The Daily Beast: Lawrence Gelb: GOP Hates Barack Obama More Than a Nuclear Iran

Posted on March 11, 2015 by Derik Schneider

The Daily Beast

Even through Senate Leader Mitch McConnell is the strongest and most powerful Republican in Congress and that includes the Speaker of the House John Boehner, who outranks him in the U.S. Constitution, being a stronger leader than John Boehner is not much of an accomplishment. And even though Leader McConnell is effective at bringing Senate Republicans and Democrats together to resolve some crisis that Republicans generally in the House caused, he doesn’t control the caucus in the sense that he can prevent one of his radicals from making a dumb and irresponsible move. Like telling Iran that Barack Obama shouldn’t be trusted, to use as an example.

Hate is a very strong word and probably the harshest word short of calling someone a mass-murderer or something like that. So it’s not a word I throw around and only use when I mean it to describe how someone feels about someone else. And I’m not a mind-reader obviously. I’m also not God or George Washington, incase that isn’t obvious enough either, but just going off the available evidence at hand I don’t know how else to describe how at least a large faction of Congressional Republicans, including all forty-seven Republican Senators who signed this letter to Iran and how they feel about President Obama. Other than Mitch McConnell himself, because he and the President seem to actually be able to get along.

There use to be this tradition in Washington that you fight the other side or team all day and then shake hands and work out a deal and perhaps even have a drink with at the end of the day. But you treat your opponents as exactly that and not as enemies, which is different. You hate your enemies, but we’ve all had opponents at some point in life that we actually like. And perhaps became friends after we started competing against each other. But with a strong faction at least in the House of Representatives, you would think Barack Obama plays for the enemy. Meaning the terrorists that would like to attack America and authoritarian regimes that would attack Americans if they felt it was in their interest. And based on this Congressional letter from the forty-seven Republican Senators, they seem to believe the same thing.

There great reasons why President Obama is not asking for Congress to weigh in on a final agreement with Iran when it comes to Iran’s nuclear program.

For one, this is not a treaty.

Two, Congress will get to weigh in later not on Iran’s nuclear program, but whether economic sanctions on Iran will be loosened or ended based on the Islamic Republic’s behavior. Which is something that Congress gets to do anyway when it comes to sanctions and something the President needs Congressional approval for.

Three, a political reason, but just important as the others. Congressional Republicans won’t support any agreement with Iran that is anything short of surrender on Iran’s part. Which means Iran completely gives up their nuclear program, or there’s no deal. But the whole point of compromise and negotiation is that neither side gets everything that they want.

These Senate Republicans know that the Obama Administration knows that they meaning these forty-seven Senators won’t support any deal that is anything short of complete surrender on Iran’s part. And Senate Republicans also know they can’t stop the President from negotiating with Iran. So what they’re trying to do, which to me is at least borderline treason is to tell the Iranian Government that they not only don’t trust Barack Obama, but they don’t like him if not hate him. “And neither should you” meaning Iran, “because this guy can’t be trusted.” And it violates all forms of proper protocol and how Democrats and Republicans are supposed to relate with each other.

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The American Mind: Charles Kesler & Francis Fukuyama: The Meaning of Life

Posted on March 11, 2015 by Rik Schneider

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There’s an obvious reason why people from at best developing countries, but in some cases come from countries where the economy is barely moving at all and come to America or Canada and Europe to a certain extent, but generally America. Because they want a quality life for themselves and their kids if they have any. They are looking to escape poverty or authoritarianism and in come cases both. And live in freedom and have the opportunity to build good lives for themselves and their children. Which I think is one of the points that Frank Fukuyama was making here.

You don’t many people emigrating from free developed countries, to move to some place where they won’t be able to find a job. Or if can get a job it would be less than what a minimum wage worker would work for in America. Or because they are trying to escape freedom of speech and assembly, or believe they have too much privacy. They in a lot of cases are tying to escape countries where they don’t have those things at all, like in the Middle East to be able to live in a country where they can have basic levels of freedom and human rights at least. And the opportunity to build a good life for themselves.

That is a big reason why America has ten-fifteen-million illegal immigrants in America and why we take in somewhere around a million new legal immigrants each year. Because there are so many people around world and not just in Latin America, but Africa, Middle East, Asia and yes still Europe, people who want to move to America to build good lives for themselves and their families. They aren’t looking escape freedom and a middle class way of life to live in poverty and under a superstate that is going to try to manage their own affairs for them. But to live in a country where they can do those things for themselves.

