Finance Committee backed the Ron Paul/Alan Grayson bill in an effort to rescue our country and its economy.

"The measure, cosponsored by Reps. Ron Paul (R-Texas) and Alan Grayson (D-Fla.), authorizes the Government Accountability Office to conduct a wide-ranging audit of the Fed's opaque deals with foreign central banks and major U.S. financial institutions. The Fed has never had a real audit in its history and little is known of what it does with the trillions of dollars at its disposal."

A Rasmussen poll taken last summer revealed that the Federal Reserve is less popular than the IRS and 75% of poll participants favor auditing the Federal Reserve. 

Bernanky and other Federal Reserve insiders probably know that this effort to audit the Fed, to expose its family jewels (secrets), and abolish its power over US currency, inflation rates, and the banking, lending and insurance industries will most likely get overwhelming public support.  He's hearing our shouts, "We're mad as hell! We're not going to take this crap anymore!"  Ben Bernanky is on the PR circuit, trying his utmost to save his powerful job.

He claims that an audit of the Fed will hurt the economy.  Quite the contrary! The Federal Reserve has participated in the destruction of our economy while sitting on a mountain of multi-trillion dollars in US currency.

Happy Thanks Giving!

I am taking a short break.  Typing one-handed...

Sucks!

Am in reading mode.

Be back to interact when I feel better.

Later! :)

The warehouse meat industry that supplies meat products to American grocers has given plenty of people reason to, at least, consider going vegan.  Yet, some carnivores are uncomfortable with such a radical dietary transition.

I occasionally mention on behalf of carnivores that there are meat sources that restrict their practices to free range and organic (for example: no growth hormones). I just recently discovered one source that has an online presence, provided by somebody that I have trusted for many years:

Polyface Farms.

Here are some other interesting sources for both meat eaters and vegans:
Local Harvest shares information about organic farms, farmer markets, grocers, and so forth throughout the United States.  This source also offers some other content, including interactive forums.

I hope, these links are useful to somebody.

Obviously, politicians are doing us no major favors with their divisive efforts to transform American health care policies and trends as they see fit.  They appear to be more interested in providing welfare for health care profiteers (at least in the insurance industry) through mandatory insurance. 

The people are obviously at odds with each other and with the politicians over how we address our health care industry concerns and problems.  More than one side of the public argument has expressed reasonable concerns. Most of us agree that something needs to be done to resolve our heath care issues.

I believe, if ideas are exchanged by people willing to seek and collectively develop the best possible plans to solve problems without creating more problems  we might be able to get beyond widespread social division.  If by sharing and exploring ideas, discussing their pros and cons, we might create alternatives that can win the public's approval.

I created this post to encourage any of you that read it to offer and discuss ideas about how we can ensure that no one is denied quality health care because of their financial status,  or hardship.  If you believe that you might have a better idea to solve our health care crises, please feel free to share it and discuss it here.

The comments thread is open.  Please respect this blog as a flame free zone.

That's right, Folks!  Universal Health Care already exists, established in 1912.  It's called Medicare.

Congressmen Dennis Kucinich and John Conyers authored HR 676, which declares that we have a constitutional right to health care.  It appears in Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution "which defines the purpose of government 'to promote the General Welfare' now thereof.

The Conyers/Kucinich bill HR 676 demands Medicare for all as a universal single - payer, not-for-profit which means the end of premium, co-pay, and deductibles.

For more details and to sign the petition establishing health care as a civil right Click Here.  Please pass this petition on to anybody you know that will most likely sign it.  Please share it with communities that will welcome and allow the posting of outside links.  Feel free to post it on your blog, website, tweet account, and social bookmarking networks.

I found two links to a couple of quizzes shared by Wannabe Tesla here. 

Here are the results of the first quiz (Political Spectrum Quiz):

With the compass ranging in extremes from far left, to far right, and from libertarian, to authoritarian, my results were:

You are a left social libertarian.
Left: 6.55, Libertarian: 7.06

On the foreign policy scale:

On the left side are pacifists and anti-war activists. On the right side are those who want a strong military that intervenes around the world. You scored: -6.71

I am primarily opposed to intervention (especially military) in the affairs of our global neighbors. (I sometimes make exceptions, as in the case of obvious indications of a nation, or other militant group forcefully and actively seeking global domination, and/or genocide.)  It is all too easy for a country that seeks to solve the world's problem, such as, through military intervention, to create a bigger mess.  Such as, by arming and training one side that later uses the weapons and training against the country that previously aided that side.  Also by sending troops and others representing one's country to "help" people, but without proper training and oversight which results in creating more problems for those people, thus giving them reason to believe that they were better off before the foreigners butted into their affairs.  The amount of American meddling and coercion of our global neighbors has a lot, or everything to do with why my government and military and much of our society keeps attracting more enemies, including those that want to kick our asses off the face off the Earth.

