Please Stop the Kumbaya - I don't want to break bread with conservatives I...
I knew I would see this from pundits and writers. Salon.com is apparently no exception. Yes, we are a divided America. We've always been a divided America. This mythical America where liberals and...
View ArticleThank You For Your Service
I just wanted to write this on Veteran's day to commemorate the veterans in my own family and in keeping with the holiday. In a way, I just kind of wanted to get this off my chest because it's been...
View Article"You're liberal, but you're more conservative than most conservatives..."
I have a buddy of mine who is a political mortal enemy of mine. We despise each others politics and out of our own arrogance try to one up the other, but we're amazingly still friends for some odd...
View ArticleMichigan Right to Work probably to stay
I know that many people are angry about Governor Snyder making it clear he wants right to work laws despite the fact he lied and said he didn't. I understand and I stand with labor, but here's the...
View ArticleWhat They Really Want - Right to Rule not Right to Work
I enjoy this site even though I think I'm to the left of most of the people on the site. I've been reading Heinlein and musing on "Right to Work" that is about to rip my state in half and I think I've...
View ArticleA very personal diary but in light of DOMA it should be said
I know that this is an anonymous diary and coming out on it is probably strange to do, but after thinking about the possibility of DOMA reaching its way to the Supreme Court and given the ongoing...
View ArticleThe King is Overthrown - Letting Go of My Father
I always find ways to weave politics into my personal life, and today it happened again. I started reading some of President Obama's books, and I got to the part about his father. The President is...
View ArticleA pacifist on nationalism
This essay is super long, prepare yourself :)I've always been a pacifist since I was a teenager and I first got into history. I know pacifism gets a lot of play on this site, at least for a lot of...
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The Fall of American Rome - Welcome to Obama's America
First, you should read this surreal article from "New York" about conservative activists and "intelligentsia" (if such a word could be applied) on a cruise ship, lamenting the loss of America to the...
View ArticleOpen letter to Laura Hollis: This is why you lost
Dear Professor Hollis,I fear that the studies on authoritarians and right wingers, expertly done by Bob Altemeyer, has proven all too true: right wingers have a tendency towards having...
View ArticleHey, at least it's better than civil war
I know we've had dozens of diaries that fall into the "Obama rox!" and "Obama sux!" categories with a few people in between telling everyone to be realists. You can get your blood pressure up about...
View ArticleSome thoughts on education
I had a good debate with a friend of mine on standardized testing and teachers unions, and my own recent experience starting out as a fledgling teacher has gotten me thinking about a lot of different...
View ArticleTeaching a Genius or "I wish my teacher had done that for me..."
First off if you've been reading my diaries, then you already know that I'm a middle school teacher at a very small school. I teach four core subjects: Science, Math, Social Studies, and English. My...
View Article"Has it ever occured to you the private sector doesn't know what it's doing?"
Right now I'm working a second job at fast food wage slaver-o-rama, and there is one extreme right winger there who I have named "Dudley Do Right." He's libertarian, he just doesn't know it yet. He...
View ArticleI'm an evil pacifist who'll destroy Christmas
Yeap, I'm an evil pacifist. I am that crazy cousin that your family never talks about that goes on road trips and preaches nonviolence. I will destroy us all with my naivete and my unwillingness to...
View ArticleThe only person with their eye on the ball - Elizabeth Warren
The whole debate on taxes and spending is missing the point, but this country has lost one of the most basics tenets of capitalism that I think everyone of any part of the spectrum could agree on....
View ArticleFinding my Family - The Wall of 1870
So, I'm a sucker for free subscriptions. Ancestry.com offered a two week free subscription for genealogical research, and I totally fell for it. I try to avoid these whenever possible. I always give...
View ArticlePlease stop blaming the unemployed - Corporate has no idea
As always, this is a long one :)I have a friend who idolizes corporations. He gets starry eyed when he hears how many eggs McDonald's serves in a day, his heart flutters when he thinks about how much...
View ArticleIncome Inequality: We need to fight at the ground floor
As always, a long one.I watched Rachel's show last night and was disgusted by how far our country has sunk. We have wealth inequality that would make most 3rd world nations blush, and it's socially...
View ArticleThe Government is Telling Me How to Drive!
I am approaching my late twenties and I'm in an area now where driving is all but essential. As an atomistic individual, unattached to other human beings, existing in a void of personal...
View ArticleNation Building - Americans are not suited for it
There is a great diary here that talks about America's role as "nation builder" over the past decade. Liberals, leftists, and many on this site have considered nation building to have been a doomed...
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Everything wrong with this country happened this morning on my Facebook page.
I am a teacher. My main subjects are English and Math, but I have been complimented on my Science teaching. Teaching English and Math means that I weave from the creative to the logical, and back...
View ArticleOpen Letter to Veteran Zackary Dryer
Dear Mr. Dryer,Your article on your experiences during the Iraq War moved me to write. I am glad to see you taking the first steps in your new profession. Being a writer is a wonderful thing. I've...
View Article"If gay marriage is permissible then everything is permissible..." The Bible...
A friend of a friend is a rabid far right Catholic. I saw a screed of his on Facebook, complaining that Democrats in California were going to protect the rights of pedophiles to not have "their...
View ArticleProgressivism Wins - Fight the DLC Third Way
First off, let me say this. I don't like chained CPI (and yes I know what it is) any more than most Democrats do, but we need to remember it's not like Boehner can agree with Obama anyway. It cannot...
