In 2006 we had a crop of Congressional challengers that was poised to win in tough districts and take back the House and Sente.  It was a cautious list, at times a moderate list, and while there have been some excellent progressive lawmakers from that group (Steve Cohen, John Hall, Bernie Sanders and Sherrod Brown come to mind), overall it was a list full of more Democrats instead of better ones.  You never know what you're really going to get from a candidate until they're in office, but this year there are some promising signs that the class of 2008 is substantively better on several issues.

I know it's considered gauche to pimp out your own blog, but I only registered it, what, a day ago, so it's not like you can read anything at samethreechords.blogspot.com, even though it's there and I am very good looking.

In Kos's otherwise great post yesterday about Joe Garcia and the South Florida Cuban exile community, I was a little bothered, as a proud Democrat, South Floridian, and Cuban American, by some of the wording. It's not you, it's me.

Most reasonable people can agree that the detention camp in the tropics has been a miserable failure and that it should be closed. Most reasonable people can also agree that the forty-something Cuban embargo has failed miserably to weaken the Castro dictatorship's grip on power.  Nor has our policy, after all these years, moved the Cuban regime an inch closer to embracing democracy and our way of life.

I hereby propose a solution to both problems:

the more I have been thinking i have come to question if socilaism is really all its cracked up to be, or if only the cracked up people want to be socialist.
 What has made me question this is if total gevernment control of our lives is such a great idea, why aren't there boatloads of Americans floating to Cuba,  Maybr they are trying to escape here to have a chance for the freedom we seem to be intent on trying to destroy.  
 I also question if the United States is such a bad place to live why do we have MORE people trying to MOVE HERE LEGALLY than ALL THE OTHER COUNTRIES COMBINED.  
 Me thinks we may be foolish by taking what we have for granted.  We have become the modern day Roman Empire  by letting political correctness take us over and if we allow this country to fail the world will be looking at a new dark ages that the world may never recover from

Republicans keep repeating the claim that the Chinese and/or Cubans are drilling for oil off the coast the Florida. Myopic, traitorous, fish hugging Democrats are letting communists suck up the black inky lifeblood out of the Gulf that rightly belongs to us! While I'll bet if you squint real hard you can almost see the rigs from Sloppy Joe's in Key West.

The argument is now so prevalent I thought I'd do some googling to find out what's really going on. Besides that I thought I read somewhere the Chinese have signed some contracts with Cuba and may actually start putting some exploratory rigs in the Gulf off Cuba as soon as next year. I envision wingnuts claiming "we were right all along" if that comes to pass.

So here is what I found. Read on for more:

Crossposted at TPM

Republican Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave repeated Monday a lie told by Dick Cheney, falsely claiming that China is drilling for oil 60 miles off the Florida coast in Cuban waters.

In an article in The Fort Collins Coloradoan, Musgrave was reported as repeating Cheney's June 12 whopper, which he was forced to retract when experts reported that, well, it simply wasn't true.

"The perpetrators of these crimes have been able to live in freedom for so long. And some say why go after old men in their last years? Because, in fact, they should not have the opportunity to live out their lives without being held responsible for these horrendous acts. These murders are 30 or 40 years old. Obviously they're difficult to investigate and to prosecute because evidence has been lost or destroyed, witnesses and defendants have died, and memories have dimmed. We must act quickly to bring the long-overdue justice to these victims and their families."

The Politico had this story on how Obama was on the wrong side of the Elian Gonzalez saga.  They detailed how this singular issue could impact the outcome of Florida in November. Here is the link to the story:  http://www.politico.com/...

Iraq controlled its own destiny, but could not prevail in its most important match.

As we go through this so-called oil crisis, I have been amazed as I have watched Republican after Republican scream and pound their chests about drilling in "ANWAR" and the oil companies bloviating about needing more offshore drilling sites due to the "tight" oil supply.

Meanwhile you have Republicans also talking about China drilling offshore of Cuba. Of course this is false, but that does not stop folks from saying it and the media just letting this issue get murked up by their "two truths" mentality.

Meanwhile, the oil companies have 10,000 unexcercised permits, and 34 million acres of on-shore land that has been leased to the oil companies but they are not using to increase their oil capacity.

The Corporate - Neo-con truth and reality are part of this "two-truths" mentality I speak of. Both left to sit out there in the media to keep the waters murky.

If the media did their job, this subject would not be so murky for the ignorant and so frustrating for the informed. As you read, the only conclusion you can come to is we have representatives in Congress that are protecting the oil companies and their greed and pushing a mid-east agenda that can only lead to more bloodshed and profiterring by the oil companies and defense contractors..

watch the CNN report:
http://www.cnn.com/...

read the story:
http://www.miamiherald.com/...

I'm not necessarily sure how big of a protest this will be when Obama goes to Miami FL, however considering Cubans have been a Republican stronghold, McCain may make this an issue and I can guarantee it will be covered extensively by the mainstream and local media.

Far be it for me to offer campaign advice to John McCain, but I've got to say that I am extremely puzzled (and rather delighted) by his seeming willingness, perhaps eagerness, to antagonize voters in Florida.

Today, speaking to Republican donors and oil moguls in Houston, McCain called for allowing offshore oil drilling. This is high risk in Florida, where the population and elected officials of both parties overwhelming oppose lifting the drilling ban. In a state where tourism is a major part of the economy, and where the 1,300 miles of coastline and beaches define the geography and identity of the state, people are understandably not eager to gamble with a repeat of the Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969.

But that isn't all on a variety of issues important to Florida, McCain just keeps stepping in it.

The latest episode in the all-out economic warfare being waged by the United States against Cuba that the former insists on calling a mere "embargo," but which examples like this make very clear deserves the name the Cubans use - "blockade" (or, to be precise, "bloqueo"):

A Somerset [U.K.] health shop selling Cuban sugar and a London tobacconist dealing in Habanos cigars are among British businesses told by a bank to cut their ties with the island or move their accounts.

Lloyds TSB has written to customers who have dealings with Cuba saying they will have take their accounts elsewhere, apparently in the wake of threats by the US government, which operates an embargo against Cuba.

The US has said it will prosecute any businesses that have any dealings with Cuba and also have a branch in the US.

In Orson Welles’ film masterpiece "Citizen Kane," a dying newspaper publisher utters a mysterious last word—"Rosebud"—which turns out to be the name of his sled. Oh, s**t—I wasn’t supposed to tell you that last part. Why do I always do that? It’s not even relevant to the article I’m posting here. I don’t why I did that, I’m sorry. Perhaps this will make up for it:

On Wednesday, Vice President Dick Cheney used George Will as his assignment editor when he put out the ridiculous claim that China was drilling for oil just 60 miles off the shores of Cuba.

Sen. Mel Martinez (R-FL), along with a number of energy experts, immediately rebuffed this claim, and challenged Cheney to produce evidence other than Will's self-aggrandizing puffery.

Within 24 hours, the only remaining mystery was whether Cheney would continue to hold to this GOP boogeyman.

More of this sort of bluntness, please:

GOP claim about Chinese oil drilling off Cuba is untrue
Erika Bolstad and Kevin G. Hall | McClatchy Newspapers

last updated: June 11, 2008 08:31:54 PM

WASHINGTON — As Congress has debated energy policy over the past several days, an unusual argument keeps surfacing in support of drilling off the U.S. coastline and in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Why, ask some Republicans, should the United States be thwarted from drilling in its own territory when just 50 miles off the Florida coastline the Chinese government is drilling for oil under Cuban leases?

Yet no one can prove that the Chinese are drilling anywhere off Cuba's shoreline. The China-Cuba connection is "akin to urban legend," said Sen. Mel Martinez, a Republican from Florida who opposes drilling off the coast of his state but who backs exploration in ANWR.

"China is not drilling in Cuba's Gulf of Mexico waters, period," said Jorge Pinon, an energy fellow with the Center for Hemispheric Policy at the University of Miami and an expert in oil exploration in the Gulf of Mexico. Martinez cited Pinon's research when he took to the Senate floor Wednesday to set the record straight.

Who's guilty of spouting this particular line of bull?

Vice President Dick Cheney, in a speech Wednesday to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, picked up the refrain.

Surprise!

But guess what? It wasn't a lie, it was "faulty intelligence!"

Cheney quoted a column by George Will, who wrote last week that "drilling is under way 60 miles off Florida. The drilling is being done by China, in cooperation with Cuba, which is drilling closer to South Florida than U.S. companies are."

The article also catches House Minority Leader John Boehner -- whose otherworldly tan is itself rumored to be of offshore Chinese manufacture -- repeating this crap, as well as relative nobody Rep. George Radanovich (R-CA). It also reportedly appeared in an Investor's Business Daily editorial earlier this week. Boehner and his tan, for their part, blame... The New York Times:

The office of House Minority Leader John Boehner defended the GOP drilling claims. "A 2006 New York Times story highlights lease agreements negotiated between Cuba and China and the fact that China was planning to drill in the Florida Strait off the coast of Cuba," said spokesman Michael Steel.

Boehner's tan had no comment, but was allegedly later sold for $136.38 a barrel.

Moral of the story: These guys will lie about absolutely anything. WMD. War and peace. POW rescues. The combat records of actual war heroes. Whether or not they marched with Martin Luther King. Everything.

And you can't "work out bipartisan compromise" with liars. Compromise requires at least two genuine positions to start with.

I was reading about the Platt Amendment last night in the wonderful graphic novel version of Howard Zinn's A People's History of American Empire, and was wondering where I had heard something frighteningly similar to this remnant of The Age of American Imperialism recently...

Hmmm... where was it?...

Dang! I hate when I forget like this...

As reported by the BBC:

"Cuba is to abolish its system of equal pay for all and allow workers and managers to earn performance bonuses, a senior official has announced.

Vice-Minister for Labour Carlos Mateu said the current system - in place since the communist revolution in 1959 - was no longer 'convenient'."

Cuba to Abandon Salary Equality