https://www.vox.com/conversations/2017/5/8/15440292/neil-postman-donald-trump-politics-culture-television-media
Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay
Sunday, May 14, 2017
Saturday, May 13, 2017
Monday, May 8, 2017
A must-read: Spices at Penzeys
https://www.penzeys.com/cook/themes/affordable-care-act/kristen-moore/
"Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay"
Oregon Public Empowerment News (OregonPEN.org)
"Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay"
Oregon Public Empowerment News (OregonPEN.org)
Sunday, May 7, 2017
Thursday, April 6, 2017
‘How dare you work on whites’: Professors under fire for research on white mortality - The Washington Post
Guo: Absolutely. That's one point that I made a week ago when I wrote about this. It's not just a lot of these death rates are rising, but that a huge chasm has now opened up between us and Europe.
Deaton: The obvious difference is that the safety net is enormously more generous in Europe. And lot of people in their 50s who lose their jobs can go on retirement. You get a doctor's certificate and you get paid pretty much your salary until you die.
There's one other policy recommendation that I've been pushing. We're spending about three trillion dollars a year on health care. And our life expectancy is going down. Whereas all these other countries are spending way less, and their life expectancy is going up. For me the implication is if we implemented single payer, we'd get rid of a lot of these costs. Not without screaming and yelling, of course, and not without goring a lot of oxen.
But the crucial thing is recognizing the extent to which these rising health care costs are responsible, at least in part, for the stagnant wages for people without a college degrees. If they've got an employer and they've got health care, their wages are getting pushed down by the employer paying for that health care. People don't even realize this. They think it's for free.
I'm not a left-wing nut pushing for single-payer! It's not because I like socialized medicine. It's just because I think this is eating capitalism alive, and if we want a healthy capitalist society in America, we've got to get rid of this monster.
"Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay"
Wednesday, March 29, 2017
Important Step Forward to a Stronger Salem
Wednesday, March 8, 2017
Mark Your Calendar: An All-Too Important Event @ SalemCinema - April 4
Please share widely, let's pack the theater and support an important organization.
TUESDAY, APRIL 4TH AT 7PM!
A Fundraiser For Common Cause Oregon
all seats only $12 ~ Tickets available now at our box office during regular business hours or online at boxofficetickets.com!
On April 4th, numerous participating theaters nationwide will screen the film 1984, based on the 1949 novel by George Orwell. The story centers around Winston Smith, a member of the Outer Party. Winston works in the Records Department in the Ministry of Truth; his job is to rewrite and distort history. As a way to rebel and escape Big Brother's tyranny, at least in his own mind, he begins a diary, which is an act punishable by death. The group of movie theaters chose April 4 to screen this film because that is the date in which Winston starts writing on his diary.
A joint statement from theaters reads, "The endeavor encourages theaters to take a stand for our most basic values: freedom of speech, respect for our fellow human beings, and the simple truth that there are no such things as 'alternative facts.' By doing what we do best - showing a movie - the goal is that cinemas can initiate a much-needed community conversation at a time when the existence of facts, and basic human rights are under attack. Through nationwide participation and strength in numbers, these screenings are intended to galvanize people at the crossroads of cinema and community, and bring us together to foster communication and resistance against current efforts to undermine the most basic tenets of our society."
no coupons, passes or CineBucks accepted for special events
Best of Salem: Naomi Oreskes lecture at Willamette, Mar. 10
Naomi Oreskes Lecture Salem - Mar 10 |
 Willamette University, Rogers Hall 900 State St 7:30 pm
|
"Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay"
Oregon Public Empowerment News (OregonPEN.org)
Sunday, March 5, 2017
Find out How Oregonians' Votes for President Can Count Again
All ready except for one Senator: Salem's Peter Courtney, Senate President. He's fine with having Oregonian's wishes ignored and having a system that lets reactionary billionaires start out with a head-start towards installing their preferred candidate for the presidency every four years.
The Electoral College was always 100% about slavery and giving certain people -- white, rural people -- more power than anyone else in deciding who should be president.
The entire reason the Electoral College was created was to protect the slave states from an abolitionist president, while allowing them to disenfranchise most of their residents; further, they got to count enslaved people as 3/5ths of a person in the census, which determines the seats for the state in the House of Representatives in Congress.
You can no more separate the Electoral College from its roots in preserving the disproportionate power of white rural votes than you can separate the purr from a cat.
The whole point of using this bizarre anachronism is, as it was before the Civil War, to disadvantage the people more urban regions (the norther, free states) while unfairly advantaging voters in rural states (the South). It's the most un-American idea in the Constitution, in that it is entirely about making "one person, one vote" into pure fiction, as the Electoral Collect means that the weight of your vote for president -- the only national elected office -- depends entirely on whether you are in a more or less populous state. If you are a rural voter in an empty state, your vote counts many times more than it would if you were in a high population state.
The Electoral College is now not just stupid, it's a pathological and dangerous threat to the American Republic in the age of nuclear weapons. That's because its terrible defect -- the consequence of electing a popular vote loser -- is now dormant no more; twice since 2000, the popular vote winner was not elected and the electoral vote loser was.
Worse, the arguments in favor of the Electoral College have now been clearly shown to be absurd.
The Electoral College doesn't protect against the unqualified populist, it is what allowed the unqualified populist to use over-weighted rural votes to win the office despite having millions more Americans opposed to his election than in favor of it.
The scholarly rationalization ("the substitution of a good reason for the real reason") was always that the Founding Fathers feared a demagogue and a candidate for president who would whip up popular sentiment against the rich and powerful and convince the people to give him power, which he would then use to benefit himself and his friends instead of governing in the national interest. This is precisely what has happened now, in this most dangerous time.
The only reason Oregon hasn't joined the NPV compact is the President of the Oregon Senate, Peter Courtney, Salem's state senator. Come to Louck's Auditorium next Sunday at 3:30 and hear more about NPV and what you can do to help get Oregon into the right column of YES states.
National Popular Vote: What is it? Why is it needed?
Event Information
Friday, March 3, 2017
These Folks Loved Trump. Until Their Friend Was Taken Away. | Mother Jones
http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2017/02/trumps-immigration-policy-served-steamimg-platter
Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay
Let's live on the planet as if we intend to stay
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