Posts by Liza Sabater

Liza Sabater blogs at Culture Kitchen.

Palin's Own Cheerleaders Have Kicked Her in the Teeth On the Way Out
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on November 10, 2008 at 8:42 AM.

For feminists and progressives it's really easy to criticize Sarah Palin. She has a horrid record of defending reproductive rights for women. She sees nothing wrong with abusing her power as governor of Alaska. She has a record of taking gifts and expensive favors from lobbyists and political allies.

What's worse : It's no secret she was not chosen for her knowledge of national domestic or foreign policy and politics. The woman was not vetted properly because she was not crowned the GOPs beauty queen for her knowledge or experience. She was chosen for being a good looking Christian Nationalist that would "turn on" the theocratic faction of the GOPs "base". And it doesn't hurt she actively sold herself to the neo-con hacks desperate to slap some lipstick on the ever ugly Republican Party pig.

Yet all those negatives were pushed aside by the GOP operatives, Bill Krystol included, who sold Sarah Palin as a viable Vice-President to John McCain. All those hacks squabbled over Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, and McCain's own pick Joe Lieberman. They wouldn't have any of them.

After a less than 2 hour meeting, McCain and his campaign and party hacks chose her. No drama involved just a cold and calculated political decision. They had more experienced and better qualified women to go after the "Hillary Vote", yet they made her their political beauty queen as the last "Hail Mary" pass they had up their sleeve.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Incredibly Scary: Watch E-Voting Machine in West VA Flip Votes
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on October 28, 2008 at 2:32 PM.

Via BradBlog we have two videos. The first one shows an early voter recounting how the machine kept flipping her vote from Democrat to Republican :

In this second video we can see West Virginia Jackson County Clerk, Jeff Waybright demonstrate how when their electronic voting machines (ES&S iVotronic) "flip votes" even after they have been calibrated properly:

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

John McCain's Attack on Women
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on October 16, 2008 at 9:14 AM.

As I was writing my list of debate words and phrases, I left out my new character, "Jane The Pregnant" for a reason. We need to talk about how John McCain hates women's freedoms :

psst! @JohnMcCain cares more about #JoeThePlumpber than #JaneThePregnant. pass it on. #debate08psst!

One of the most poignant moments of last night's debate was the discussion over abortion and the composition of the Supreme Court. I hate to say, but it took my breath away.

I was shocked at the callousness and cruelty exhibit John McCain exhibited towards women. This is not just a man that thinks that women have too many freedoms. He basically said that the life of a women was worthless compared to the viability of a fetus and to say any to the contrary was to be an extremist primed for his contempt. That's the extreme pro-abortion position, quote, "health", said John McCain as he said derisively about the need to save a woman's life.

It was a breath-taking moment that left me not just confounded but chilled to the bone.

John McCain, after defending "Joe The Plumber" throughout all the debate, not only was belligerent about women's right to choose. He feels it is appropriate to invoke "state rights" with their laws of slavery's past because he believes women are fickle about the reasons they want to terminate a pregnancy.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Debate Was an Open Book Test for Palin
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on October 3, 2008 at 2:58 PM.

No wonder I was confused about Sarah Palin's body language. She didn't just sound like she was heavily scripted. She sounded like she was reading cue cards or even a tele-prompter.

Because the cable and network television stations did not show a split screen of the debate, most viewers could not see that, during Joe Biden’s answers, Palin spent almost all her time looking down and studiously reading her notes. But viewers did see that when Palin delivered her answers, she would repeatedly glance down to check her talking points.

ThinkProgress has compiled a video documenting some of the instances where it was clear to the audience that Palin was propped up by written responses.

What's outrageous is that I actually questioned my judgment and bias when I mentioned last night that it looked like she was reading off cards. I couldn't fathom her reading off cue cards she'd have hidden in her jacket.

Wow.

Washington Mutual: The Biggest Bank Meltdown in U.S. History
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on September 26, 2008 at 8:01 AM.

Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism has put it rather succinctly : Hope you like the smell of napalm in the morning. Otherwise, this will not be your sort of day.

The biggest bank meltdown in US history and it has to be Washington Mutual, the bank that's holding most of my money. Geezus! This from the Financial Times :

JPMorgan Chase has acquired the banking operations of Washington Mutual which was seized by US regulators on Thursday night in the biggest bank failure in US history.