View ArticleLeaving out the ideologically inconvenient - Austerity Fail?
Austerity grips Europe and has been the heavy anchor the keeps the Democrats from being something other than a center right party. The idea that entitlements must be cut to "save them for future...
View ArticleFirst Experience Administering Standardized Test - Some thoughts
I'm an educator with only a few years experience, and most of it abroad, so today was my first day giving out and administering a standardized test. I thought I would collect my impressions and try to...
View ArticleOn single parent families, Conservatives cannot hide their idiocy
There's a lot of brouhaha about Eric Erickson and Megyn Kelly going at it about the statistic that the number of households headed by a single female is going up day by day. Eric Erickson's "science...
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The last time someone built a really big wall to keep unwanted people out...
The Great Wall of China, not so much visible from the moon, was the crown jewel of ancient Chinese government programs. The Great Wall was built, in theory, to protect China from incursions from the...
View ArticleIn Pain Today - Writing Helps
One of the things I do when I face emotions that are so painful I can't deal with them is to write. Writing clears my head and takes chaotic, emotional thoughts and condenses them into something of...
View ArticleMcDonald's makes the case for raising the minumum wage without realizing it
First off I've worked at the Golden Arches off and on since I was 15. I've been in situations where the check was my only income, and other situations where I just worked McDonald's to pay off some...
View Article"That's about right for unskilled labor." Unskilled? Really?
Let me give you a scenario. See if you can follow along.It's 8:45 p.m. on a Friday night. You're working at your local McDonald's and the after dinner rush is about to pull in. It comes in everyday...
View ArticleMedia Consciousness - Pope Francis and Seeing Things You Want to See
I get being religious. No! Really! I get it! I'm not religious at all. I wouldn't go so far to say that there is absolutely, proof positive, NO higher being of any kind. Highly unscientific....
View ArticleIs and Ought - Amateur Philosophy Hour and Gay Rights
I've hated philosophy since high school. My favorite subjects in high school were History and Mathematics. Those were the two subjects I felt you could truly "know" something about the real world. I...
View ArticleUkraine and the Future - Late Night Thoughts
First off I'd like to say that I'm not a mind reader, I'm not an Ukrainian/Russian scholar with 20 years of experience, and I'm not some ex-CIA/KGB agent. I'm just writing this diary to work through...
View ArticleCommon Core and Education Hysteria
As usual, this is a long diary, so get some warm cocoa. Much like the health care debate, the insanity over Common Core has become frustrating. When will people learn that if you don't do a slick...
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Teaching Evolution - How I stopped worrying and learned to love the Jesus
As usual a long post, but you have a chance to learn some cool science!I'm a middle school Science teacher. I teach 6-8th grade Science, namely Earth Science, Biology, and Physical Science in that...
View ArticleThis probably can't stay together
So I took a long hiatus from Daily Kos to tend to life, work, and generally enjoying my existence. I’ve am living and working in China, and it’s been a trip to see how our elections are being...
View ArticleAlternate Media Universe: Do not underestimate Cheetoh Jesus
Having talked to some Trump supporters, and generally speaking I live around some, I really hope that HRC, the DNC, and pretty much anyone else they’ve got in their camp do NOT get too complacent about...
View ArticleI worked for a man like Trump.
Several years ago I worked for a man who was just like Trump. Egotistical, selfish, but a smooth talker. Probably a bit of a sociopath. He owned a private school. He sold people on his class, his...
View ArticleMy conversation with an outsourcer
So for business trips sometimes I have to take jaunts to China. The plane ride is a long 15 hour slog, so it usually does me some good to strike up conversation with the folks in my aisle. The...
View ArticleThe world is watching, let's make it count.
I live and work in the PRC. Yes, it’s pretty much communist in name only, but China has gone through a huge set of transformations since the 1980’s. I teach English and History at a high school with...
View ArticleI phone banked for the first time today...
I have never done canvassing or phone banking, ever. In fact, I have to say the past few weeks have been harrowing, but I wanted to do something that would force me to do things I am not comfortable...
View ArticleCan we please dispense with nonsense?
Our number one aim is to defeat Trump in November. Resoundingly. I want Trump to get destroyed in the popular vote and to get utterly annihilated in the electoral college. I will do what is...
View ArticleNovember 2022
I share in ko’s enthusiasm when we read the polls and hear reports of Trump cratering. I am not one of those progressives that tells themselves to “Act like you’re 10 points down!” when my candidate is...
View ArticleCan we please act like we won?
We just won a major election, in a landslide. With each passing day they count more votes, and Biden’s vote count is almost at 80 million. We turned two red states into blue states on the presidential...
View ArticleParler is being downloaded - This is huge!
My friend who lurks Reddit posts messaged me in the middle of the night with this absolutely bombshell. I work in tech and someone on the internet has managed to crack into Parler and begin downloading...
View ArticleThe Perverse, Twisted Logic of Bill Maher
I stopped watching Maher awhile back. He was funny when I was younger, but then as the years dragged on it became clear he was another entitled narcissist. I watched a clip of Maher recently and it...
View ArticleGround View from a Michigan Millenial
The youth were responsible for the lack of a red wave last night, despite the gloom and doom of pundits and even from some Democrats! I wanted to write this diary to give the community a perspective of...
View ArticleTucker Carlson finally puts to rest the idea that Republicans know more about...
Tucker Carlson has a new suite of propaganda videos extolling the virtues of living in Russia and how it has “radicalized him against Western leaders.” His proof is that he walked into a grocery store...
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