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The New Democrat Coalition: U.S. Representative Ron Kind: The American Prosperity Agenda

Posted on March 11, 2015 by Erik Schneider

Source:The New Democrat Coalition

There’s a faction in the Democratic Party that I’m and this blog is part of that I believe at least represents most of America. We represent most Americans because we believe in things that tend to unite us as a country. The New Democrat Coalition and most of the Democrats that make it to the leadership of the party in and out of Congress and who tend to get elected President of the United States. Including the current President who has New Democrat leanings at least, tend to be New Democrats as well.

Americans tend to believe in both economic and personal freedom. We like to keep most of the money we make ourselves in order to take care of ourselves and our families. We don’t want big government or any other government to manage our economic affairs for us, or even try to. Which makes us very different from Europe especially Scandinavia, at least from that perspective. And we don’t want big government in our homes and personal lives in general. Snooping on innocent Americans and telling us what we can do in the privacy of our own homes, short of hurting innocent people. This is where a majority of Americans tend to be.

Now people who say that Americans who believe in a high degree of both economic and personal freedom and economic freedom, must be Libertarians. Especially people who tend to be very far to the Right or Left and aren’t fans of either personal or economic freedom, or at least one of them. And some on the Far-Left in America aren’t fans of personal freedom either and believe in the nanny state to prevent Americans from making unhealthy decisions with their own lives. But Americans tend to want both and don’t want big government managing their economic or personal affairs, but aren’t anti-government. And don’t want government to shut down or do practically nothing.

Americans tend to individualistic and want freedom. New Democrats what all Americans to have that individualism and freedom. So those things aren’t based on who your parents are and their income levels. But what you’re able to contribute to society and how hard you’ll work to achieve freedom for yourself. New Democrats believe in these things and what we believe the role of government is to make sure that all Americans have that opportunity to obtain freedom for themselves. But also for their children as well.

And that means we need things like a modern infrastructure system.

A public education system that works for everyone that is part of it.

Tax reform that encourages more economic development and not less.

An energy policy that takes advantage of all of our natural resources and not just oil and gas, but all of them.

An immigration system that encourages people who want to work and be productive and who have skills to offer America to come here. And that brings undocumented immigrants who are only guilty of being undocumented to come out of the shadows and pay for being here illegally, but allow for them to stay in America and contribute.

These are the things that New Democrats believe in and if I had to guess things that most Democrats believe in. And for the Democratic Party to be the majority party in Congress again, especially in the House that has so many swing districts and areas, more of us are going to have to get elected to the House of Representatives. And run for the Senate in states where neither party has an overwhelming advantage. And doesn’t like big government from either fringe.

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The Nation: Richard Kreitner- ‘FDR Signs The Emergency Act, Launching The New Deal: March 9, 1933’

Posted on March 10, 2015 by Derik Schneider

March 9, 1933_ FDR Signs the Emergency Banking Act, Launching the New Deal

Source:The Nation– 1930s America.

“Today in 1933 the newly inaugurated President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Emergency Banking Act, officially launching the New Deal. The act allowed the Federal Reserve to guarantee the assets of banks that Roosevelt had ordered closed a few days earlier. In its issue of March 22, 1933, The Nation ran the following front-page editorial note approving of the first two weeks of the Roosevelt presidency.
If you think President Barack Obama had it tough when he became President of the United States back in 2009, imagine being President Franklin Roosevelt when he became President in 1933. A country where the economy is literally in free fall. The economy shrinking at ten-percent or thereabouts, twenty or thirty-percent unemployment and about that or more people living in poverty. Without a functioning public safety net to help people who are going through these harsh realities. But that is what President Roosevelt inherited from Herbert Hoover and I’m sure people close to FDR were asking or at least thinking, “President Roosevelt, are you sure you still want to be President?”

From The Nation

Within the first two-years a lot of the New Deal was already passed and I’m sure that had some positive effect towards the Depression, like putting money directly in people’s pockets who perhaps otherwise wouldn’t of had it. But the new infrastructure investment and the public works projects was where the real improvement in the economy started happening in the 1930s. Because those projects literally put people back to work with good jobs repairing and building the country.

But to be completely accurate, it isn’t until the 1940s with World War II when the economy starts to completely climb out of the Depression and we start to see income and unemployment levels start to look like they were pre-Great Depression.

