Kiki and Bubu! Austrian art collective monochrom presents the adventures of two sock puppets. Part One: Kiki and Bubu and The Shift. "Bubu wants to know why his dad is busy all the time. And Kiki explains him why... because of the neoliberal shift." Part Two: Kiki and Bubu and The Privilege. "Bubu ran into a bunch of liberals and they gave him a book. They said if he doesn't read it, they're going to beat him up. But Bubu can't read! And so Kiki helps..." [Via BB]
posted on Jun 7, 2008 - View this thread

David Mamet: Why I am no longer a 'Brain Dead Liberal'. "The right is mooing about faith, the left is mooing about change, and many are incensed about the fools on the other side—but, at the end of the day, they are the same folks we meet at the water cooler. Happy election season."
posted on Mar 12, 2008 - View this thread

And we're off! Prime Minister John Howard has set the date for the Australian Federal election as November 24th, meaning we're up for a long six-week campaign. With Kevin Rudd leading the PM by between 16 to 18 points (depending on who you read) in recent opinion polls, this election seems the most likely to provide a change of Government since Howard was first elected 11 years ago. Antony Green's usual excellent election guide is up and running here, along with an excellent calculator which shows which seats are up for grabs dependent on a 2 party preferred swing. You might also want to check out the Vote-O-Matic, a fun but entirely disposable quiz which aims to help you decide who you'll vote for.
posted on Oct 13, 2007 - View this thread

Government is good. An unapologetic defense of a vital institution.
posted on Oct 9, 2007 - View this thread

The Trap. Are you a young, college educated liberal who can't afford health care or a place to live? In his new book, Daniel Brook says you are getting screwed by being forced to choose between a job that you would actually like or selling out so you can have a middle class lifestyle.
posted on Sep 29, 2007 - View this thread

Bill O'Reilly got word that Jet Blue was sponsoring the YearlyKos convention. He sent a camera crew to confront the CEO of JetBlue, asking why they were supporting radicals. He has spent the week comparing DailyKos to the KKK and Nazi websites. He spent the majority of his radio and TV shows discussing this "hate" site. He said the right-wing equivalent of Kos was Fred Phelps. Jetblue caved and apologized. Has someone ever misunderstood a website this bad?
posted on Jul 20, 2007 - View this thread

South Park Refugees. "The G.O.P. used to have a sizable libertarian bloc, but I couldn't see any sign of it at the conference. Stone and Parker said they were rooting for Hillary Clinton in 2008 simply because it would be weird to have her as president. The prevailing sentiment among the rest of the libertarians was that the best outcome this November would be a Democratic majority in the House, because then at least there'd be gridlock."
posted on Sep 1, 2006 - View this thread

Is Canada ready for a gay prime minister? How about a hockey player? Or a former Harvard professor? After Paul Martin flamed out and took the Liberal Party with him, the Liberals have to choose a new party leader in December from a rather eccentric list of candidates. Place your bets, eh?
posted on Aug 30, 2006 - View this thread

$1,000 CDN ($880.80 US) reward for exposing anonymous blogger: A Prince Edward Island business owner wants to punish a person by breaking their anonymity. According to the CBC, the targets are PEI Liberal Party (peiliberal.blogspot.com) and The Guardian (theguardianpeca.blogspot.com). More info: Don't Sue
posted on Apr 23, 2006 - View this thread

"Why Jon Stewart Isn't Funny" (Boston Globe) In an op-ed in the Boston Globe, Michael Kalin, a "2005 Harvard College graduate" isn't predicting that Stewart will bomb on Sunday night's Oscar show. Instead, "Stewart's ever-increasing popularity among young viewers directly correlates with the declining influence of progressive thought in America. Coincidence? I think not." He blames Jon Stewart for turning tomorrow's leader away from potential careers in politics. His evidence, "Meet Joshua Goldberg, a fictional composite of the typical apostle of 'The Daily Show" who goes to work on Wall Street instead of pursuing a job in inner-city teaching like Kalin did, as he told CBS. "Although Stewart's comedic shticks [sic] may thus earn him some laughs Sunday at the Oscars, his routine will certainly not match the impact of his greatest irony: Jon Stewart undermines any remaining earnestness that liberals in America might still possess." This left me speechless. In my personal experience, Jon Stewart has dramatically increased my own children's interest in politics.
posted on Mar 3, 2006 - View this thread

Ignatieff for Canada. The Liberals just lost a non-confidence vote and elections are set for January. In Etobicoke, Ontario, Michael Ignatieff, Harvard Professor of Human Rights and Author is set to run. Will this be the opening moves of a new intellectual Prime Minister? How will his views on humanitarian intervention and the idea of a lesser evil play out?
posted on Nov 28, 2005 - View this thread

Help! Mom! There are Liberals Under My Bed! (54 pp., illustrated, "The story of two boys who dream about opening a lemonade stand when a strange thing happens...") Don't miss the excerpt [pdf] and the "cast of 'characters'" links on the left. Feel free to skip the author's note. (via.)
posted on Aug 25, 2005 - View this thread

Horse trading North of the border. With the vote of non-confidence looming today, Canada may find itself facing another election this summer. Today's vote is result of the Liberal's weak position and the still continuing Gomery commission - charged with investigating the Liberal Party's sponsorship scandal. This last month, every action coming out of the PMO has been seen as being inherently realpolitik. With each side being close to holding the crucial 150 odd votes needed, this week's defection of Belinda Stronach has also caused broken hearts, harsh criticisms and created a hero. Canadian politics hasn't been this exciting since it saw the fall of one of Canada's youngest pm. What will happen this afternoon is anyone's guess.
posted on May 18, 2005 - View this thread

