Since CNN has gone COO-COO, we have become MSNBC and Bill Maher viewers for our news. Here is a warning from Maher about the Birthers:
For the last couple of weeks, we’ve all been laughing heartily at the wacky antics of the “birthers” — the far-right goofballs who claim Barack Obama wasn’t really born in Hawaii and therefore the job of president goes to the runner-up, former Miss California Carrie Prejean.
Also, when Obama was sworn in as president, he forgot to give his answer in the form of a question.
And yet, every week, the chorus of conservatives demanding to see his birth certificate grows. It’s like they’re the Cambridge police, Obama’s in his house — the White House — and they need to see some ID.
And there’s nothing anyone can do to convince these folks. You could hand them, in person, the original birth certificate and have a video of Obama emerging from the womb with Don Ho singing in the background … and they still wouldn’t believe it.
Maher impressed on me the seriousness of this group’s claims. I’ve been ignoring their cries just as I ignore the rantings of Russ Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. But we need to do more to discredit this group.
We need to concentrate on the issues facing American citizens. I will lose my healthcare coverage in a few months, as COBRA payments will become too expensive for me on my unemployment “salary.” My husband has no healthcare as well as no job.
We have been making and paying taxes on a six-figure income the past few years. Who is covering our shortfall to the government. You (the 90% who are employed) are already paying for me to survive.
We need to stimulate the economy to provide jobs for those of us who are unemployed. Yes, I’m out there every day trying to make a living on commission marketing branded merchandise, but I need help until I can make money in this new career.
America, let’s concentrate on the issues at hand. Please stifle the Birthers. They are just fodder for comedians.
Last night we watched on HBO the outstanding documentary, Prom Night in Mississippi. Both my husband and I were in tears during this film.
I cringe when I see CNN promoting another Black in America documentary. Prom Night in Mississippi is black in America. Prom Night in Mississippi is white in America. Apparently Latinos have not migrated to Clarksdale, Miss., yet. No other demographic lives there.
The movie is shocking to me, as it reflected life in my small home town forty years ago. The high school prom was canceled. Reasons were never given, but it was because the school board feared blacks and whites partying together. I cannot believe that in some parts of America, things have not changed since the 60s and early 70s when forced integration occurred. In 2008 Mississippi, separate proms were planned for white kids and black kids. Morgan Freeman and the students changed all that.
I have admired Morgan Freeman as an actor. I could listen him to read the phone book (if it still exists). I knew that he was a humanitarian in his small community where he once lived. Now he is my hero. He changed the community by having one senior prom.
CNN is making a big deal of this. I am impressed about his work ethic. Since I am on unemployment benefits, the stimulus package has aided me with extra money each week and help with my COBRA payments for a while.
I am glad that he is President. He has thrown us a lifeline, but we are not out of the deep yet.
I have been watching some of the CNN discussion of the tea parties. Don’t these folks realize that taxes for 95% of working families will be reduced?
I’ll be glad to trade places with the tax protestors. I’m not paying any income tax (or very little) in 2009. I do not have an income. Maybe the tax protestors will be the next group of citizens losing their jobs.
And what is with Rick Perry? Is he already running for 2012? Let’s don’t send any Federal monies to Texas. He sounds as if he does not want any Federal aid.
CNN just showed a clip of the hundreds lined up at the Nashville Zoo to apply for 60 seasonal jobs. The meerkats were well represented in a clip watching out for danger.
Breakfast where the news is read; television children fed
This is my favorite lyric from the Doors. To me it describes my generation perfectly. We grew up with television as our babysitter, our teacher, our escape from mom and dad. As adults, it is still an escape from the problems of the world (if we don’t watch the news) and our spouses. Well, we can watch the news specially tailored to our own prejudices and belief systems on cable. Select CNN, Fox, or MSNBC. We can hear what we want to hear while our spouses complain about the dog wanting to go outside or the cats needing food.
Then why are we not ready for digital television? Since television is central to the lives of Americans, why are we not ready? I find that ironic that most of us who are TV addicts are connected to cable and will not need to worry about the digital conversion. We are ready. The others in the minority do not watch television. They surf the internet or read books.
Our household became HD enlightened when lightning destroyed many of our household electronics last spring. Otherwise, we might be lagging as the plan was to buy all the HD stuff in late 2008. Of course, by then we were unemployed. The expensive conversion to HD would have probably been shelved for a while.
Is the downturn in our economy responsible for us not being HD ready? That must be fixed. In the past, I may have cried, “I want my, I want my MTV.” Today, it is give me my twenty movie channels in hopes that I can find one movie a week to watch.
Although we are frequent movie goers, it is so easy to miss a good flick now and then. We took a break from football and watched Blood Diamond last night on Cinemax. I could not look at my very modest diamond collection without guilt today. While genocide was taking place in the movie, CNN was broadcasting the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal. I loved that little social commentary about our society. We need our diamonds despite the cost of human life and suffering.
Today we saw in the theatre The Reader, which gets my vote for the best movie of 2008 (although I do not have a vote). I loved the book, and the movie is just as good.
Last Tuesday evening, November 4, I got home from working out with my trainer around 7 p.m. I turned on the television to see the looking for signal notice. Oh, no, I thought. No Wolf Blitzer! No John King with the magic map of the United States.
Finally, the signal was found. Wolf was doing his thing as the polls started closing, and CNN made their projections. I watched with hope, and the news was good for Barack Obama. Shortly before 10 p.m., I was dozing on the couch. At 10 p.m., I heard the projection from CNN that Barack Obama would be elected President of the United States. I kept waiting, expecting, the news that the projection was wrong, as in 2000. Was I dreaming? Were those fireworks in my living room? People were celebrating in Grant Park, in Atlanta, in New York and in my living room.
I received a call from my husband that he was on his way home and that the election was a landslide. Can it be? Yes. Reality was that Barack Obama would be the 44th President of the United States, the first African American elected to the office. Not until I saw Jesse Jackson crying in Grant Park did the significance of Barack Obama being black occur to me.
Oh, my God, I thought, I can’t believe it. How far we have come in my lifetime! To me, his being black isn’t important. But it is important for the historical significance.
I like him for his vision and his intelligence. I see him as a leader for our age.