What the New Deal was and still is was the creation of the public safety net in America. We are still not like Europe and I imagine never will be as far as what the central government provides to the people as far as taxpayer-funded social insurance programs. But we’ll always have a public social insurance system, at least as long as we need it for people who truly need it. And have been knocked off their feet economically and need help getting back up. Which is where we should be as a modern liberal society that helps people in need, but also helps them help themselves so they can live in freedom. And not have to be taken care of indefinitely because they can take care of themselves.

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U.S. News: Peter Fenn: ‘The Rapid Radicalization of the Republican Party’

Posted on March 10, 2015 by Rik Schneider

Jim Jordan

Source:U.S. News– U.S. Representative Jim Jordan (Republican, Ohio) one of the members of the Tea Party Caucus, in the House of Representatives.

“This is a blog, not a history lesson. But I can’t resist trying to make some sense of the current Republican desire for self-immolation.

Where has this so-called “Hell No Caucus” come from? Whether it is refusing to pass bills to fund the government, approve increases in the debt ceiling or provide money for the Department of Homeland Security, the Republican Party has an increasingly apparent and growing antagonism to pragmatic solutions. It has drifted so far right that it is truly in danger of self-destruction. As New York Republican Rep. Peter King, put it on ABC’s “This Week,” “[T]here’s a wing within the Congress which is absolutely irresponsible – they have no concept of reality.” Speaking with MSNBC’s Luke Russert on Friday, he added, “I’ve had it with this self-righteous, delusional wing of the party.”

Source:U.S. News

If it wasn’t for the fact that John Boehner had a choice in whether or not to run for House Minority Leader back in late 2006 after Congressional Democrats won back the House and Senate and then later run for Speaker of the House in 2010 after House Republicans won back the House, I would probably feel sorry for the man. Because he’s the head, but not leading a caucus of Republicans that doesn’t believe in governing. They believe in their principles and their tactics and their ideas and anything less than that is worse than actually governing and moving the ball forward on whatever the issue is at the time.

The House Republican Conference, which is what House Republicans call their team in the House, Democrats call their team the Democratic Caucus, but the HRC especially its Tea Party and Republican Study Committee are the main reasons why Congress doesn’t work. Not the only reasons, plenty of issues over in the Senate especially in previous Congress’s, where Senate Democrats would bring their own bills to the floor that generally wouldn’t even go though committee and Leader Harry Reid would bring them to the floor and not allow amendments. At least not any Republican amendments because Leader Reid didn’t want his members vote on things that could hurt them in their reelection campaigns. And as a result Senate Republicans led by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell would simply block from consideration anything that Senate Democrats would try to pass themselves.

But House Republicans would say they passed all of these bills over in the House and say they did their jobs. Not mentioning that most of the legislation they passed was passed with mostly Republican votes without any Democratic input and would even lose several of their own members on their bills. And a lot of the stuff they would pass like having to do with the Affordable Care Act and cutting benefits there to pass other things wouldn’t even get a vote in the Senate because Senate Democrats would view it as unacceptable. And all these crisis’ would develop because House Republicans would pass their own bills and think everything they did was all the work they needed to do. And when the crisis is broken in the Senate thanks to Harry Reid and Mitch McConnell with a compromise from both sides, they would pass it and send it back to the House and House Republicans would say, “hell no!” Because it isn’t their bill.

The 2011 debt ceiling crisis where House Republicans attached an ObamaCare rider to the debt ceiling increase is a perfect example of that. The so-called fiscal cliff in 2012-13 where House Republicans wouldn’t accept any tax cut extension that had any increases on the top tax rate, even if the bill extends tax cuts for everyone else in the country. They would’ve rather have seen tax cuts expire on everyone, than to see tax rates on the top go up. Then go up to the government shut down in the fall of 2013 where the government is shut down for a month. Because House Republicans wouldn’t pass a budget and the appropriations unless the Affordable Care Act was repealed. And the last almost government shutdown involving Homeland Security, where House Republicans attached an immigration rider involving President Obama’s executive order on immigration.

The Tea Party Caucus or the Republican Study Committee there, looks like to me anyway the audience of right-wing if not Far-Right talk radio in America and the publications and blogs that they follow. These people don’t believe in governing or government. At least not divided government, which means if they don’t get their way all the way all the time, nobody gets anything. And as a result some crisis gets created because this group in the House won’t compromise. Which is how divided government works. You can say this all started the day that Barack Obama became President of the United States, a man this group and their followers I’m sure hates for obvious reasons, which I won’t get into. But they gave President George W. Bush headaches over things like immigration and education reform as well.