What's the matter with Liberals? An article by Thomas Frank, author of What's the Matter With Kansas, and previously linked here. Well researched, and worth arguing over. via MoFi
posted on May 5, 2005 - View this thread

Looks like a minority liberal government for Canada. The entire process will have been completed in a single day. The voters used pencils to mark X's on paper ballots, which were stuffed into ballot boxes then counted by hand. Despite the differences in population, is there a lesson here for our southern neighbours?
posted on Jun 28, 2004 - View this thread

George Lakoff writes in his book Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think that the book began with a conversation about a single question that might be used to tell liberals from conservatives. His friend offered the question: "If your baby cries at night, do you pick him up?" Is there a basic belief that underlies all conservative and liberal positions? Lakoff's answer, that our politics are connected to how we view family, is summarized in this interview. Is he right? What about you, what makes you a conservative or a liberal?
posted on Mar 29, 2004 - View this thread

Move Over, Right Wing Radio - the Liberals Are Coming. "The handwriting is on the wall for right-wing talk radio: To build profits, programmers must reach beyond diehard Republicans to unserved listeners."
posted on May 20, 2003 - View this thread

"You rats! You stinking rats who hide in the sewers! You think you can go after my income? You think you can kill my advertisers? You think I'm Dr. Laura? You think I'm gonna roll over like a pussy?..."
Thus did MSNBC's newest hire, Michael Savage, react to the information that GLAAD is meeting with the head of programming to protest his hiring. What's more, he feels the Bush administration owes him an investigation of GLAAD and any other group that protests his hiring, because "I have millions of people who vote. Mr. Bush wants to get re-elected, and just consider me a politician at that point. I'm going to ask for a trade in favor. If they keep it up, my favor is going to be I want these groups investigated."
Some of Michael Savage's comments regarding America, homosexuals, and the state of the country can be read or listened to here or at his Paul Revere Society site linked above.
posted on Mar 3, 2003 - View this thread

Canadian Liberals Discover Cost/Benefit Analysis
posted on Dec 4, 2002 - View this thread

Sweden bucks the trend. In a heated election yesterday, Swedish voters ended the European left's losing streak. Despite having the highest taxes in the industrialized world, Swedish voters rebuffed the tax-cutting, center-right parties that proved so successful in Denmark, Austria, Italy, Portugal, France and Holland. With Germany's Socialists suddenly ahead in the polls, and the implosion of Austria's far-right Freedom Party, is the center-right revolution in Europe out of gas?
posted on Sep 16, 2002 - View this thread

The problem with America's colleges - Are schools of higher education too liberal minded?
posted on Sep 9, 2002 - View this thread

Why Are Left-Wing Brits Like Hitchens, Amis And Rushdie Supporting President Bush? In this terrific article, The New Statesman's John Lloyd dares to pose the question. To which I would add my own: so far as the campaign against terrorism is concerned, isn't the standard Right/Left dichotomy becoming an increasingly American thang? [Please look inside Ty Webb's "Axis of Evil" post for an interesting discussion on the Hitchens/Bush (dis)connection]
posted on Mar 11, 2002 - View this thread

Evangelist Franklin Graham, stands by his statements that Islam is "wicked, violent".

"It wasn't Methodists flying into those buildings, it wasn't Lutherans," Graham told NBC. "It was an attack on this country by people of the Islamic faith."

Is it strange that the son of the popular and eloquent Billy Graham hasn’t come under much fire for his anti-Islamic statements while the goofy duo of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell are still being roasted for their own inflammatory 9.11 statements against liberals and gays?
posted on Nov 19, 2001 - View this thread

Limp Liberals - Aintchasickovem? A really fine left liberal answer to Berkely and all the faint hearts. And it fits right in with my own thinking. It's time we stood up and got counted for human rights against any "culture" or "religion" that denies them. Polly Tonybee writes an excellent and timely piece. Liberals too, should not "go wobbly" out of a plain cowardly "respect" for reactionary strains of Islam, Christianity or Judaism. What do you think?
posted on Oct 10, 2001 - View this thread

"I have no hesitation in describing this mentality, carefully and without heat, as soft on crime and soft on fascism. No political coalition is possible with such people and, I’m thankful to say, no political coalition with them is now necessary. It no longer matters what they think." Christopher Hitchens says that intellectuals of the left who seek to understand the new enemy are no friends of peace, democracy or human life. Two different versions of the same article here and here. Along the same lines, a piece from The Economist arguing that "Whatever its mistakes, the idea that America brought the onslaught upon itself is absurd."
posted on Oct 2, 2001 - View this thread

Rev. Jerry Fallwell, Pat Robertson, f*cking lunatics.

'gays, feminists, "pagans," and a host of liberal advocacy groups have made "God mad" and must share the blame for the terrorist attacks'

posted on Sep 14, 2001 - View this thread

A glimpse into the "Ivory Tower" - The online community at Swarthmore College is abuzz with reflections, debates, insults and demands for revenge prompted by the recent tragedies. After being physically threatened by a member of my college community after commenting that I thought that the Netherlands was a more "free" nation than the US, I've stopped going to the site myself; however, a look at the forum may demonstrate that such reactionary thought isn't limited to "middle America" or the "unenlightened," as some intellectual snobs/idealists seem to think. (Swarthmore was tied with Amherst as the number one liberal arts college in the country according to U.S. World and News Report.)
posted on Sep 13, 2001 - View this thread

Democrats: Al Gore lost because he was a raving lefty. *sigh* I guess the dems will run an even more conservative candidate next time. At least they've stopped blaming Ralph Nader.
posted on Jan 24, 2001 - View this thread

"Who on Earth actually listens to what [Michael] Moore says?," Nicholas Confessore asks in the current American Prospect. "You might as well blame the Republican Party for some nut's post on FreeRepublic.com."
posted on Jan 6, 2001 - View this thread