THE COFFEE REBELLION SPREADS!!

Think I made it up did you?? Well it seems I'm not the only one that smells the aroma of rebellion and its not from drinking the Corp. Reich wing Tea bags being passed around as the real thing! Check out what this young lady is saying. Join the COFFEE REBELLION today!!!

PACIFIC TIDAL WAVE MAP!

TIDAL WAVE!!

@ the title link is the latest BBC article and map about the Tsunami waves rolling through the Pacific at this very moment after one of the strongest earthquakes since the Dec. 2004 Indian Ocean quake and Tsunami event. Fortunately, this time its in the Pacific where an excellent tsunami forecasting system exists Ocean wide. This has given Pacific coastal nations time to warn their populations and to evacuate people in low laying coastal areas. Even with this wide spread destruction is very possible and not everyone gets the message so some loss of life will probably occur.

BEACH REPORT:

THE BIG SNOWY CONTINUES PLUS THE BIG EARTHQUAKE HITS CHILE !!

Final weekend of Feb. in this the snowiest winter in recorded weather history so far. 58" of snow has officially fallen this winter in our area. I'll still take the snow over the reported 8.8 earthquake that has hit Chile earlier this morning. As I write this the Pacific rim coastal areas are bracing for the expected Tsunami that was generated and reported by Ocean bouys place in the Pacific solely for this purpose. People are being moved to 3rd fllor and above at this very moment in Waikiki beach and other coastal resorts. The west coast of the U.S. has also been placed on alert. Kind of takes the edge off the local weather distress doesn't it?

AVATAR - 3D CINIMAX

Went locally to the Trop. last evening to see the latest film triumph of James Cameron ( Terminator series, Titanic ) the biggest grossing film in history AVATAR. The CGE effects are so far ahead of anything I've seen yet as to leap a light yr. ahead of any other recent movie. The story was a patchwork of plots and ideas taken from dozens of sci-fi and fantasy and even westerns I've read and seen over the last 50 yrs. Nevertheless, it's well written and told along with the stunning visuals to engage you totally in the spectacle. I doubt it made many friends though of the more conservative Fox news watchers with it's anti-neo con /Imperialist and anti-Corp message line. I hear even the Pope condemned it for some odd reason? Anyway, I usually don't comment on Movies or endorse them but this one is worth a peek if you haven't already seen it.

THE COFFEE CUP COALITION IS BORN!!!

It's Time for a Progressive Tea Party Movement

By Stephen Crockett
February 25, 2010

Take Action: Eat lunch for peace--become a "brown-bagger"

Published by t r u t h o u t.

Most progressives have little respect for the Fox News-generated "Tea Party" movement. However, it has tapped into a very real populist anger with the direction the country is headed in at this point in our history.

Progressives should see a real opportunity in the emergence of the "Tea Party" movement to educate the public and redirect the anger to the real villains whose actions and policies created the many problems faced by the citizens of the United States of America. Our government has failed the American public by serving corporate interests and private profit instead of the public good.

The Republican Right has been somewhat successful in twisting this legitimate anger and aiming it against those who have been fighting this corporate takeover and corruption instead of themselves. They do this by lying to the public and twisting reality.

Of course, Fox News has been the leading force in this evil propaganda campaign. However, a few corporatist Democrats like Sen. Ben Nelson, Independents like Joe Lieberman and almost every elected Republican in the nation have helped advance the corporatist agenda by deceiving the reformist elements in the Tea Party movement.

Tea Party activists should realize that Fox News was formed by corporatists to advance the corporatist agenda. The corporatists have captured the "conservative" movement. They are playing their followers for suckers. A few Tea Party leaders know they are being used as a tool of the Republican Right and corporatists, but most do not.

The American government is not the enemy if it is actually controlled by the American public instead of by the rich and powerful elite who make up the corporatists' power structure. The American government needs to provide a check and balance against corporate power. We must recapture our government from corporate interests. This will never be done by Republicans. It will never be done by the small corporatist faction of the Democratic Party. It can be done with an alliance of progressives, real Tea Party reformers, economic populists and grassroots Democrats.