One might say that these Republicans would be better and more responsible if they had a united government. Republican President, with a Republican Congress both House and Senate. But as the early days of this new Republican Congress has started, controlling both the House and Senate instead of just the House hasn’t improved their ability to even pass basic bills that government has to have in order to function. Like Homeland Security and later we’ll see if House and Senate Republicans can come together and pass a federal budget on their own. Because House and Senate Democrats won’t work with them on that, if the Republican Leadership doesn’t work with them. Meaning both sides work together and pass a united budget, instead of one side agreeing to pass the other’s budget. Give Republicans the whole government and they’ll just fight among themselves. Creating a hell for a mainstream Republican President.

You can also see this post at The FreeState, on Blogger.

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AP Archive: Angela Davis- Radical on Trial

Posted on March 8, 2015 by Derik Schneider

img_0479Source:AP Archive

Angela Davis should’ve never have been in jail, at least for what she was charged with here. Which was being involved in a Marin County court-house shootout in 1970. They had nothing on her other than the fact that she was legally involved and helping people who were accused in the case, like George Jackson. This was about the California establishment trying to take down a women that they were terrified of. Because she was fighting against racism, the prison industrial complex and wanted a different type of government and economic system. That was different from America’s liberal democratic capitalist system.

And to show you that California had nothing on Professor Davis, just look at the fact that she was found innocent. Even though I doubt she had the personal resources that she would’ve needed to defend herself. But had such a large following and different groups that wanted to help her, she was able to get the defense that she needed and deserved. I’m not a Socialist or Communist obviously. Just read this blog on a regular basis if you’re still not convinced. But I wish there were more Angela Davis’s today regardless of race or gender. People who are willing to take on the prison industrial complex that benefits so many wealthy people and business’s at the expense of everyone else. And will risk their freedom to fight the system.

California didn’t try to put Angela Davis away because she was a criminal, terrorist or did any other illegal activities. They tried to put her away because of her political views and what she was fighting for. Which was a different type of government and economic system for America. Which I would’ve opposed her on, but she has every right as a an American to advocate for it. As well as fighting against the prison industrial complex that puts non-violent offenders away for long periods of time. For committing minor offenses mostly on the so-called War on Drugs and things like shoplifting. It was fascists in California that tried to put Angela away simply because of her political views.

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Michaels Backporch: NBC Nightly News- Charles Manson Family Trial (1970-71)

Posted on March 8, 2015 by Ederik Schneider

Charles Manson Raw Trial _Stock News Footage Tate LaBianca MurdersSource:Michaels Backporch– The Manson Family learning about the Los Angeles justice system.

You can also see this post at Real Life Journal, on Blogger.

You can also see this post at FreeState Now, on Blogger.

“Description: Raw Footage Charles Manson Family trial 1970-71 NBC news footage. Charles Manson Raw Trial Footage NBC Tate LaBianca Murders.”

From Michaels Backporch

I couldn’t dream up a stranger trial then the Manson Family trial of the 1970s. It’s not just that you had so-called Hippies involved, but criminal hippie, dope addicts who were kicked out of their parents homes or were runaways, who were looking for a leader and got the worst leader imaginable in Charles Manson.

What California or I guess Los Angeles County had against Charles Manson was the facts. And an army of witness’s that could back up the facts. Including Manson’s own soldiers former soldiers.

Now, since Manson never physically acted in the murders except for ordering them, the prosecutors led by Vince Bugliosi had to prove that Manson ordered them. And prove which solders that he selected to carry out these murders of actress Sharon Tate and several others. And that is where the witness’s come in and all the evidence that they left at the Spawn Ranch where the Manson Family lived.

Not a conventional case where you have lets say one murderer whose guilty of murdering at least one person. And you basically know the defendant is guilty based on the current evidence at hand. And it is just a matter of showing and proving how murder or murders by the defendant happened. The motive, the opportunity, the weapon and everything else. And looking at things like DNA, witness’s if any, lack of an alibi and everything else.

With the Manson Family case you have to prove that one man ordered a certain group of people to murder several others. Without the leader actually saying, “go murder these people over here and at this time.”

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CSPAN: ‘The Dark Side of Henry Kissinger: The Dirty Secrets of The Nixon White House – Price of Power (1983)’

Posted on March 8, 2015 by Rik Schneider

The Dark Side of Henry Kissinger_ The Dirty Secrets of the Nixon White House - Price of Power (1983)

Source:CSPAN– Henry Kissinger was President Richard Nixon’s chief foreign affairs and national security advisor, from 1969-74.

