Our Mayor Stocks, Sore Loser's Sour Grapes

Jerome Stocks just can't stop himself.  I guess it is no surprise that this politician who seems to struggle with self control and monitoring his own words and behavior would yet again embarrass himself days before his last official duty - to resign.

He once again sneered to his peeps at SD Rostra about Tony Kranz.  This time he couches a reasonable request from a newly elected council member for a 3D rendering of the community park.  He throws out a number without any sliver of a citation.

Reality is that this is not out of bounds in the universe of architectural or engineering design.  Moreover, the city's planning department has the requisite software (bought with taxpayer money at a pretty huge expense) which can accomplish this without extensive skill or time.  It simply hasn't been done.

And no, I'm not providing all the research for a change.  He or his cronies can provide facts to refute or back his hyperbolic claims - with their creepy threatening undertones no less.

Please, Jerome, be still.  Knock it off and show some modicum of good grace. You lost.

Quote of the Day - Philosophy of Futility

"The goal for the corporations is to maximize profit and market share. And they also have a goal for their target, namely the population. They have to be turned into completely mindless consumers of goods that they do not want. You have to develop what are called 'Created Wants'. So you have to create wants. You have to impose on people what's called a Philosophy of Futility. You have to focus them on the insignificant things of life, like fashionable consumption. I'm just basically quoting business literature. And it makes perfect sense. The ideal is to have individuals who are totally disassociated from one another. Whose conception of themselves, the sense of value is just, 'how many created wants can I satisfy?' We have huge industries, public relations industry, monstrous industry, advertising and so on, which are designed from infancy to mold people into this desired pattern."

-- Noam Chomsky

Who's Behind the Hit Pieces?

Via Councilwoman Teresa Barth's Newsletter today:

As predicted, the smear campaign rolled into high gear this past week. 

First there was a mailer in support of Stocks & Muir and 

blasting Shaffer and Kranz 

Return Address: 

North County Taxpayers for Responsible Government 

330 Encinitas Blvd #101 

Encinitas, CA 

Treasurer: Nancy Haley 

She is also the treasurer for Stocks & Muir 

Then there was the 

"Don't let Shaffer and Kranz Occupy Encinitas" 

Sent out by the San Diego County Republican Party 

who endorsed Forrester, Muir and Stocks 

Followed by a vicious character assignation against Tony Kranz. 

 Sent out by San Diego County Voters for Progress and Reform 

 7185 Navajo Rd, Suite P San Diego, CA

Treasure: C. April Boling 

She is also the Treasurer of the Lincoln Club 

 Muir, Forrester and Stocks were endorsed by the Club. 

 Who's the Lincoln Club? 

 Who supports Prop K - Elected Mayor? 

Bond, Muir & Stocks

Editor: Thank you Councilwoman Barth for a thorough summary that is well documented.  We appreciate this as we appreciate the kind of thoroughness you devote to your service on the city council.  My wish is this. You will be joined on the dais with two equally competent council members like Shaffer and Kranz to get real work done - rather than special interest empire building. And I would also wish that paid journalists would present vital summaries like this to the public, rather than waiting for information from elected officials to be handed to them. 

Myths America

Update at end

PART ONE Historic Myth 

The excerpts in Part 1 below are from an article written for the Journal of 9/11 Studies for the eleventh anniversary of September 11, 2001, the day that terminated accountable government and American liberty.

"In order to understand the improbability of the government’s explanation of 9/11, it is not necessary to know anything about what force or forces brought down the three World Trade Center buildings, what hit the Pentagon or caused the explosion, the flying skills or lack thereof of the alleged hijackers, whether the airliner crashed in Pennsylvania or was shot down, whether cell phone calls made at the altitudes could be received, or any other debated aspect of the controversy."

You only have to know two things. 

