I’ll see you in Chicago.
Video
An Interview With Chris Hedges
On a new series from The Real News called Reality Asserts Itself with Paul Jay, Chris Hedges observes that although the liberal elite continues to speak in the “feel-your-pain” language of traditional liberalism, they’ve completely betrayed the very people that they purport to represent and defend.
I would urge you to watch the entire series.
Reality Asserts Itself – Chris Hedges
Glenn Greenwald on the NSA Story
Glenn Greenwald appeared on Morning Joe to discuss recent revelations concerning the NSA’s surveillance programs. I would urge you to watch the first 17 minutes.
You can see the full interview with Edward Snowden on the Guardian Website.
A Bitcoin Primer
Here’s three minutes worth watching. It’s a simple, yet thorough, introduction to the decentralized digital currency known as Bitcoin – from Duncan Elms and Marc Fennell.
With a Single Voice Like Thunder
Here’s another brilliant and inspiring song from Matthew Grimm.
“If your enemies are firefighters, teachers and nurses, your enemy is everyone.”
America, the Nurses Have Your Back
Support the Financial Transactions Tax. Learn more at NursesHealAmerica.org.
Video: Complete SXSW Tom Morello Set
In this hour-long set from Rolling Stone’s Rock Room day party, Tom Morello burns through a string of modern protest songs. His headlining gig at the Occupy SXSW showcase had been busted up by cops the night before.
The Crisis of Civilization
The Crisis of Civilization is a documentary about the end of the Industrial Age based on the book by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed. Director Dean Puckett and Animator Lucca Benney remix, interweave and otherwise mashup clips and images from far and wide to illustrate Ahmed’s narration.
The film provides compelling evidence that the many crises facing us in our day are all interrelated manifestations of a single failing global system. The question is not whether there should be dramatic changes to our way of life. For better or worse, change is already upon us. The question is whether we can find a way to sustain human life and liberty in the coming age.
Our days of denial are coming to a close.
JFK Speech to the Houston Ministers
On September 12th, 1960, Presidential candidate John F. Kennedy addressed a group of Protestant ministers at the Rice Hotel in Houston, Texas. Many Protestants in the United States (particularly in the South) had expressed concern that a Roman Catholic President would be a mere puppet of the Vatican. Senator Kennedy went into the lions’ den to address the issue directly.
Here is a short excerpt.
I believe in an America where religious intolerance will someday end – where all men and all churches are treated as equal – where every man has the same right to attend or not attend the church of his choice – where there is no Catholic vote, no anti-Catholic vote, no bloc voting of any kind – and where Catholics, Protestants and Jews, at both the lay and pastoral level, will refrain from those attitudes of disdain and division which have so often marred their works in the past, and promote instead the American ideal of brotherhood.
That is the kind of America in which I believe. And it represents the kind of Presidency in which I believe – a great office that must neither be humbled by making it the instrument of any one religious group nor tarnished by arbitrarily withholding its occupancy from the members of any one religious group. I believe in a President whose religious views are his own private affair, neither imposed by him upon the nation or imposed by the nation upon him as a condition to holding that office.
This speech is getting some attention once again in the 2012 Presidential campaign, as Republican contender Rick Santorum (also a Catholic) has condemned the sentiment in some very strong terms.
Thank you, Rick, but I hold with JFK.
You can watch a video of the entire speech at the following link.
Address of Senator John F. Kennedy to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association, September 12, 1960. [John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum]