Recently I attended the regional blogger conference sponsored by Northwest Progressive Institute. One of the most provocative topics was the relationship between "real" journalists and bloggers. The more prolific bloggers who cover local stories, particularly of a political nature, discussed the relative warmth ranging to animosity of their interactions with the local press. There were instances in which the blogger was the one who got the news scoop, the exclusive interview.

I hadn't written anything yet for this week because I'd been at a regional blogger conference and was still mentally processing and mulling over alot of things in my head. I saw these symbolic grave markers and stopped, but soon realized that it would be impossible to photograph them. When I took a photo encompassing all that would fit in, and then moved to where that photo ended and took another one (with the hope of connecting them for a panorama), it took me twenty photos. When walking back, I decided to film them. It took me a few seconds short of five minutes just to walk by and capture the graves of Arlington West, which are here in Seattle for the fifth year. For shame!

Meanwhile, as Matthew Carnicelli alerted us to, the networks are avoiding war coverage. They may be tired of it, but those of us who haven't forgotten should remember when we vote next.

Why an economic crisis is good for Americans

We are only glimpsing the tip of the economic iceberg of disaster, as yet. The diabolical monetary and fiscal sleight-of-hand employed over the past 5 years to pay to blow up technology, contractors, soldiers, and civilians in the Iraq War, and to bail out corporations and millionaires alike, has looted our national treasury to an extent only guessed at, in a glass, darkly.

But soon – may I predict, shortly after this administration slinks out the back doors of the White House in January – we will come face-to-face with painful, snowballing economic realities: a plummeting dollar, skyrocketing prices for fuel, food, and other commodities, rampant unemployment, stifling inflation. A stock market in turmoil as the super-wealthy frantically trade money back and forth in a futile attempt to profit off market movements which increasingly, bear no relationship at all to the crumbling companies they once represented.

Report: Exams prove abuse, torture in Iraq, Gitmo

That's the headline at the A.P. indicating that torture has been happening at Gitmo and in Iraq for the last six years.

When reports and pictures of torture first surfaced, the media followed the White House's spin: it was only a few bad apples and the person (people) who revealed the tortured were smeared in the media in a nasty, ugly way.

Jesselyn Radack and Tom Fiscus were the first to reveal the torture policies by our government. Both revealed pictures, memorandums, emails, etc... to the media. Both mysteriously witnessed public emails and notes being recertified as "secret or top secret" or simply disappear.

Nonetheless, the media refused to dig deeper into the information that Radack and Fiscus brought to them. And instead, the media filled the airwaves and cyberspace with hit pieces against Radack and Fiscus. While at the same time, respected journalists had their phones illegally wiretapped as a way to prevent future leakings of truth to the public.

Yet, in the meantime, they allowed our citizens to believe that it was only a few rotten apples who tortured in Iraq or Gitmo and they catapulted the propaganda for the White House.

Take a look at what the medical reports are saying happened according to the A.P. article.

a href="http://silencedmajority.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/06/13/english_brain.jpg">George Lakoff was recently in Seattle at Town Hall to talk about his book "The Political Mind." Prior to speaking, staff from Northwest Progressive Institute had dinner with him. I was invited but found the email when it was too late to arrange to go. By the time I got back to town, I would not even be able to get into Town Hall to hear him speak. Luckily, there were reviews.

He spoke about his book, The Political Mind: Why You Can't Understand 21st Century American Politics with an 18th Century Brain.

Lakoff's thesis is that the progressive movement has been stifled by a faulty theory of mind and that progressives think arguments are won using facts and reason whereas conservatives have poured money into think tanks. Therein, they made up neo-con terms like "tax relief" which are then parroted by the media.

Last night, Dennis Kucinich spent over three hours reading the thirty-five charges of high crimes and misdemeanors against George W. Bush. The list is so long and lengthy that the weight of the page takes forever loading onto the website, so I gave it it's own thread. But the weight of the page, is just like the weight of the crimes against the people of the United States, or the weight of the crimes against the world, and the weight of the crimes against humanity! The load is too heavy to contain in any normal person's thinking. (You can see all thirty-five charges by clicking here)

What makes Dennis Kucinich's reading of the thirty-five articles of impeachment unusual is that those articles were read into the record, without interruption, and without partisan trickery to prevent it. Even though the hallowed halls of Congress were almost empty the whole time, the symbolism of that too is not a surprise! After all, the hallowed halls of Congress have been empty of real debate and real adherence to our laws and the Constitution for the last 10 years!

