The Political Voices of Women

Here is a guest post from my friend Cynthia Samuels at Don’t Gel Too Soon.

Have you seen this movie? I sat in bed watching it early Sunday morning on cable and was just blown away. It’s one of the saddest, scariest, most moving American documentaries I’ve seen in a long time. That’s no surprise, since it was directed by Barbara Kopple, who made Harlan County USA – the landmark documentary about coal mine union battles in Kentucky.

What happened to the Dixie Chicks is infuriating: performing in London just before the start of the Iraq war, lead singer Natalie Maines (married, by the way, to HEROES star Adrian Pasdar,) told the crowd “Just so you know, we’re ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas.” The scene is included in this preview.

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As I watched the film, seeing the rage and cruelty that emerged in the response to this one sentence, my first thought was, “Oh my God, what does this mean for Barak Obama?” The people who went after the Dixie chicks were nowhere near a sense of respect for the First Amendment – and sounded like they would be particularly vulnerable to “elitist” or racist accusations against a candidate. If you remember the exit polls in West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania you’ll recall that many respondents just about acknowledged that they would not vote for Senator Obama simply because of his race. Am I unfair to wonder if many of those people are the same ones booing and even threatening Maines’ life? Still “out there” in larger numbers than we wish? Look at these figures:

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This is a post by Sue at Nailing Jello To The Wall — Writer’s Strike At The Daily Kos

It is so tiring and stressful to read the Hillary Clinton-bashing that has been allowed to go on at so many if the big “progressive” liberal blogs, such as americablog, Huffington Post, and Daily Kos. I read the quotes taken out of context, the facts misrepresented, and rumors posted as fact, and I am torn between just clicking away and standing up for her. The problem is, if I post a comment that defends Hillary Clinton on any of those sites, I am assured of hateful, often disgusting replies. Sometimes directed at Clinton, sometimes at me. So I’ve pretty much just given up on those sites.

And that’s why I was so pleased to read this post from Alegre, a regular writer at Daily Kos.

I’ve been posting at DailyKos for nearly 4 years now and started writing diaries in support of Hillary Clinton back in June of last year. Over the past few months I’ve noticed that things have become progressively more abusive toward my candidate and her supporters.

I’ve put up with the abuse and anger because I’ve always believed in what our on-line community has tried to accomplish in this world. No more. DailyKos is not the site it once was thanks to the abusive nature of certain members of our community.

I’ve decided to go on “strike” and will refrain from posting here as long as the administrators allow the more disruptive members of our community to trash Hillary Clinton and distort her record without any fear of consequence or retribution. I will not be posting at DailyKos effective immediately. I will not help drive up traffic or page-hits as long as my candidate – a good and fine DEMOCRAT – is attacked in such a horrid and sexist manner not only by other diarists, but by several of those posting to the front page.

I have been checking in on those sites every once in a while, just to see what people are saying. But I have to say I agree with Alegre: I don’t want to have any part in driving up their traffic or giving them an audience.So, in addition to her writer’s strike, let’s have a reader’s strike, as well!

ALSO SEE:

Taylor Marsh Blog

and

Tennessee Guerilla Women

This is from Amy at Georgia Women Vote.

Should progressive bloggers refuse to speak ill of other Democrats? Yesterday, I spoke about blogging at the Georgia Federation of Democratic Women’s Spring Meeting. (It was, by the way a very well put together, well planned event thanks to people like Tina Simms, Kathy Bird and others. Great work, ladies.) Catherine Smith from Blog for Democracy was also there and chimed in with some helpful information. Toward the end of my remarks, Gail Buckner who served in the Georgia House and then was the Democratic nominee for Secretary of State stood and, in summary, expressed her concern about some things that were written about her on blogs during the last cycle, observed that she does not see conservative bloggers bashing Republicans (must not have been reading Peach Pundit lately) and opined-I am paraphrasing-that perhaps we should not speak ill of our own, and if we do, we should be sure that what we say is true.

Well, I certainly agree with the last part of her statement-that we shouldn’t write something unless we believe it’s true, but what about the rest?

READ FULL POST AT Georgia Women Vote

This is from a post at Bluedaze.   A Dark Day For The Bill of Rights

Tuesday, February 12, 2008, was a dark day in the United States Senate for the people and Constitution of the United States of America. The Senate passed a bill to enshrine permanently the disgraceful law enacted in August 2007 to expand the powers of the President to engage in electronic surveillance of private communications without judicial warrants; in effect, to legalize the illegal wiretapping program that the criminal Bushite administration first hid from the public, then admitted to in 2005 after being exposed.

Not only does the bill give the criminal president the power to perform actions for which he should have already been impeached and criminally prosecuted; not only does the bill trample on the Fourth Amendment of the Bill of the Rights of the U.S. Constitution; but also, it deprives citizens of due process of law in the courts by giving the giant telephone companies retroactive immunity for illegally wiretapping telephones and invading their customers’ privacy rights.  — You can read the full post by David Van Os here. 

This is from Pam at Pandagon. 

And you thought the Patriot Act and warrantless wiretapping was a big deal. Hah — look at what Uncle Peeping Sam wants from you now.

National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell is drawing up plans for cyberspace spying that would make the current debate on warrantless wiretaps look like a “walk in the park,” according to an interview published in the New Yorker’s print edition today.

READ FULL POST AT PANDAGON

image from

Here is a guest post from Nailing Jello to the Wall.

