Truth and Traditions

Another hat in the alternative party arena:

According to Jones and MoveOn, the driving forces behind the launch, “Rebuild The Dream” is the Left’s collective effort to use grassroots organizing and new media to challenge the rhetoric coming out of Washington and strengthen the middle class.

Jones is a natural fit to lead the effort. For many Democrats and liberals, he is viewed as a rare pol who can leverage authority, celebrity and purity. His professional and ideological credentials are in good order; he led up Green Jobs for the Obama administration, and was infamously run out of that job after a misleading and race-baiting campaign by Glenn Beck. Jones never sold out — he blew up. …

In Jones’ speech on Thursday, he argued that an active government was critical to building a healthy middle class, regulating responsible employers, and cultivating “good citizens.”  He warned the audience about three “lies” animating the conservative narrative:  America is broke; Taxing the wealthy is bad for the economy; and “Hating” on our government” is actually patriotic.

via Van Jones Returns, Launches Liberal Alternative to The Tea Party | The Nation.

A New York Times reporter who helped uncover the Bush administration’s secret domestic spying program says he continues to face government surveillance and harassment under President Obama. In a new affidavit, James Risen says government monitoring of his incoming and outgoing phone calls has carried over from the Bush years. Risen has been subpoenaed twice to reveal his sources for a 2006 book on the CIA, in which he detailed the CIA’s role in disrupting Iran’s nuclear program. Risen writes: “I believe that the efforts to target me have continued under the Obama administration, which has been aggressively investigating whistleblowers and reporters in a way that will have a chilling effect on freedom of the press in the United States.”

via New York Times Reporter Alleges Obama Government Harassment, Surveillance.

The land of the free and the home of the brave have become a money machine for the rich:

A new graphic from Mother Jones shows what many of us suspect: We’ve gotten a lot more productive in recent years, but our wages haven’t reflected that.

The richest Americans, on the other hand, appear to be doing a better job reaping the rewards of everyone’s hard work.

The graphic, which uses data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Congressional Budget Office, Census Bureau and the Economic Policy Institute, shows that productivity has risen steadily over the past three decades, while overall wages have barely changed.

Meanwhile, the nation’s wealthiest have seen their income surge.

via Life Inc. – Good Graph Friday: You’re working harder, they’re making money.

Does Bill Clinton still not grasp that the current economic crisis is in large measure his legacy? Obviously that’s the case, or he wouldn’t have had the temerity to write a fourteen-point memo for Newsweek on how to fix the economy that never once refers to the home mortgage collapse and other manifestations of Wall Street greed that he enabled as president.

via Bill Clinton’s Legacy of Denial | The Nation.