One is that according to the official story, a handful of Arabs, mainly Saudi Arabians, operating independently of any government and competent intelligence service, men without James Bond and V for Vendetta capabilities, outwitted not only the CIA, FBI, and National Security Agency, but all 16 US intelligence agencies, along with all security agencies of America’s NATO allies and Israel’s Mossad.  Not only did the entire intelligence forces of the Western world fail, but on the morning of the attack the entire apparatus of the National Security State simultaneously failed. Airport security failed four times in one hour. NORAD failed. Air Traffic Control failed. The US Air Force failed. 

The National Security Council failed.  Dick Cheney failed. Absolutely nothing worked.  The world’s only superpower was helpless at the humiliating mercy of a few undistinguished Arabs. 

It is hard to image a more far-fetched story–except for the second thing you need to know:  The humiliating failure of US National Security did not result in immediate demands from the President of the United States, from Congress, from the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and from the media for an investigation of how such improbable total failure could have occurred.  Instead, the White House dragged its feet for a year resisting any investigation until the persistent demands from 9/11 families for accountability forced President George W. Bush to appoint a political commission, devoid of any experts, to hold a pretend investigation.

[ . . . ]
Naive and gullible Americans claim that if some part of the US government had been involved in 9/11, “someone would have talked by now.”  A comforting thought, perhaps, but nothing more.  Consider, for example, the cover-up by the US government of the 1967 Israeli attack on the USS Liberty that killed or wounded most of the crew but failed to sink the ship. As the survivors have testified, they were ordered in a threatening way not to speak about the event. It was twelve years later before one of the USS Liberty’s officers, James Ennes, told the story of the attack in his book, Assault on the Liberty. I continue to wonder how the professionals at the National Institute of Standards and Technology feel about being maneuvered by the federal government into the unscientific position NIST took concerning the destruction of the WTC towers.

[ . . . ]
If enough Americans or even other peoples in the world had the intelligence to realize that massive steel structures do not disintegrate into fine dust because a flimsy airliner hits them and limited short-lived fires burn on a few floors, Washington would be faced with the suspicion it deserves. 

If 9/11 was actually the result of the failure of the national security state to deter an attack, the government’s refusal to conduct a real investigation is an even greater failure. It has fallen to concerned and qualified individuals to perform the investigative role abandoned by government. The presentations at the Toronto Hearings, along with the evaluations of the Panel, are now available, as is the documentary film, “Explosive Evidence–Experts Speak Out,” provided by Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth. 

The government’s agents and apologists try to deflect attention from disturbing facts by redefining factual evidence revealed by experts as the product of “a conspiracy culture.” If people despite their brainwashing and lack of scientific education are able to absorb the information made available to them, perhaps both the US Constitution and peace could be restored. Only informed people can restrain Washington and avert the crazed hegemonic US government from destroying the world in war. 

Improbably, Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy (under Reagan) and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators Syndicate.  

PART 2 - Current Jingoism

Jeremy Scahill speaks out on Sunday show Up with Chris Hayes.  He steps away from the corporate side shows of the national party conventions by criticizing and holding responsible the corporate media.  This is an MSNBC program, owned by General Electric, a weapons contractor for the Department of Defense.

Jeremy Scahill, a Puffin Foundation Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute, is the author of the bestselling Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army, published by Nation Books. He is an award-winning investigative journalist and correspondent for the national radio and TV program Democracy Now!. You can read his blog on TheNation.com here.

Of course the big theme here is War and the Military.  National Security has been used to justify abolishment of citizen rights and accountability at all levels. These are emotional subjects, but let's respect our citizenry can tackle adult subjects, both simple and highly complex.  Being treated as stupid will make us stupid.

Political malpractice? Mythmaking as public policy needs to be exposed on the national stage and on the local dais - regardless of political gamesmanship (or season). Pointing out if there never has been an acceptance of more than minimal deference to open government from the other national party and our local majority is part of this.

We could argue that the media is a major author of these myths and are nearly entirely responsible for filtering out, censoring or otherwise killing dissent.  Even locally our papers primarily act as a delivery system for news initiated by government sources or their funders rather than community dissenters. You will never ever hear anyone campaigning in 2012 locally or nationally bring up these myths.  It doesn't mean they don't matter.