The Scott Browns and Sarah Palins of the nation only play at being populists. They act in support of the corporatist agenda while talking like reformers. Scott Brown was financed by corporatist forces. He was heavily financed by the debt collection industry, banking interests, health insurance companies and the like, just like Sarah Palin. Brown opposes Wall Street reforms and regulation. He wants corporate power to go unchecked. These ideas are clearly enemies of the American public and real functional democracy. Folksy talk is just more hot air. It is actions that count.

Fox News seems designed to act as a financial and political backer of Republican Right corporatist politicians. They spin everything to defeat real reforms and undermine real reformers.

Labor unions act as a check and balance on corporate power. Fox News and the Republican Right corporatists demonize them at every opportunity. Union leaders are always elected by the membership. They are the only truly democratically elected populist element in our economic system. The Fox News crowd calls these elected leaders "union bosses." You do not get to elect your "boss." Try suggesting free elections for all the management positions at your place of employment and you will probably be joining the ranks of the unemployed. Corporations are basically organized in a top-down dictatorial manner. It is their nature and mindset to be dictatorial with very, very few exceptions.

Suing corporations acts as a check and balance to corporate power. Fox News and the Republican Right corporatists are trying to eliminate the effectiveness of this check and balance under the disguise of "tort reform."

Campaign finance laws slightly reduced the ability of corporations to buy elections, smear reformers and defeat reforms. While in power, the Republican Right corporatists packed all our federal courts with corporatists. This is why the Republican Right corporatists on the Supreme Court recently overturned over 60 years of established law to give corporations unlimited power to spend shareholders' money to advance their corporatist political goals.

Most corporations are not loyal American citizens as the recent Supreme Court ruling implies. Almost all the large corporations operating in America are international in nature. International corporations should not be controlling the American economy, the American political system or the American government. American citizens should be. No matter what the Supreme Court says, international corporations are neither people nor American citizens.

The percentage of the American economy going toward debt is growing rapidly. Why? The answer is corporate power and corporatist government policy. So-called "free trade" has failed the American public while enriching the corporatists. Tax revenue has gone into the toilet because we do not tax imports and tens of millions of former taxpayers have lost their jobs. Without good-paying jobs, these workers/taxpayers are not paying nearly as much in taxes.

Tax cuts for over 30 years have been focused on enriching the corporatists and screwing the middle classes. The Fox News and the Republican Right corporatists want you to place the blame on the poor for government debt. This is pure nonsense. Unfair tax cuts are the real villains along with corporatist "free trade" policies. Additionally, the corporatists start unnecessary wars financed by public debt that enrich the international corporations while killing and maiming American soldiers.

So-called "free trade" is undermining our national security by crushing our industrial manufacturing base and crippling our national finances.

Government spending as a percentage of our economy is excessively large mostly because our economy has not really grown the way it should because of so-called "free trade." Free trade has not been free for American citizens. Our public and personal debts have exploded. Our wages have not grown as quickly as our cost of living. Our jobs are disappearing or have already disappeared.

Government debt to enrich international corporations instead of improving the lives of American citizens is nearly criminal. Why does Medicare money get paid to drug companies without bargaining down the price of drugs? Corporate power is the only answer.

Why do Americans pay twice as much for medical care as in any other industrialized nation, but have worse results? Why are medical costs exploding here at the same time as millions of citizens are being kicked out of their health insurance plans? Why are our companies paying the cost of health insurance while all our foreign competitors get subsidized by government payment of health care costs? The answers are corporate power.

The real reformers of the Tea Party movement need to look at corporate power instead of government as the villains threatening the future of America. The Republican Right, corporatists and Fox News are threatening your civil liberties and Constitutional Rights, not the ACLU, Obama or the Democratic Party. The Republican Right, corporatists and Fox News are those who support the "national security state," torture, jailing citizens without trial, wiretapping without court orders, etc.

International corporate interests have much more control over the lives of the average American citizens than our government does. When the government gets captured by these corporations, as it did under George W. Bush and his allies who are still in office, the American public gets hammered!

You are not ignorant or out of touch with reality just because you watch Fox News or listen to right-wing talk radio, but prolonged exposure will eventually get you there. Watching only Fox News will likely stop reform supporters of the Tea Party movement from realizing that they have much more in common with progressives than they ever knew. The real reformers in the Tea Party movement and progressives should unite in a Progressive Tea Party movement. Fox News and the Republican Right corporatists should not control or define the Tea Party. Both progressives and the real reform elements in Tea Party movement should reach out to each other and make common cause on many issues.

