Fabulous Photos

Local photographer Julie Blackmon is chosen as one of 2007's 30 New and Emerging Artists to Watch in the March issue of Photo District News, from an article in today's News-Leader.

I've long admired her style. She is now represented by galleries in Chicago, Seattle and Santa Fe. Check out her portfolio at www.julieblackmon.com.

Blunt Fee Office Investigation Comes Under Scrutiny

This Republican administration is like an octopus with a thousand putrid tentacles choking off the democratic process. Testimony will be forthcoming from H. E. Cummins who was fired by Attorney General Gonzales and replaced by J. Timothy Griffin, "a former political operative for White House political director Karl Rove."

Via The Turner Report:

Cummins to testify before House subcommittee

Former U. S. Attorney H. E. Cummins, one of eight who was fired by the Bush Administration in recent months, will testify before a House Judiciary subcommittee Tuesday, according to an article in today's New York Times.

Cummins was fired despite excellent job reviews. His firing came during a time in which he was investigating the methods used by Governor Matt Blunt's administration to award license fee office contracts in Missouri.

Fired Up Missouri commented on the Cummins firing earlier this year. "Who knows whether Cummins may have reached a different conclusion on whether to file for indictments against figures in Missouri government had he not received a loud, clear message from the highest levels that his fee office investigation was counter to the wishes of the Attorney General and President?"

Lunar Eclipse Begets Bitchiness?

If you have anything to bitch about, tomorrow's lunar eclipse may give you the excuse you need to let it all out. An occasional bitchfest does clear the air and is so good for your mental health.

From Gawker.com:

Crazy Blood-Red Moon To Mark Culmination Of Worldwide Bitchiness

Don't say we didn't warn you:

The Moon will blush red as it passes through Earth's shadow in a total lunar eclipse on Saturday. From most locations on Earth, at least part of the 6-hour eclipse will be visible if skies are clear.We don't know if you've made plans yet, but we're suggesting a boy's night out. Might be safer for everybody.

Moon to blush red during total lunar eclipse [New Scientist]

Paper Ballot Initiative Proposed for Missouri Voters

Activist Phil Lindsey, director of showmethevote.org, announced a 2008 ballot initiative yesterday at UMKC, that would return Missouri elections to the paper ballot.

From the article by Michael Collins, Show Me The Vote!

...This announcement marks the first major resistance to the e-voting trend. If the initiative gets on the ballot and passes, Missourians will be voting on and hand counting paper ballots. Canada, Ireland, Italy, and England all vote on hand count paper ballots. The United States did as well until the rush to electronic voting rendered the traditional paper ballot all but extinct...

Election Day 2007 in Missouri will offer citizens of the Show Me state the chance to be the first state in the country to just say no to electronic voting. The process will be an uphill battle by the citizen groups supporting the measure. Once on the ballot, the challenge will be even greater with tens of thousands of dollars in anticipated contributions by e-voting manufacturers to fight the proposal.

Ultimately, it is the choice of the people that matters. Public opinion polls show a runaway trend against e-voting. Missouri voters may lead the nation in making that trend official and returning to a centuries old American tradition...

Disabled Iraq Veterans Shafted

Despite all the flag-waving, support our troups blah blah from this chickenhawk populated administration, disabled veterans returning from Iraq are routinely being given the shaft by the military regarding their disability pay and medical benefits upon discharge.

Meanwhile, the VA has a backlog of 400,000 new claims from fiscal year 2006.

This is a travesty.

John at AmericaBlog says "This is a national disgrace." He comments today on a piece from the Army Times, Wounded and Waiting and a two-part series in the Washington Post, Soldiers Face Neglect, Frustration at Army's Top Medical Facility and The Hotel Aftermath.

Drinkin' The Kool-Aid

After hearing the White House report on the new budget proposal...

Feb. 5, 2007: ...earlier today the President transmitted to the Congress the FY 2008 five-year budget. It contains good news for the American people. It includes a balanced budget over five years, while meeting the nation's priorities.