“At the height of Kissinger’s prominence, many commented on his wit. In February 1972, at the Washington Press Club annual congressional dinner, “Kissinger mocked his reputation as a secret swinger.” The insight, “Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac”, is widely attributed to him, although Kissinger was paraphrasing Napoleon Bonaparte.Four scholars at the College of William & Mary ranked Kissinger as the most effective U.S. Secretary of State in the 50 years to 2015. A number of activists and human rights lawyers have sought his prosecution for alleged war crimes. According to historian and Kissinger biographer Niall Ferguson, accusing Kissinger alone of war crimes “requires a double standard” because “nearly all the secretaries of state … and nearly all the presidents” have taken similar actions. Ferguson adds “this is not to say that it’s all OK.”

From The Memory Hole

The Far-Left in America both see Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger as war criminals. Because of President Nixon’s and his top National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger’s involvement in the Vietnam War. And their involvement with Far-Left Marxist dictators in Latin America and trying to even oust them. Not saying what Sey Hersh says about President Nixon and Secretary Kissinger was wrong, or all of it was wrong. But you at the very least have to take that into account when you hear Sey Hersh and his colleagues talk about Nixon and Kissinger. And know that what they are going to say about those two men are of course going to be negative. And to be made to look as negative as possible about those two men.

Now, from my perspective and I’m a Center-Right Liberal Democrat. (Or Classical Liberal, if you prefer)  And we are not always against the use of force and we aren’t anti-military. Unlike the Far-Left in America who would probably dissolve the military if they could. And having said all of that I consider President Nixon to be our best foreign policy President at least going back to Dwight Eisenhower and Harry Truman and FDR. No one new foreign policy and national security as a President better than Dick Nixon. And I consider Henry Kissinger to be our best Secretary State of all-time. If not Kissinger, then it would be George Schultz. Even though they are both Conservative Republicans.

And I say that, because Nixon and Kissinger saw things back in the early 1970s that most if not the rest of the country couldn’t see for another twenty-years. The ending of the Soviet Union for one and a point where America and China if not allies would at least not just be communicating with each other, but even working with each other on key issues. They both also saw China as a future world power and economic power. China now has the second largest economy in the world and one of the best militaries as well. They saw things that no one else could which is why they ran their foreign policy the way they did. That you talk to your enemies to encourage them to behave.

Dick Nixon and Henry Kissinger both have their faults of secrets that we’ll never know everything that they did exactly acting as representatives of the United States. In the President’s case, both extra legal and illegal like with the way he ran his White House to use as an example. But you can’t deny what they both accomplished when it came to foreign policy and doing things that no one else could’ve done at least when they did them. Like opening up the Soviet Union and People’s Republic of China in 1971. To the point that America and China had an official relationship by the late 1970s. And these are things that you don’t hear from people who simply dislike Nixon and Kissinger if not hate them.

You can also see this post at The FreeState, on Blogger.

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Minister Malcolm X: 1972 Documentary

Posted on March 8, 2015 by Erik Schneider

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Source:YouTube Movies– two boys from this film.

You can also see this post at FRS FreeState, on WordPress.

“Often misunderstood, Malcolm X was one of the leading forces of the United States’ Civil Rights Movement. He inspired many–and frightened many–but is destined to be remembered as one of the greatest men of his era. This riveting biography–based on The Autobiography of Malcolm X and filmed shortly after his assassination while the passions of the Movement still burned–combines speeches, newsreels and film clips provided by friends and acquaintances.”

Source:YouTube Movies

If it wasn’t for what Malcolm X fought for, for the African-American community as far as freedom and independence and trying to empower that entire community and free them from poverty, injustice and ignorance, then I probably wouldn’t have much respect if any respect for him. Because he used a lot of if not racist, certainly racial and nasty rhetoric towards Caucasian-Americans. And even though he did reform himself at the end of his life in 1964 or so after being exposed to more Caucasians-Americans as well as people oversees, he still said a lot of racial things that Caucasians probably couldn’t get away with.

Malcolm X is someone who I believe from the Center-Right in America, Conservatives and Conservative Libertarians, all the way over to the Far-Left can respect at least to some degree. Probably on the Far-Right which includes Americans of multiple races and ethnicities would say, “he was no good, he was a troublemaker, why should a Blackman have so much power?” That type of thing, but the Center-Right and Center-Left I think can if not respect the man because of what he was fighting for, for his community. Which was freedom and independence and moving his community off of public assistance though things like education, economic development, infrastructure.