I must have missed this story in all the pre-Christmas hoopla. Everyone else must have missed it, too, because otherwise I would think (that is, I would hope) that it would get more press than just a couple of paragraphs.

From The Ledger:

DAYTONA BEACH | A police officer used a stun gun to zap a yoga instructor who yelled at her in a crowded department store, drawing questions about the non-lethal weapon’s use.

Elizabeth Beeland, 35, went to a Daytona Beach Best Buy on Nov. 26 to purchase a CD player for her father. Her lawyer said she stepped outside the store when she received an emergency call about her daughter, leaving her credit card behind.

A store clerk suspected Beeland was using a stolen card and called over Daytona Beach Police Officer Claudia Wright, who was at the store.

When Wright approached Beeland, she became “verbally profane, abusive, loud and irate,” Wright reported.

In a video posted on the Daytona Beach News-Journal Web site, Beeland is seen backing away and avoiding Wright before crumpling to the floor after being hit with the Taser’s 50,000 volts.

She was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct and resisting a police officer without violence.

The “Don’t taze me bro” story from earlier this year got lots and lots of attention and outrage at the time. Unfortunately we were all subjected to repeated showings of the young man badgering John Kerry at the Florida speech, and I guess eventually we all thought, well, he was getting kinda obnoxious. After watching the video over and over again, well, tasing started to seem almost reasonable. I at least wanted to flick him in the forehead.

But here we have a woman who’s in the pre-Christmas shopping nightmare that is Best Buy, and she mouths off to a security guard. And that’s enough to get her tased?! Good lord almighty! What’s next — Customer Service will have a handy taser behind the counter for when customers get upset about an expired 30 day warranty?

I emphasized the final sentence in the news story because this is where your civil rights just gasped their last sigh: She was not violent, yet she was tased. The arresting officer said the woman was “verbally profane, abusive, loud and irate.”

Sister, I taught six years of middle school. Do you know how many hundreds of students I would have tased if that were the benchmark? There was a time in this country when we were allowed to be an irate customer. Have we become so afraid of the terrorist shadow that even that little slice of our lives has been taken away?

I, for one, plan to continue to be an irate customer when warranted. But I guess I’d better invest in one of those t-shirts: “Don’t tase me, bro!” for whenever I hit the mall.

This is a guest post by Marianna at Life In These United States.

Responsibility of Free Speech

“As a matter of constitutional tradition, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, we presume that governmental regulation of the content of speech is more likely to interfere with the free exchange of ideas than to encourage it. The interest in encouraging freedom of expression in a democratic society outweighs any theoretical but unproven benefit of censorship.” – Justice John Paul Stevens, writing for the majority

I was reading a post by Saudi Jeans regarding the dilemma of a Saudi man, Fouad Al Farhan, a leading Saudi blogger who faces jail time….due to comments made in a blog. I find this disturbing. I fail to see why such a man should be punished for this kind of thing.

Perhaps his comments are a threat to the Saudi elite and the “good order” and “discipline” of that country? Makes me wonder.

Makes me appreciate my own rights to free speech.

I think we Americans can sometimes take for granted our ability to express ourselves. Now, with this freedom comes responsibility. We cannot incite violence (makes sense) or voice extremist concerns to overthrowing the government. Of courseWe can let it be known our displeasure regarding the current administration…that is our God given right.

We shouldn’t be a bull in the china shop so to speak when it comes to being able to express ourselves. Tact, maturity and reason should be taken into consideration. There will always be dissenters, buffoons, terrorists who equate freedom of speech with irresponsible behavior. A civil society has boundaries…finding that balance to being civil and being censored is the key.

This is from a post at Chronicles of Dissent.

Arlen Specter’s “Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Substitution Act of 2007″ (S. 2402) is a dangerous piece of proposed legislation because his bill aligns Congress, the White House, and the telecoms against the citizenry. Indeed, his bill would be more properly named the “Telecoms Shield Act of 2007″ or the “Substituting Our Judgment for the Courts Act of 2007″ because what it would do is dictate who we may or may not sue and what the courts must do if some conditions are met.

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This is from a post by Kirsten Anderson at the Huffingont Post.

Dennis Kucinich wants to save the Constitution, and he believes you can help.

On Manhattan’s west side, on the fourth floor of a nondescript building, Dennis Kucinich got the chance to talk for an extended period of time and answer questions on topics that he, or the audience, deemed important. In other words, he did what he usually doesn’t get to do at debates. . . .

It’s easy for other candidates, media, and casual observers to call Dennis Kucinich crazy, just as they do with Ron Paul. But Kucinich isn’t crazy—you may not agree with him, but he’s a lucid speaker, who knows his material and has specific ideas and plans that don’t involve aliens, horoscopes, or talking cats. He’s obviously read the Congressional bills referred to in the questions, which is something that probably not every member of Congress can claim to have done. He could deflect the more extreme questioners without insulting them. He quoted Shelley and Tennyson (the man obviously knows his romantic poets–is that how he landed the wife?).

READ THIS FULL POST HERE

This is a post from theGarance.

The outrage that people are expressing over the presence of questioners with campaign affiliations during the Republican CNN-YouTube debate is depressing.

Where has everyone been over the last four years? The idea that average everyday citizens would be able to submit questions to a national political forum without having to compete with the more sharply-worded and compelling products of people with a stake in the outcome of the contests in question goes against everything we’ve learned over the last four years about who is engaged with online media, and even who participated in sending in questions to the earlier CNN-YouTube debate.

READ MORE FROM theGarance