It is time for a Progressive Tea Party movement.

READ ABOUT US NOW POSTED @ the 2nd largest Progressive blog in America Firedoglake!! Click on the title link NOW!!

Multiple sexual harassment lawsuits filed against Harrah’s Atlantic City Casino Hotel

At least 13 sexual harassment lawsuitshave been filed against Harrah’s Resort in Atlantic City. The company management has also been accused of trying to cover up the harassment and retaliating against employees who complained about the hostile work environment.

The lawsuits accuse former supervisor Raymond Montgomery, who served as the “Director of Nightlife” at Harrah’s The Pool nightclub, of making sexual advances on numerous female employees and pressuring them to drink excessive amounts of alcohol. Two of the women allege that they blacked out and later discovered that they had been sexually assaulted by Montgomery.

Another Harrah’s boss, Jeffrey Chafee, was named in the lawsuits. Chafee was accused by a female employee of subjecting her to “inappropriate, vulgar, and off-color comments, innuendos, and jokes.” According to the complaint, the woman was retaliated against and accused of “insubordination” after she reported Chafee’s behavior to Harrah’s HR department.

Two human resources managers, Mylka Naranjo and Tim Kreischer, were named in the lawsuit complaints for failing to try to stop the harassment. Naranjo is alleged to have told a woman who complained to her to “Stop being a baby,” and Kreischer is accused of engaging “in a concealment and cover-up of such instances of sexual harassment and the creation of a hostile work environment in the workplace in order to prevent wrongdoing of co-employees, supervisory and managerial level employees from being exposed.”

IN SEARCH OF THE DEMOCRATS

THE JOB MACHINE IS BROKEN

Today's AC Press leads off with a story ( @ the title link) about local towns having to lay off Police and other workers. As the Great Recession deepens and tax revenues in many states, counties and towns and cities continue to decline these types of lay-offs will increase and the spiral down will deepen further. Last yrs. Federal stimulus created few private jobs, no matter what the Obama people say. It mostly just padded Gov't payrolls and forestalled the inevitable. Without, job creation in the private sector there isn't going to be the $$ available to maintain the existing public sector as time goes on. People who work for Gov't must understand the two situations are linked in a very direct way. Nobody wants to see anybodies job disappear, but it's absurd to think it's not going to happen to people working for the Gov't simply because they work for the Gov't. Nobody's job is secure anymore.

Where are the JOBS going to come from?

The BIG ?? is where are the new PRIVATE businesses and the jobs they will create going to come from? The Big Corp. sector doesn't seem to care if it creates jobs in America or China as long as they pay their new employees the least possible amount without benefits. The Public sector for to long has thought it could just continue to do the opposite and that ride is coming to a close. So , where are the millions of new jobs necessary to keep society afloat and to maintain a society with a middle class going to come from?

NJ TO BAN SMOKING ON PUBLIC BEACHES

Bills would ban smoking on NJ's beaches

Posted: Thursday, February 18, 2010 | 1 comment

Smoking might be banned at beaches, amusement parks and racetracks in New Jersey.

A state Senate committee on Thursday will consider consolidating three bills that would expand retrictions already imposed by some Jersey shore towns.

State Sen. Andrew Ciesla (SEES'-la) of Ocean County wants to prohibit smoking on state-owned beaches.

Sens. Barbara Buono of Middlesex County and Loretta Weinberg of Bergen County would ban smoking at state- and municipal-owned beaches and parks.

Sen. Shirley Turner of Mercer County would ban smoking on beaches and other public places, such as racetracks and amusement parks.

If the committee approves the combined bill, the full Senate could vote on the measure as early as Monday.

Posted in NEW JERSEY on Thursday, February 18, 2010 6:25 am

NJ is taking steps to ban smoking on it's public beaches. I'm not sure how I feel about this one. I don't smoke but this law might be over the top.

WILL THEY EVER LEARN??

Nags Head, NC

@ the title link is another of the endless articles about a stupid politician selling the siren song of the sand lobby to its clueless citizens. Will they ever learn?