Malcolm X wanted the African-American community to be a community of business owners. Small, medium and large business owners that would open their business’s in their communities and hire the people there. As well as working good middle class blue-collar jobs. His goal wasn’t integration and certainly not integration for the sake of integration. But he wanted freedom whether that meant getting that freedom living in separate communities from the Caucasian community. Or even living and working together, which by the time he dies he thought could work. With African and Caucasian-Americans living and working together.

Malcolm X was no Al Sharpton. Where he would use a lot of racially charge if not racial rhetoric to charge people up. And try to make Caucasians guilty and get them to give the African-American community more Welfare and other forms of public assistance. Malcolm X wasn’t about public assistance, but about independence. The ability for people to be able to live freely and not need government to take care of them. Which is where he separated from Dr. Martin King’s more social democratic movement that called for all sorts of new federal Welfare spending for the African-American community and Americans who live in poverty in general.

The Far-Left in America regardless of race would respect if not love Malcolm X because of how he talked about racism as it was directed towards African-Americans. And the rhetoric he used against racist Caucasians and Caucasians in general. Especially men, but they would separate from him back then like the Black Panther Party and today with Occupy Wall Street and other Far-Left movement’s when it came to economic policy. Because they don’t see public assistance and government dependence as bad things, even if it is indefinite. But as acts of compassion that, “this is how compassionate societies treat their people in need.”

So Malcolm X was someone who had broad appeal, respect, as well as hated across the political spectrum racial melting pot in America. He was loved for being a freedom fighter that literally wanted to empower an entire community of people to be able to live in freedom. And not to have to live with racism and injustice and be able to take care of themselves. But by his haters he was seen as a troublemaker and perhaps even as a troublemaker by people in the mainstream civil rights community that saw his rhetoric as unhelpful for their cause and movement. And one of the tragedies of his death is that it cost us an opportunity to see how he would’ve grown and be treated today.

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Movie Clips: ‘Free Angela & All Political Prisoners (2012)’

Posted on March 7, 2015 by Derik Schneider

IMG_5632

Source:Movie Clips– from the documentary Free Angela, which is about New-Left political activist Angela Davis.

“A documentary that chronicles the life of young college professor Angela Davis, and how her social activism implicates her in a botched kidnapping attempt that ends with a shootout, four dead, and her name on the FBI’s 10 most wanted list.”

From Movie Clips

Freedom of speech in America is not about the right to say things that most of the country already agrees with. Or the right to be friendly, or the right say non-controversial things that people don’t necessarily agree or disagree with, but haven’t thought much about.

But freedom of speech is exactly that: the freedom to speak freely. Even if it may intend to offend others. Which is why I’m so against political correctness in America, whether its practiced by the Far-Left or Far-Right and I will defend the Far-Left’s and Far-Right’s ability to speak freely as best as I can. Because political correctness is illiberal and Un-Liberal Democratic, because it is a form of fascism.

That is exactly what this movie, Free Angela is about: one woman’s struggle a UCLA professor in Angela Davis who got that position in her mid-twenties, not just her age, but a young African-American woman in the late 1960s early 70s getting such an important position as a great school like UCLA.

Professor Davis she was in a fight for her life to be able to speak against injustice in her community and America as a whole. And even use provocative if not extreme Far-Left rhetoric to express how she felt about America and the state of the African-American community. She didn’t and doesn’t still have the right to express her feelings about these issues because a lot of people agree with her. But simply because she’s an American with the right to free speech.

And then throw in the fact that Professor Davis was a Communist back then and even though she’s given up communism since and is a Democratic Socialist today, but back in the late 1960s and early 70s she was a Communist in the heart of the Cold War and she offended too many people. And the establishment in California decided that they can’t have a young African-American woman with that much power, that big of a platform and that big of a following loose on the streets. And came up with a bogus case to put her away in jail. Ultimately the good guys and gals won this case and Angela Davis was free in I believe 1971. But she should’ve never of had to go through that as an innocent person.

I’m not defending Professor Davis’s communist and now socialist views. Simply her constitutional right to express them, as a Liberal Democrat myself. I’m not nearly that far to the Left as a center-right Liberal and not a Socialist, but we do agree on the prison industrial complex. Which simply needs to be destroyed and replaced with a responsible and sensible criminal justice policy in this country. If we want to remain a liberal free society.

But again Socialists on the Far-Left have as much right to express themselves in America, as Christian-Theocrats and Nationalists on the Far-Right. The constitutional right to be heard and express yourself. And that to me at least is what Professor Davis’s case was about.

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