Update, 9/11/12 @ 2 pm: Didn't think that the local news situation could degrade.  According to a Patch article this morning the North County Times has been Sold to UT San Diego.

We BILKED This - Begins Monday

Happy Anniversary to the Women of the US of A - 92 years of having the vote.

This doesn't mean we have rights.  There is a certain party that would deny women rights over their own bodies. This has been a war on women for forty years. If every woman in the US of A who could vote, would vote we would see a country transformed. 

Hat Tip to Truthdig's Mr. Fish and Emma's Revolution and the Renegade Raging Grannies.

Image of the Day Reminder

Tough week.  Sometimes it is difficult here in our well off beach town to remember it isn't whitelandia of straightville . . . Well, you get the picture.

Our neighbors do include the homeless, muslim, black, gay, immigrant, jewish, atheist, disabled, addicted - and the poor as our neighbors. They may simply be mostly invisible and silenced. This is their town.  It is not pay to play democracy is it?

It was heart crushing to see the celebration of hate and bigotry at a fast food outlet - directed from outside our city - but attended by far too many neighbors.

Also this week, nobody wants to see or hear activists acting like nitpicking nincompoops in the press comment threads or in a once cherished blog. Personal fixations during a campaign? Really?
One good experience was Encinitas Undercover giving a rough overview of candidates this week.  This was an articulate and acurate (by all of our reports) accounting of the situation.

Entries into the campaign to assist the shit-stirring forces with us always in Encinitas are those who strive to divide and keep community a mere buzz word because their own goals are so special.

With transparency and open government the central theme of this 2012 campaign, it is puzzling to find so little online about the ballot initiative for 2013. Density couldn't possibly be the only point, could it?  Let's chalk it up to a tough week to feel patience and trust.  Open to hearing a more justice oriented goal . . .

Breaking news today of another mass shooting by a lone gunman in a Wisconsin Sikh Temple with 7 dead (including shooter).  Hate and bigotry kill hope.

Fighting Big

Update below
Even billions in profit don't stop giant US employers from demanding workers give up pay or benefits. We are familiar with the wage slaves in the retail industry, restaurant, agriculture and food distribution.  But, industries that traditionally paid workers respectable wages, thanks to labor unions, are now trying to destroy these unions.  Councilman Jim Bond made his wealth in the telecommunications field working his way up the ladder.  No doubt he was a part of unions on that ascent.

Fast forward to the present. Millions of jobs have been taken from the workers of the US for corporations to pay less abroad. And, those that remain are under constant duress to remove securities, benefits and advancement.  Our community is filled with households struggling with these very issues in their own workplaces. At minimum, our city council should be cognizant of how many are struggling, where they live and how our community government can assist.  This is happening in city councils all over the country, with this Encinitas city council majority?  Not so much . . .

It's a culture more about pillage the village than support the people. Our Council majority believe in trickle down economics despite the evidence of its failure.  Even for the "I've got mine, the hell with you" crowd must realize that neighborhoods filled with foreclosed, neglected or abandoned properties, closing businesses, high unemployment, increased drug / booze or other self-medicating behaviors are all antithetical to a thriving community.  Punishing, fining or stigmatizing victims of a recession that the people aren't responsible for isn't just reprehensible, it's bad business.

Here's a challenge to all the candidates - even before sitting council members or their friends have declared - Is your first responsibility to the people of this community or to tax revenues they represent?

Think Progress Update on Verizon 6/4/12:

America’s largest wireless service provider plans to cut 1,700 jobs by offering its technicians and call center employees buyouts. Verizon Communications announced last week that it would reduce its nationwide workforce by 1 percent, and if enough workers don’t accept the buyouts, it will resort to involuntary layoffs. 

Verizon paid chief executive Lowell C. McAdam more than $22.5 million in 2011, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of executive compensation. The company has paid its top five executives more than $350 million in the last five years, according to the Communications Workers of America, the union that deals most directly with Verizon.

Stocks Erupts: That is a Lie!