...I was thinking, this is positive. Maybe Bush is actually doing something right, getting things turned around and at least headed in the right direction. Then it dawned on me, I'm drinkin' the Kool-Aid. It's just smoke and mirrors, a BushCo snow job.

Richard Calderhead at Itsez has some comments worth consideration:

UNCLE SAM: ARE WE (REALLY) BROKE?

February 6: Average Americans will wake up today with the Good News: Bush is declaring a New Budget...that will Reduce the Deficit. And...(best news of all...No New Taxes!)...

According to Steven Rattner, NYTimes today, America is in really, really deep trouble. There is Red Ink stretching so far into the future it is nearly unimaginable to conceive of a way to get our national budget balanced!

How can this POSSIBLY be? WE are supposed to be America...the Land of Untold Riches and Prosperity (for...well, NEARLY all.)...

Bush has only been in office for 6 years...but he has radically worsened an already bad situation...which was CREATED by Ronald Reagan...on purpose...to Destroy America's Social Contract.

We will accept Rattner's numbers...so get this:

In 2006, we collected $185 billion more in Social Security than we paid out! Surprised? Well, there are a couple of problems with that fact.

1. First, you would ASSUME that SS payments would go into a SS Savings Account, to accrue interest to pay FUTURE payments? Wouldn't you? (Most Americans more or less believe this.)
Think again. That HUGE SS SURPLUS is swept up by Bush and used to make the current operating deficit appear smaller than it is.

2. Next...forget this current Surplus. We find out that Bush, Inc., is blithely LYING TO US (again)...and that we would need to put aside RIGHT NOW no less than $39 TRILLION...just to pay for Social Security, Medicare and OTHER payments already promised!

Quick now: Where will Uncle Sam EVER get a quick $39 TRILLION?

We have a few other pressing problems that need to be taken care of NOW. Put them all together and we see Ol' Sam in an entirely new light. Broke. Busted. And begging for cash to keep the country afloat.

Now...ask yourself: Is THIS what you read about every day in your local newspaper...or your favorite weekly? Not even Lou Dobbs is talking about it.

The word "Deficit" is made small ON PURPOSE...because it is swallowed up by all the other, more "pressing" problems we face.

Now do keep this in mind: If we fail to deal with this, in a systematic basis...and do it as a National Priority...we are headed for unimaginable troubles.

EXCEPT...that, once again, the Fat Cats will slip on by...and go their merry way, unaffected by the carnage they are creating. THEIR money, safely tucked away in Zurich or the Caymans...through various tax shelters you are not privvy to...will sustain them in the hour of need.

Only YOU, Suckers, will take it on the chin. As millions of American are hurting even as we speak.

And, saddest of all, your kids already BELIEVE that Social Security is doomed; they ACCEPT the failure (blaming it on Greedy Old Foggies and fumble-bumble DEMOCRATS!!!) and they ASSUME that...something "New" and "Smart" and "Modern"...will need to be put in its place.

In other words...they've Bought The Kool-Aid!

Itsez does not for a minute believe the Solution is easy. First, the Entrenched Interests will need to be rolled back. And THAT'S not going to be any walk in the park.

I knew this, just needed my daily wake-up call.

Eureka! The Language of Global Warming

Following links from Chris Mooney's post Framing Global Warming, I read the Ellen Goodman column in today's Boston Globe. She points out -

The folks at the Pew Research Center clocking public attitudes show that global warming remains 20th on the annual list of 23 policy priorities. Below terrorism, of course, but also below tax cuts, crime, morality, and illegal immigration.

One reason is that while poles are melting and polar bears are swimming between ice floes, American politics has remained polarized. There are astonishing gaps between Republican science and Democratic science. Try these numbers: Only 23 percent of college-educated Republicans believe the warming is due to humans, while 75 percent of college-educated Democrats believe it.

Mooney points out that Goodmans's source of inspiration comes from the work of Matthew Nesbit, PhD and who writes on Framing Science, as a part of the Science Blog community.