RUNAWAY TRAIN

Davenport Landing 2010

Check out my newest blog @ the title link. "Runaway Train" is about Art, Music, Theater / Movies , Culture and Sports , anything but politics and news.

HAPPY V-DAY!!

BEACH REPORT:

The Weather is the news!!

Another record breaking snowy week here on So. Jersey coast. This will end up being the snowiest winter in recorded history locally. It seems two weather phenomenon have teamed up this winter to give us this record snow fall a very strong El Nino event in the Pacific ocean and another fixture of North Atlantic weather called the North Atlantic Oscillation. The Oscillation is a semi-permanent High pressure zone that usually moves off into the Atlantic after the fall and allows the Jet stream to move north over Canada. This yr. for some unknown reason it chose to stay put over Newfoundland and is forcing the northern jet south bringing with it lots of cold air which is hitting the El Nino moisture stream coming across the country every few days. Until something changes in this set up we can expect even more snow or rain. Oddly , the northern states are experiencing a drought with almost no snow in places like Portland, Maine and the White Mts. of new Hampshire and Vermont. In essence we are having the grand daddy of all "northern winters." if you ever wanted to know what its like in Buffalo, NY or Maine this time of year all we have to do is look out the window! Lets hope this isn't the new normal but merely a chance variation. Some of the warming models predict such radical events happening more frequently and some even have predicted a worsening of winters in the northeast for some periods. One thing is for sure something odd is taking place in the atmosphere and its not just the weather.

SCIENCE FRI: - CLIMATE & WEATHER

Climate map of the Earth

I'm getting really tired explaining to the Global warming deniers the difference between climate and weather, so for those of you who read my blog here's the Wikipedia definitions of the two. Oh and No, just because the Eastern US is having an extremely wet winter with record snowfall it doesn't in the least disprove Global warming theories. The major Global warming theories predict just such extremes as the climate system begins to shift. While the East coast has had record snowfall other areas of the North American continent like Alaska are having record warmth at the same time.

Ex-Ventnor Mayor Tim Kreischer back in the news!

New sexual harassment suits go beyond The Pool, allege Harrah's knew and covered up

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Harrah’s not only tolerated sexual harassment but covered it up, alleges a new set of lawsuits against the casino.

Two workers filing those suits are the first to make allegations that go beyond The Pool nightclub and since-fired manager Raymond Montgomery, who is the target of 13 lawsuits that have been filed since November.

Until now, Montgomery was allegedly the sole aggressor in the accusations, although the casino, its leaders and several Human Resources employees were accused of allowing the harassment to continue. Harrah’s has responded by saying as soon as they were made aware of the allegations an investigation was conducted and Montgomery was terminated. He has refused to comment.

But now, two of three suits filed last week allege the environment of harassment existed outside of the water-themed club and Montgomery. And those who were supposed to implement the policies meant to protect employees instead allowed harassment to continue, the suits allege.

One woman says she was working in a parking garage bathroom June 18, 2005, when a co-worker who had been harassing her came in and sexually assaulted her. The woman — whose name is being withheld due to the nature of the charges — reported the incident to police, and received workers’ compensation as a result. No one was arrested in the case, even though police confirmed both the woman and the man she accused are named in the report.

The suit claims she never pursued charges because relatives of the man — who also worked at the casino — intimidated her. When she reported the relatives to Mylka Naranjo in Human Resources, she was told: “Stop being a baby,” according to the suit.

At one point, she charges, she was even assigned to work with the men whom she had reported were harassing her. The hostile work environment allegedly continued to at least this past December.

Bridgeton-based attorney Thomas Seeley, who said he has 20 plaintiffs so far, believes some workers were afraid to come forward until seeing that others have.

“What I think may be happening, is some other workers are saying, ‘I’ve put up with this for years,’” he said.

While the suits claim several members of management ignored workers’ claims, Naranjo and manager Tim Kreischer were the most culpable, according to the claims. Both worked in Human Resources and were supposed to implement policies to maintain a non-hostile work environment, but instead they allowed it to continue unabated, the suits allege.

Kreischer — the former mayor of Ventnor — “further engaged in a concealment and cover-up of such instances of sexual harassment and the creation of a hostile work environment in the workplace in order to prevent wrongdoing of co-employees, supervisory and managerial level employees from being exposed,” the suit states.