I also believe that people often choose violence as a quick and convenient response for lack of desire, knowledge and wisdom to seek a non-violent and more effective way.  To me, that's indicative of intellectual and ethical weakness.  It is little wonder why most people in my country did not recognize the industrial, economic and trade warfare tactics being used against us for over a decade and on a grander scale since March 2003.

Culture:

Where are you in the culture war? On the liberal side, or the conservative side? This scale may apply more to the US than other countries. You scored: -6.2

I have my personal views regarding issues, like abortion, but I do not believe that the government should dictate whether, or not abortion should be legal.  I am also opposed to forced abortion by a government, or any other entity.

Although, the argument over gay rights and gay marriage has no personal and direct impact on my personal liberties and on the quality of my life, I believe that we were all created equal and are entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I oppose discrimination and oppression.

In the Political Quiz at politicalquiz.net I strongly took issue with one description of my views, based on the quiz results.  However, most were rather accurate.

The scores are based on a gradual range of 0 to 12. For instance, a Conservative/Progressive score of 3 and 0 will both yield a result of social conservative, yet 0 would be an extreme conservative and 3 a moderate conservative.

Here are my results:

Conservative/Progressive score: 9
You are a social progressive. You generally consider yourself a humanist first. You probably think that religion and patriotism go too far in society. You probably consider yourself to be a citizen of Earth first rather than a citizen of your country.

(I do consider myself to be both a citizen of the world, or Earth, and also a US citizen. So far, the rest of this description was accurate. I've been calling myself a progressive for years.)

Capitalist Purist/Social Capitalist score: 12
You're a Social Capitalist, you think that, left to its own, Capitalism leaves a lot of people behind. You think that Health Care should be free to all, that the minimum wage should be raised, and that the government should provide jobs to all that are capable of having them. You likely hated the Bush tax cuts, and believe that the middle class has gotten poorer, and the rich have gotten richer over the past several years. The far extreme of social capitalism is socialism.

(This one was inaccurate. I do not want the government to provide jobs for every person capable of working.  When a government does that then the lawmakers and their appointed officials will surely dictate which type of work, or career each person will have.  I believe in a fair amount of free enterprise.  I believe in a living wage as a means of preventing hard-working people from struggling against impossible odds to get above the poverty level.  I prefer cost of living adjustments in addition to a living wage. I also believe that the work force should set the minimum pay and hourly standards just as manufacturing executives, retailers and service providers determine prices.  As with the latter, negotiation might be possible.)

Libertarian/Authoritarian score: 0
You are libertarian. You think that the government is making way too many unnecessary laws that are taking away our innate rights. You believe that the government's job is primarily to protect people from harming other people, but after that they should mind their own business, and if we give the government too much power in controlling our lives, it can lead to fascism.
 
(This one was completely accurate.)

Pacifist/Militarist score: 0
You're a Pacifist. You are angered that the United States thinks it should dominate the world through its military force. You think that the only time war is necessary is when we are in direct danger of being attacked. You also believe the US spends way too much of its money on defense, as we can practically cut it in half and still easily defend ourselves, and use that money to fix all our economic problems.

(This was accurate.  As for military spending, I believe that the government spends way too much on militant aggression.)

As a final note, I was described as most likely a hard-core Democrat.

That's so wrong.  I am non-partisan.  The Democratic politicians piss me off as much as the Republicans.  One side goes about it differently than the other, except where nearly all of them sell us out to the plutocrats that bribe them.

In 2003 Rep. Stephen Buyer (Rep., Indiana) founded the Frontier Foundation that reportedly existed to attract donor dollars for education scholarships that were never offered to any student. Congressman Buyer also claimed that he doesn't recall where he got the original capital of $25.000 that he used to establish this group, according to Sharyl Attkisson of CBS news (Can A Donation Buy Legislation?).  The supposed non-profit organization shared office space with Buyer's political campaign office.  Apparently, his campaign manager handled operation of the Frontier Foundation.  The dirt discovered about Buyer, the Frontier Foundation, and top donors got a lot more interesting. The televised report is more detailed about the controversial favors that Buyer was doing as a lawmaker to the lobbyists that donated to the Frontier Foundation.

Apparently, the Frontier Foundation was created to attract lobbyists and donor dollars to Stephen Buyer in exchange for political favors on Capital Hill.

This reminds me of a report that I read years ago in a late 1990's issue of Mother Jones Magazine, titled Co-op Congress.  Members of both political parties were exposed for introducing, endorsing and voting on bills from which they profited in various ways.

Some things never change...

Rome's patron senators used to sit outside with giant pots to encourage the public to drop coins in them. The object was for people to rent a Roman senator's ears where they could tell the patron senator what they needed, or wanted.  If they paid enough money then they had a better chance of their cause being introduced to the senate.

Plutocracy lives on in modern-day governments.  Today, we Americans stand a much better chance of our issues being introduced to the House and Senate and supported by either, or both parties if we pay the politicians and each party enough money to buy their support.