Nesbit refers to the "ineffectiveness of fear" in motivating the majority of consumers to alter their behavior to contribute less to carbon emission. Many of us seem to have our heads stuck in the sand, or have succumbed to the Masque of the Red Death Syndrome. We depair that nothing we do can possibly matter, so have locked ourselves in and plan to party till the bitter end.

I, like Ellen Goodman, am slowly converting to the compact flourescent light bulb. This is one small thing I can do, but I know it's not nearly enough.

Scientists must find a way to make their case in a way that will inspire the majority of the voting public to put pressure on local, state and national politicians to change course and at least make some attempt to lessen our contribution to global warming.

The F* Word And The Future Of Liberal Politics

Updated below--

Today's New York Times reports on criticism of the John Edward's campaign hiring of bloggers, Amanda Marcote (Pandagon) and Melissa McEwan (Shakespeare's Sister).

Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, said in a statement on Tuesday, “John Edwards is a decent man who has had his campaign tarnished by two anti-Catholic vulgar trash-talking bigots.”

Mr. Edwards’s spokeswoman, Jennifer Palmieri, said Tuesday night that the campaign was weighing the fate of the two bloggers.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. I can use the F* word with the best of them, I assure you. But, I never cease to be amazed at the amount of profanity coming from the pens of liberal/progressive bloggers who, I presume, want to bring sanity back to Washington (and Jefferson City).

Of course, it's a "free" country, so they can say what they want. The other day I caught about ten seconds of Michael Savage screaming LIBERAL SCUM over and over and over. The button was red hot as I switched back to some droning classical music on KSMU.

The Radical Right has been winning elections by reeling in the "family values" voters. Why would we want to give them more fuel for the fire?

Liberal bloggers, get a clue! Stop shooting yourself in the foot. You're bright enough to get the point across without bringing your potty mouth into it. Save that for Friday night at the pub, or in pithy e-mails to each other.

WTFO,

Betty

Update:
Glenn Greenwald has a long post about the Edwards/blogger flap. From Glenn's post: As James Joyner points out: "Bloggers have a 'paper' trail. The longer someone has been blogging, the more of their sometimes-developed thoughts are out there for public consumption. Not only have they likely written things uncomplimentary to their now-boss, but they have almost certainly written things that could embarrass him."

A Newer World has this- "If Edwards can’t stand up to this kind of lame hack attack, he’s in for big trouble once the campaign really gets ugly.
And he’ll lose the netroots in a heartbeat."

John Edwards' Health Plan

Since my health insurance premium has raised to $589 per month for a policy with $2,000 deductible with no prescription med coverage, I've been thinking about universal health coverage quite a bit lately.

When I was in the hospital doing chemo some years back, my roommate was having treatment for a rare form of cancer. Her husband was a farmer and she worked part-time, so they had no health insurance. She said she did not know how they were going to pay the medical bills, she guessed they'd have to sell a cow. I imagine they wound up declaring medical bankruptcy.

Two of my acquaintances have had burst appendix events in the last couple of years. Both were uninsured for different reasons, and both declared bankruptcy. Both of these guys are conservative Republican voters. Go figure.

So who paid for their medical expenses? I guess I did. I'm the one who scraped up the money to pay insurance premiums for the last thirty years. Or more probably, you, the taxpayer paid the bill. I know several people who go to the emergency room for all their medical needs--sore throat, poison ivy, whatever ails them and never pay the bill. Hospitals either charge more to those who pay, or get some kind of reimbursement from MedicAid programs.

My sister was fired from her job in the middle of treatment for breast cancer, and as a result she lost her insurance coverage. The hospital helped her apply for MedicAid which paid for her three surgeries and chemo.

My point is, none of this makes sense. Recently, someone wrote "what if we didn't have universal police service"? (Sorry I can't remember the source on this). Things would pretty much dissolve into chaos. I live in the city where we have univeral fire service, but I have lived in a rural area where you had to pay a fee to be assured of fire protection. Those who didn't pay were just SOL.