Reached at his home, Kreischer referred all comment to Harrah’s. A telephone number could not be found for Naranjo.

“We’re not trying to create any type of feeling towards the casino or Harrah’s,” Seeley said. “We want to simply present the facts that we have and let a neutral fact-finder determine whether or not what Harrah’s has done is a violation of the law under sexual discrimination.”

Harrah’s spokeswoman Alyce Parker said the company has only received one of the three new lawsuits, and legal counsel is reviewing it.

She previously has said Harrah’s Entertainment has a zero tolerance policy when it comes to any form of harassment.

“Our policy encourages employees to bring such issues to our attention so that we can investigate and take appropriate action,” she has said.

Contact Lynda Cohen:
609-272-7257
LCohen@pressofac.com

SARAH PALIN USES A HAND-O -PROMPTER

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Sarah Palin Uses a Hand-O-Prompter
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Economy

Colbert's take on this RETARD masquerading as a Presidential candidate is hilarious.

MGM TO SELL IT'S 50% OF BORGATA

BORGATA

The hammer continues to fall hard and heavy on AC these days, it was announced today that MGM that it would divest itself of its silent partnership with Borgata ( Boyd gaming) and sell all of its AC holdings. This coming fast on the heels of the announcement the other day that Pinnacle Inc. the owners of the old Sands property had put all of its AC holdings up for sale as well.

NJ Pols hold meeting in AC about AC's Future

While more and more of the casino rats jump ship daily the State is now worried that the days of easy money rolling into the State treasury from AC's once flourishing gaming halls are coming to a rather rapid close. My guess is that these well heeled gentlemen will all call for more meetings. What we need are more customers and less meetings.

EL NINO RETURNS

The strongest El Nino weather event in over a decade is now happening in the Pacific. The monumental snow storms hammering the Eastern US are a result of this event. The EL Nino will continue right into spring this yr. according to the article I've linked at the title page.

BLIZZARD !!

Blizzard conditions are raging outside as I write this with over a foot and half or more already on the ground and strong winds causing huge drifts along buildings and fences. The heavy wet snow is also taking down trees and power lines as the power has been going off and on all night here. This storm is not going to be the winters last and its a good bet this winter will be a record one for snow and rain along the jersey coast.

Beach Erosion?

The strong Nor'easters are also causing significant narrowing of all the local beaches. This is a normal variation and not a disaster as its being played by the "sand lobby" and its political cheering section locally and DC. Its another example of disaster mongering by the well connected Corp and political set.We can almost count on a call for more billions by this greedy crowd after these storms pass. They'll whine about how their projects have worked but they need to fix them now.

THE UGLY FACE OF "THE GREAT RECESSION"

Graph showing the extent of job losses after every recession since 1974

The arrow is pointing @ this recession's % of jobs lost graphed by months since the official start of the recession in Dec. 2007. This is indeed "The Great Recession" as many are now calling it. Least we forget who brought us this disaster. This is the result of 8 yrs. of mis-management in DC by the GW BV$H administration. This is the legacy left to our current President. The GOP doesn't bring up this man's name anymore in polite conversation the same way they tried to forget Herbert Hoover. The road back from this creatures reign will be long and hard and many young people will probably never know decent work because of the trends in our declining economy. Some of the disaster is also the result of 30+ yrs. of larger trends in the economy. America is not the same place it was in 1980. Its IMO in far worse condition then back then.

@ the title a good article about today's job nos.

Published on Thursday, February 4, 2010 by TruthDig.com

Volcker Rules

by Robert Scheer

Finally President Barack Obama has come to his senses on financial regulation. His endorsement of what he calls the “Volcker Rule” for once puts him squarely on the side of ordinary Americans as opposed to the banking bandits who have so thoroughly fleeced the public.

The proposal from former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker basically involves restoring the spirit, if not the letter, of the 1930s Glass-Steagall banking regulations to prevent another Great Depression. It means separating the activities of commercial banks, entrusted with the deposits of ordinary folks, from the antics of the financial high rollers who are presumably dealing with wealthier and more knowledgeable investors. Commercial banks were intended to be heavily regulated and insured by the government to protect the savings of unwary citizens. Less risk-averse investors and the firms that handled their funds could fend for themselves, and if there was a collapse there would be no innocent victims requiring a government bailout.