Under the deal, which was brokered by government, JPMorgan will pay $1.9bn to the banking regulator, and acquire all insured and uninsured deposits, assets and some of the liabilities of WaMu’s banking operations, including its troubled mortgage portfolio.

Holy crap! Where's my money? AUUUUUUUGH!

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

The Real Reason McCain Suspended the Campaign: Palin's a Mess
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on September 25, 2008 at 10:13 AM.

Chris Cillizza over at the Washington Post spends a kabillion words explaining why McCain suspended his campaign. Booman goes to the point : "He is afraid to debate and he is doubly afraid to have Sarah Palin debate. I mean look at Sarah Palin. Look at her."

UPDATE

From Ryan Powers over at Think Progress (More Palin incoherence after the flip):

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Brad Pitt: Gay Marriage Avenger
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on September 18, 2008 at 3:32 PM.

I love this bitch!

Brad Pitt is putting US$100,000 of his money to fight for the right of gays and lesbians to marry.

"Because no one has the right to deny another their life, even though they disagree with it, because everyone has the right to live the life they so desire if it doesn't harm another and because discrimination has no place in America, my vote will be for equality and against Proposition 8," the actor said in a statement.

Courage! And let it be known that I am in an infinitesimal minority who doesn't find Brad Pitt that attractive.

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Many Minority Women Don't Vote, Here's How to Help
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on September 16, 2008 at 3:15 AM.

69% of Latinas do not vote. Even though we have the highest pregnancy rates and the fastest growing incidences of AIDS in the United States. 70% African American and Asian American registered voting women also abstain from voting.

Pass on this video clip to every single, Black, Latian, Asian, Native US American woman you know and ask them to pass it on to their family friends.

Faced with the prospect of a McCain presidency that would squash any hope of Universal Health Care and would put on the bench Supreme Court Justices that would bring back reproductive slavery, it is absolutely necessary that each and every minority woman and man go out and vote.

From the EngageHer blog :

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

Humorous Flashback: Buchanan Gushes Over Obama Speech
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on September 9, 2008 at 4:25 AM.

Check out Pat Buchanan, a historically rabid white supremacist, fanboying all over Barack Obama. What do I love? The look of disbelief on all the other talking heads including Rachel Maddow.

LOL!

Unbelievable: How Much Do You Think Cindy McCain's RNC Outfit Cost?
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on September 4, 2008 at 3:02 PM.

Editor's note: We had an impromptu guess-a-thon here in the AlterNet office and no one was even close. Laura Bush had the good sense to rock duds only costing somewhere between $3,425 to $4,325 ... but Cindy ... well it's just ridiculous.

Vanity Fair does the numbers on the "banana look" so you don't have to :

Cindy McCain

Oscar de la Renta dress: $3,000

Chanel J12 White Ceramic Watch: $4,500

Three-carat diamond earrings: $280,000

Four-strand pearl necklace: $11,000–$25,000

Shoes, designer unknown: $600

Total: Between $299,100 and $313,100

U.S. Promises to Stop Treating Nelson Mandela Like a Terrorist
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on July 2, 2008 at 11:18 AM.

This is so mindboggling it defies commentary. Up until the 1st of July of 2008, Nelson Mandela was considered a terrorist by the United States.

Bush Removes Nelson Mandela from Terror Watch List

By VOA News

01 July 2008

U.S. President George Bush Tuesday signed a bill that allows Nelson Mandela to enter the United States without special clearance.

The measure officially removes Mr. Mandela and his African National Congress from a U.S. terror watch list.

The former South African president may now visit the United States without the U.S. secretary of state having to certify that he is not a terrorist.

Mr. Mandela was placed on the list because of his work with the African National Congress (ANC), which fought to end white minority rule in South Africa.

Mr. Mandela spent 27 years in prison for his work with the ANC to fight apartheid rule in South Africa.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner turns 90 on July 18.

Un.

Be.

lievable.

[Photo by Mr. Jaded.]

Detained Immigrants Continue to Die in American Custody
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on June 19, 2008 at 10:15 AM.

I would have subtitled this video "America's New Civil War":

From the production company :

The New York Times and the Washington Post have recently reported on the "System of Neglect," namely, the state of immigration detention center conditions. As told by her sister June Everett, watch the story of Sandra Kenley, a 52- year-old grandmother, who after living in the U.S. legally for 33 years, was subjected to these very conditions and died in immigration detention.