John Edwards has proposed a health insurance plan that will be financed by a tax hike:

From Reuters:

"We'll have to raise taxes. The only way you can pay for a healthcare plan that cost anywhere from $90 to $120 billion is there has to be a revenue source," Edwards said on NBC's Meet the Press news program.

Newshog has an interesting take on universal health care. He is critical of Edwards' plan (See John, See John Run)and supports the view of Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, a study author and an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard, who noted: "We pay the world's highest health care taxes. But much of the money is squandered. The wealthy get tax breaks. And HMOs and drug companies pocket billions in profits at the taxpayers' expense. But politicians claim we can't afford universal coverage. Every other developed nation has national health insurance. We already pay for it, but we don't get it."

Links to a couple of his posts on health care are below.

The Great Divide: Public Vs. Private Healthcare: Part I
The Great Divide: Part II

I think he does a good job of dispelling some of the myths and misconceptions we have about how universal health care works in the UK, and how we could craft a plan in the US that would avoid some of the mistakes made there.

Bad Ass Weather

Returning to my humble abode on Friday, after a full two weeks without power, was a feeling akin to what it must be like to win the lottery. I was fortunate to have no structural damage or burst pipes. That was some bad ass weather.

Gratitude is expressed in no particular order:

Thank You to friends and co-workers who listened to my whining as it became clear that I would be the very last one to have power restored.

Thank You to Sara for doing my laundry.

Thank You to Rita for taking me to lunch and baking me chocolate chip cookies.

Thank You to my sister for taking in hordes of toddlers and various bored and rowdy kids and their parents and managing to maintain a sense of humor through it all.

Thank You to the workers at McDonalds, Shoney's and the Heritage for being so kind and feeding me for the last two weeks.

Thank You to the two nice (and good looking) young men who sawed up the big mess of limbs in my front yard for $40.

The Power Of Language

I followed a link from Crooks & Liars to an thought provoking post at The Fear of All Sums. The blogger finds himself in "enemy territory" at a New Year's Eve party -

Anyway, I have nothing against these folks. They seemed damned decent to me and I liked them. They didn't strike me as partisan political junkies at all. They were ordinary folks who, like anyone else, were reacting to the news of the day. But the conversation was peppered with vintage BushCo talking points despite the fact that I didn't get the feeling these were rabid Bush supporters. Still, they were riding the "fight them there so we don't have to fight them here" horse like Willie Shoemaker...

My opening came when one of the guests mentioned that our involvement in the war was now longer than our involvement in World War II. That factoid seemed to surprise some of the others in the room and that gave me the opportunity send up my trial balloon.

"That's true," I said, "but when you really think about it, it's not really a war so much as it is an occupation," I offered helpfully."I mean, there's not really a line of troops with tanks, air support, attack chopper and gunships facing our guys over there," I added.

I finished it off with what I admit was a bit of superficial rhetorical camouflage, "So, if you look at it in terms of other occupations, it's not really that long at all."

Everyone reacted positively to that one, to my pleasant surprise, agreeing that it was more like an occupation than a hot war like WWII or even Vietnam...

But something happened in that room when I managed to get people to acknowledge the true nature of what's happening in Iraq. Once they accepted the idea of it being an occupation instead of a war all the talk of "victory" ended abruptly...

So here we see how language, the words we choose to use, effects the direction and tone of the debate -- a fact that I promise you is not lost on the Bush Administration. The power of language is why our media establishment is so squeamish about naming the obvious civil war that is taking place in Iraq. They insist on calling it all "sectarian violence" because "civil war" just seems too damning for their tastes and those of the White House. They would be even more squeamish about labeling our presense there an occupation if any significant pressure to do so even existed.

It's a long post, and I encourage you to read all of it and today's follow-up post.

All too often, when I find myself in social situations, I wind up pissing someone off, if not the whole room, so I have some serious lessons to learn from this guy.