This setup worked splendidly for more than six decades, until the rules were changed to permit the merger of the two types of banking activity, which never would have happened had President Ronald Reagan renamed Volcker as head of the Fed back in 1987. To reappoint Volcker would have been the logical move given his spectacular record in taming inflation, which he brought down to 3.6 percent after it had risen to 11.3 percent thanks to the energy crisis of 1979. Reagan went with Alan Greenspan instead because of their shared ideological fervor for unfettered free markets. But the repeal of Glass-Steagall required bipartisan support, and that eventually came with the presidency of Bill Clinton, who reappointed Greenspan and his fellow free-market ideologues Robert Rubin and Lawrence Summers to head the Treasury Department. They joined forces with the Wall Street lobby, and as a result Glass-Steagall was repealed in 1999 when Clinton signed the law eliminating it.

Unfortunately, and despite the collapse of the banking system brought about by the shenanigans of the “too big to fail” conglomerates permitted in the new deregulatory environment, Obama has wasted the last year and trillions of taxpayer dollars bailing out Wall Street without putting significant new rules in place to govern reckless behavior. Only now, with the economic disaster bankrupting the government, has he turned to Volcker for leadership. And in testimony Tuesday before the Senate Banking Committee, Volcker offered the essential justification for needed banking legislation:

“The basic point is that there has been, and remains, a strong public interest in providing a `safety net’—in particular, deposit insurance and the provision of liquidity in emergencies—for commercial banks carrying out essential services. There is not, however, a similar rationale for public funds-taxpayer funds—protecting and supporting essentially proprietary and speculative activities.”

Investment houses would still be permitted to play freely at the Wall Street casino, but they would have to pay the consequences of their own failure. In the event that the largest of them approached collapse, the government would still step in—not to save them but to dispose of the body in a way that did not endanger the health of others. As Volcker put it, when it would come to dealing with the impending collapse of an investment giant: “The mandate is to arrange an orderly liquidation or merger. In other words, euthanasia, not a rescue.”

Euthanasia was applied to Lehman Brothers but not Goldman Sachs, which was allowed to suddenly jump over the wall to become a commercial bank and thus eligible for TARP funding and many billions more from the government.

The biggest banks, whether originally commercial or investment banks, are now screaming their predicted pain at the prospect of new regulations—and no wonder. An analysis of the five top banks affected, led by Goldman Sachs, shows they stand to lose $13 billion in revenue next year if the proposed regulations pass, according to Bloomberg. But there is hope for at least some bipartisan support for the restoration of a wall separating these two very different sorts of banking activities, as indicated by a bill co-sponsored by Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., to explicitly restore the safeguards of Glass-Steagall.

Please don’t let your eyes glaze over on this issue as a matter of arcane economic regulation. It’s the ballgame as far as breaking the death grip of Wall Street over our economy. The projected $1.6 trillion deficit is only the first installment on decades of crippling debt that will pile up because of the irresponsibility of a radically deregulated banking system. This should be the only reminder we need that little else matters in the way of public policy discussion as long as Wall Street bleeds us dry.

Copyright © 2010 Truthdig, L.L.C.

Robert Scheer is editor of Truthdig.com and a regular columnist for The San Francisco Chronicle.

Robert Scheer sums it up pretty good. We need to get these Vampires under control again or they'll gamble us all back into the ditch. Like most degenerate gamblers they cannot control themselves and the rest of us are tired of the Gov't using our taxes to enable them further.

BI-PARTISANSHIP TODAY

Think bi-partisanship is good for America? Its what were told day and night lately, but when the Gopers ruled funny thing you never heard them calling for this, did you? Read Cenk Uygur's excellent article on why this is and why so called bi-partisanship is really bad news for America these days. Read all about it @ the title link.

GROUNDHOGS DAY!!

It's that day again and yes, Phil saw his shadow. Snow predicted tonight!

Staring Back @ Van Gogh

Vincent Van Gogh self portrait 1889

Interesting article @ the title link about one of the 19th centuries greatest painters Vincent Van Gogh.