Michelle Obama gets a War Room of her Own
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on June 17, 2008 at 9:00 AM.

Michelle Obama gets her own War Room.

HOT!

She's not going to wait for the vultures to do the talking about her. Michelle Obama gets her own war room along with a new chief of staff:

Later today, the campaign is set to announce the hiring of Stephanie Cutter, a longtime Democratic strategist who worked as Senator John Kerry’s communications director in 2004, as chief of staff to Mrs. Obama. Ms. Cutter is scheduled to begin soon, with the first task of re-crafting the image of Mrs. Obama, who has come under intense criticism by Republicans and even some Democratic rivals. She also will lead a war room to fight attacks against Mrs. Obama.

At first I found it odd that, given Kerry's slow response to the Swift Boat attacks, his former communications director is working for Ms. Obama. Maybe it makes sense because she's already "been there, done that" and won't let that happen ever again.

Hopefully that's the reason why they hired a former John Kerry staffer. Because she's indeed lived through all the republican's filth and knows now how to handle it.

Think about it, though. Michelle Obama has a war room. She's gonna get her shero on.

How HAWT is that!

AP Goes After Bloggers Under DMCA
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on June 13, 2008 at 12:01 PM.

Rogers Cadenhead, founder and publisher of The Drudge Retort, has been Cease and Desisted by AP News for publishing fragments of their syndicated news articles and reports.

Yes, fragments, not the whole articles. Go to Rogers' site to read the reasons given by AP.

Adding a quote to a blog post is very much like the sampling of a hook or a beat on a song. It's why so many people were opposed to the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. It's not only that albums like Beck's Odelay or Public Enemy's Fear Of A Black Planet would never had happened. Documentaries, archival works, opinion or scholarly writing would be all but non-existent if it means that now journalists, bloggers, historians and scholars would need to pay publishing houses for every single quote and/or sample they need for their work.

That's why I blame Hilary Rosen, the woman who became the face of the RIAA and the lobbyists who successfully paid Congress to pass the DMCA. Granted, I applauded her for her recent "I am not a bargaining chip" post, in re: the other Hillary (La Clinton), but it doesn't mean La Rosen gets a free pass.

The DMCA's main purpose is to circumvent due process by saying that trade laws trump civil rights law. So a corporation's right to make money from their "product" however way they want trumps the rights of individual citizens who would want to express themselves freely about said product through comment, parody, sample or quoting.

The DMCA throws the onus of proving Fair Use on the individual "speaking" the copyrighted materials and not on the owner of the copyright. It was an unprecedented move and one that many consider anti-constitutional since it basically allows for individuals to be considered guilty of copyright infringement until they prove themselves only in a court of law to be innocent.

Rogers gives us the perfect example of how the "corporate bottom-line trumps free speech" shenanigans is rationalized by AP using the DMCA:

Read the rest of the post on the flip side »

There's a Reason for Low Voter Turnout in Puerto Rico
Posted by Liza Sabater, Culture Kitchen on June 2, 2008 at 4:58 AM.

And guess why :

BECAUSE PUERTO RICANS KNOW THEY CAN'T VOTE IN THE GENERAL ELECTION.

"Most people in Puerto Rico, I would venture to guess, they are not even aware that there's a primary going on," said Luis Pabón-Roca, a local political analyst.

He said the political atmosphere on the island this week is subdued compared to the fever that sweeps the island before local elections.

Some poll workers in small towns started abandoning the polling stations because turnout was so low, he said.

Part of the reason for the lack of interest, he said, is because voters feel the primary isn't meaningful since Puerto Ricans cannot vote in the general election.

The Democratic and Republican parties run the primaries and caucuses, and they allow U.S. territories, such as the commonwealth of Puerto Rico, to take part in the process.

But only the 50 states and the District of Columbia vote in the general election.

El Nuevo Día reports the Board of Elections expected to have 600.000 voters. The Clinton campaign bargained on a million and more. Less than 400.000 people woke up this morning with the primaries in their minds.

As I said, when it comes to that "popular vote" tomfoolery, my people are not stupid. Puerto Ricans know their vote doesn't count.

Unfortunately, too many US voters have no idea about the political realities of Puerto Rico. And that's what's so indecent about the Clintonistas using the Puerto Rican turnout to solidify their claims of entitlement to the nomination.