Blue Girl, Red State commented today about the right-wing criticism of the profanity in the lefty blogs in her post Un.Fucking.Believable. Frank Luntz, making the rounds promoting his new book, chastizes left-wing bloggers for being angry. I'm right there with Blue Girl in my reaction to the events of the last six years. But my goal is to harness the power of language, to reach a few people in my sphere of influence.

Easier said than done.

Big Brother Scores Another Point

President Bush signed the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act into law December 20th.

Included in his signing statement is the following:

...The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection. ...

Read the complete signing statement here.

Apparently, we can construe this to mean the government may now open our mail without a warrant if the mood strikes them.

What's next? A little mini-camera in each room of the house?

Step Up To The Plate

Keith Olbermann stepped up to the plate and hit another home run. Crooks & Liars has the transcript and link to video of Olbermann as he rips to shreds the newest Bush theme for rallying the public to his planned escalation of the Iraq conflict.

Olbermann: If in your presence an individual tried to sacrifice an American serviceman or woman, would you intervene? Would you at least protest? What if he had already sacrificed 3,003 of them? What if he had already sacrificed 3,003 of them — and was then to announce his intention to sacrifice hundreds, maybe thousands, more?...

and concluding -

Sacrifice, Mr. Bush?

No, sir, this is not "sacrifice." This has now become "human sacrifice."

And it must stop.

And you can stop it.

Next week, make us all look wrong.

Our meaningless sacrifice in Iraq must stop.

And you must stop it.


This gutsy, geeky sportscaster shoots from the hip. No wonder the radical right put him at the top of their list of bad guys.

Mr. Bush, Sir, you have been outgunned. Now, how can we get you to surrender to the will of the majority of voters and military leaders and move toward ending the fiasco you have created in Iraq?

All of us, every single one, must step up to the plate, if we are to stop this madness. Sacrifice a moment of your time. Write a letter to your senator and representative, comment on a blog, start a blog, or make a whopper of a sign and take to the streets.

The Fate of Thomas White

Thomas White, a 13 year old seventh grader at Memorial Middle School in Joplin, came to school on Oct. 9th of this year with an semi-automatic rifle. He fired a shot into the ceiling and attempted to continue firing at Principal Stephen Gilbreth as Gilbreth escorted him out of the building. Due to the brave intervention of the Principal, and the jamming of the rifle, a tragedy was narrowly averted.

Gregory White, 44, father of Thomas is a convicted felon, and has pleaded guilty to unlawful possession of firearms and ammunition. From a report in the Joplin Globe:

"The boy is believed to have obtained the gun from a locked gun cabinet in his parents' bedroom and to have carried it to school, possibly concealed under a trench coat. Joplin police found four more rifles, two shotguns, a pistol and various ammunition in the home of Greg and Norma White after the shooting incident.

The boy was charged with first-degree assault, armed criminal action and making a terrorist threat, and he remains in the custody of juvenile authorities. He also was charged with an escape attempt in the first week of his detention."


Reporter Michelle Pippin, www.joplindaily.com, interviewed Thomas White's mother in the 11/17/06 edition.

Norma White, mother of the seventh-grade boy accused of entering Memorial Middle School on Oct. 9 with a rifle, said she wishes now she had done more to help her son when he came home with complaints, and even injuries from other students. She said her son's complaints of bullying began when he entered the sixth grade, and continued - in fact, escalated - into his seventh-grade year."He came home once limping; he had been kicked by an older kid in the halls," she recalled. "He came home once with a huge welt on his head from someone slamming his locker door on his head when they passed him in the hall. His hand was injured once too."He did suffer from bullying. He would come home crying, begging us not to send him back to school."


White spoke to his teachers about the problem only a couple of times - during parent-teacher conferences - but never made a formal complaint to the administration. She said she advised her son to tell his teachers, but he often insisted nothing would be done about it.