In the meantime, slowly the print media has been picking up this very important news. There seems to be a perfect storm surrounding the events leading up to last night's surprise impeachment. Perhaps, it's part of the persistent media blackout, or perhaps the primary sucked out any interest in the build up towards the impeachment.

Whatever the reason for the surprising events of last night, there is no doubt that the weight of the seriousness of these thirty-five crimes still rest soundly on our shoulders. It's still up to us to push Congress and the media to into doing their job and into doing the right thing.

Last night was an important step for holding the Bush administration accountable for crimes against humanity.

Now, lets make sure that Bush's accountability moment happens. Make those calls. Write those letters. Call the neighbors, and find any means possible to spread the news. We must impeach because there will be Hell to pay if we don't. There are hints that Bush is trying to attack Iran. There are reasons to believe that a Presidential pardon will happen before Bush leaves the White House.

So let's do what we need to do to push towards a House impeachment and a Senate 'guilty' verdict.

The world is counting on us.

Mr. KUCINICH. Madam Speaker, pursuant to clause 2 of rule IX, I rise to give notice of my intent to raise a question of the privileges of the House.

The form of the resolution is as follows:

I have to confess...

I turned on CNN's Reliable Sources today and watched the media critique themselves. Today, their biggest critique of themselves was about two stories:

1. The first was E.T.'s (Entertainment Tonight) story about Angelina Jolie giving birth to her twins. Did she or didn't she? Was E.T. scammed by an impostor who posed as Jolie's assistant? Where is Angelina Jolie's assistant's evil media-duping imposter? Enquiring minds want to know!

2. The other story was the breaking news from Thursday that Obama and Hillary ducked the media and were meeting in private at her home in DC while the journalists covering Obama were trapped in flight on their way to Chicago without Obama on the plane. (Oh my!) In the meantime, reporters staked out the Clinton's home in DC trying to be the first to grab the all important picture of Hillary and Barack together. But Hillary and Obama scammed the media; they were a mile away at Sen. Dianne Feinstein's house hidden in the trees. (There seems to be a hidden allegory there, if you ask me.)

Lost in all this week's criticism of the entertainment media was Dan Rather's words at the Media Reform Conference.

Dan Rather as you all remember was one of the few media journalists who reported the truth about Bush in 2004 and yet was hung out to dry by the corporate media. After losing his job in 2004 and getting blacklisted in the industry, he has a lawsuit against the corporate media for their actions.

He has also been speaking out loudly for media reform.

The Senate Intel Committee just released the Phase II Report (pdf) of how intelligence was (mis)used by the administration to force this country into the war in Iraq.

Only six Senators read the NIE report before voting on the IWR.

As Scotty confessed in his tell-all book, the administration sold the war and Congress and the media just went along with it. According to the report there was plenty of dissenting opinions that were never released to the public.

Yet, in today's press conference, the White House's response is essentially, "Get over it..." Dana Perino's response was, "...this is just another example of rehashing this old issue, which is fine. If people want to spend their time doing that, that's up to them."

Over 4000 dead soldiers, numerous soldiers with PTSD and other debilitating diseases, and hoards of dead Iraqis later...but we should 'get over it?!'

Yes, we should rehash this. .

Clinton lied and nobody died and yet he was impeached.

Bush lied, people died, and he should never be a free man again. Will we be able to make that happen?

Let's talk...

I got a message a couple of weeks ago from a local progressive organizer saying that when he read the newspaper, he recognized names of people from our group that had worked together previously, and his heart sank as he read. The thing he had warned against had happened .. Obama supporters were very vocal. Clinton supporters were just as vocal. Support of one's candidate was fine, but this unique campaign had brought negativism down into the mud.

Then he began to remember - about the other side - the conservatives who want the negatives to go on right through the convention and election. If we hate each other, who wins? He thought about the voting machines and disenfranchisement. Then he took action. He got ahold of a film and invited everyone to see it.

The invitation to the film:

The film I am showing exposes how deep the election corruption goes. Democrats are not the only ones getting crushed by this corruption juggernaut. You may not want to hear about it or maybe you think you know all about it. I was wrong. So is everyone else. This is a much larger issue. I never wished this happened, but the proof is in this film. I spent my own money to purchase this DVD. I am not a rich person, but all I ask here is come and watch this film and talk about what this means to you.