Norma White offered the same advice to students and parents."If an adult was bullied this way when they went to work every day - with people throwing things at them, hitting them - how long would they deal with it before they quit or snapped?" she asked. "There are a lot of kids under this kind of pressure, and I wonder how many parents don't know it. We have to ask ourselves, 'Is my kid being bullied? Is my kid a bully?

"It could be your kid."


I've been following this story in The Turner Report, and spent a couple of hours during the middle of a sleepless night contemplating the fate of this boy following his certification to stand trial as an adult. He has pleaded not guilty, but if convicted he will serve a lengthy sentence in prison. He will grow up and come to maturity in the company of hardened criminals. The abuse he suffered at the hands of school yard bullies will seem insignificant in comparison to what he will be subjected to in prison. Young prisoners are usually subjected to repeated rape and sexual abuse; and if they snitch on their abusers they suffer violent retribution.

Thomas White will emerge from prison, if that is his fate, in a few years to reclaim his place in society. What kind of man will he become in the time period of his imprisonment? Will we have exacted the proper amount of retribution for his trangression?

If this seventh grader had been sentenced as a juvenile, he could be held until his eighteenth birthday, and hopefully would finish his high school education and receive counseling to turn his life around. The punishment of spending those teen years removed from society seems suitably harsh, and if he were transformed at the end of such a sentence, we would all be benefited.

As it stands, I fear for his future and ours, as they are intertwined and cannot be separated.

Four More Years of Aunt Norma

In todays Turner Report, the incompetence of Norma Champion is once again highlighted in her failure to consider legislation submitted in 2006 by Democratic Senator Tim Green, that would have addressed problems with privately owned mental health facilities. Aunt Norma is head of the Senate's Committee on Aging, Families, Mental and Public Health.

Why does it take a tragedy, such as the one that just occurred in Anderson, MO to remind our state government that they have been remiss in protecting those citizens who cannot fend for themselves?

I would like to ask the Republicans who recently re-elected Aunt Norma how they feel about her today. Many of the voters at the polling place where I vote are elderly. Several were on walkers on the last voting day. Do they think Aunt Norma is going to be watching out for them if they or a beloved family member have to enter a managed care facility?

It seems to me that the kindly Aunt Norma is just another wolf in sheep's clothing who passes legislation only if it pleases and/or lines the pocket of a fat cat Republican campaign contributor.

Please write a letter to Aunt Norma, and tell her how you feel about her performance in the Senate. She is yours (and mine) for four more years, like it or not.

U.S. Consumers Finance China's Military Expansion

If there were ever a good reason to rethink the U.S. free trade policy with China, which sends our middle class manufacturing jobs to workers in China who labor under inhumane conditions for 30 cents an hour, this should be our wake up call.

The trade imbalance has given China's treasury billions of surplus dollars to spend on building up their military might. Our closets and knick-knack shelves are overflowing with cheap goods from China. It's becoming difficult to find much of anything produced elsewhere. It's time to change our spending habits.

Even Condi is beginning to have her doubts.


By ANNE GEARAN, AP Diplomatic Writer

Rice: US Concerned about Rising China

The United States has some concerns about a rising China, including a military expansion that may be excessive, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday.

Beijing has spent heavily in recent years on adding submarines, missiles, fighter planes and other high-tech weapons to its arsenal and extending the reach of the 2.3 million-member People's Liberation Army, the world's largest fighting force.

Its reported military budget rose more than 14 percent this year to $35.3 billion, but outside estimates of China's true spending are up to three times that level.

"There are concerns about China's military buildup," Rice told a television interviewer. "It's sometimes seemed outsized for China's regional role." ...

Read the entire article at BreitBart.com.

Unfair, Unbalanced and Slanted Hard Right

FOX News has been under increased scrutiny since reports surfaced that a $2 million ransom was paid for the release of two kidnapped Fox news employees. Details are still sketchy about who paid the ransom, but it's probable there is now increased risk of abduction for all media personnel working abroad.

Huffington Post published an internal memo from the Fox Vice President in charge of news, who's looking to put just the right spin on the Democratic victory on November 7:

..."And let's be on the lookout for any statements from the Iraqi insurgents, who must be thrilled at the prospect of a Dem-controlled Congress."...

If this is their idea of "fair and balanced," it leaves me a bit perplexed.

35 Million Americans Have Food Insecurity

The USDA is removing the word hunger from official reports this year, substituting the phrase "food insecurity" for the 35 million among us who require assistance in putting food on the table at least part of the year.

Of those, 11 million report going hungry at times, so they will now be described as having "very low food insecurity."

"In 1999, Texas Gov. George W. Bush, then running for president, said he thought the annual USDA report -- which consistently finds his home state one of the hungriest in the nation -- was fabricated."

This year the annual USDA report did not appear in October, as usual, but instead was released after the election cycle. How convenient.

Source: Washington Post

Bush Plans to Increase Troop Level by 20,000

From today's Guardian:

The Iraq study group is expected to issue it's recommendations centered around the fact that Bush has said no to withdrawal.

Four-point strategy
· Increase US troop levels by up to 20,000 to secure Baghdad and allow redeployments elsewhere in Iraq
· Focus on regional cooperation with international conference and/or direct diplomatic involvement of countries such as Kuwait and Saudi Arabia
· Revive reconciliation process between Sunni, Shia and others
· Increased resources from Congress to fund training and equipment of Iraqi security forces

Thom Hartmann on Air America Radio

Ron Davis posted an interesting comment this morning at Chatter about Clear Channel pulling Air America from the airwaves of liberal Madison, WI despite the gain of significant market share there. I received this email from Thom Hartmann in October during the election frenzy, and thought it appropriate to post it today, for your consideration.

I have read Thom's latest book, Screwed: The Undeclared War on the Middle Class and What We Can Do About It, and highly recommend it.

Why Air America Matters
by Thom Hartmann

There are times when doing the profitable thing is also doing the right thing.

That's certainly what Roger Ailes and Rupert Murdoch thought when they lost an average of $90 million a year for about five years before the Fox News Channel became profitable. It's what Reverend Moon believes, as his Washington Times newspaper lost hundreds of millions of dollars and, according to some reports, even today continues to lose money. And its what the people who have made Air America Radio possible - names you probably wouldn't recognize because they've invested millions of their own money but don't seek the limelight - believe.

Each of these endeavors hit nail-biting times.

In Murdoch's early days building News Corp. (which then helped fund Fox News), as The Hollywood Reporter noted in a 2005 article:

"[C]orporate expansion and the stock market crash of 1987 conspired to create a financial crisis for Murdoch in 1990, when News Corp. reported revenue of $6.7 billion and saw more than $7 billion in debt come due. With News Corp. shares plummeting from $24 to $8 as a result of the Black Monday crash and Murdoch's buying sprees continuing unabated, creditors became nervous. A refinancing plan was put in place, but at the last minute, one small bank in Pittsburgh refused to go along with the scheme, demanding repayment of a $10 million loan.

"That $10 million loan nearly caused the entire collapse of News Corp.: An extraordinary race against time ensued in which Murdoch and his financial advisers struggled to convince the company's 100-plus creditors to agree to a deal by which they would all be paid at the same time. Only at the eleventh hour did the Pittsburgh bank capitulate, to Murdoch's great relief.

"The mogul managed to get through the ordeal without parting with substantial blocks of stock, which likely would have forced him to lose control of the company he created (a fate that befell his rival, Turner). At one point, though, Murdoch reportedly did have to sign over as security personal assets, including his New York penthouse."

There was, however, a happy ending (for Murdoch), which helped fund the money-losing Fox News Network:

"Today, the studio and the Fox owned-and-operated stations are News Corp.'s cash machines."

Brit Hume noted, in a 1999 interview with PBS:

"This operation loses money. It doesn't lose nearly as much as it did at first, and it's -- well, it's hit all its projections in terms of, you know, turning a profit, but it's - it will lose money now, and we expect for a couple more years. I think it's losing about $80 million to $90 million a year."

This is not, of course, to celebrate losing money. It's just a demonstration of the old truism that sometimes "it takes money to make money." And sometimes it takes money to make a difference in the world, as well.

While Fox News and The Washington Times have devoted themselves to promoting the interests of America's most wealthy, most of the programming of Air America Radio has been committed to discussions of labor, the middle class, and holding up the founding ideals of this nation. These were best expressed by America's first liberal president, George Washington, when he said: "As Mankind becomes more liberal, they will be more apt to allow that all those who conduct themselves as worthy members of the community are equally entitled to the protections of civil government. I hope ever to see America among the foremost nations of justice and liberality."

Liberal or conservative, the nation has often moved as its media has moved.

Rupert Murdoch's investment in Fox News not only produced profits for him, it changed America. As Richard Morin noted in The Washington Post on May 4, 2006, in an article titled "The Fox News Effect":

"'Fox News convinced 3 to 8 percent of its audience to shift its voting behavior towards the Republican Party, a sizable media persuasion effect,' said Stefano DellaVigna of the University of California at Berkely and Ethan Kaplan of Stockholm University.

"In Florida alone, they estimate, the Fox effect may have produced more than 10,000 additional votes for Bush -- clearly a decisive factor in a state he carried by fewer than 600 votes."

Similarly, Air America Radio may have had a significant effect in awakening people across the United States to positive liberal alternatives to the conservative vision of Fox and Bush. In a democracy, which depends on a vital and ongoing exchange of free ideas for its survival, this is essential.

It's a tragedy that for the lack of an investor the size of Rupert Murdoch Air America is in Chapter 11 bankruptcy. But its existence and ongoing presence in the marketplace is an essential part of the dialogue that is known as democracy.

In a letter about Shay's Rebellion, which some argued was incited by newspapers, Thomas Jefferson wrote:

"The people are the only censors of their governors; and even their errors will tend to keep them to the true principles of their institution. To punish these errors too severely would be to suppress the only safeguard of the public liberty. The way to prevent these irregular interpositions of the people is to give them full information of their affairs, through the channel of public papers, and to contrive that those papers should penetrate the whole mass of the people.

"The basis of our government being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide, whether we should have a government without newspapers, ore newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers, and be capable of reading them."

Had radio existed in 1783, Jefferson would have probably expressed similar sentiments about it.

As Jefferson wrote in 1786 to his close friend Dr. James Currie, "Our liberty depends on the freedom of the press, and that cannot be limited without being lost."

But ever since Ronald Reagan stopped enforcing the Sherman Anti-Trust Act of 1881, leading to an explosion of acquisitions and mergers, and Bill Clinton signed the Telecommunications Act of 1996, leading to an even more startling concentration of media in a very few hands, freedom of the press in America has become as much a economic as a political issue. This is problematic, because no democracy can survive with only one voice in the media.

Back in the years when I often visited Russia, the well-work joke that everybody knew had to do with the names of the two biggest newspapers, Pravda and Ivestia. "Pravda" is a Russian word that translates as "truth" and "Ivestia" means "news." The joke every Russian can recite from memory is: "There�s no news in Pravda, and no truth in Izvestia."

As Russians well learned, single-party-news is corrosive to democracy. Jefferson made his comment about newspapers being vital to America just at the time he was being most viciously attacked in the newspapers. The core requisite of democracy is debate. When there's only a single predominant voice in the media, American democracy itself is at greatest risk.

Losing the voices of Air America would harm this nation, just as much as would losing the voices of conservative talk radio.

We need them all to really be America.

Thom Hartmann is a Project Censored Award-winning New York Times bestselling author of 17 books, and host of a nationally syndicated daily progressive talk show carried on the Air America Radio network. His most recent book is "Screwed: The Undeclared War on the Middle Class and What We Can Do About It."