Palin then and now

Sarah Palin is a media magnet like Donald trump. However much you know that they crave attention, that it is the very oxygen of their existence and they would wither away if they were ignored, it seems almost impossible to avoid reading about them and talking about them. I am as guilty as the next political observer of this behavior. I am not sure why that is but I suspect it is for the same reason that people are fascinated by sociopaths in general. Most of us cannot imagine behaving in such ways and try to understand what could be driving such peculiar behavior.
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Trump’s problems will really begin if and when he becomes president

It is clear that Donald Trump is having a blast right now. For someone with a massive ego who loves to be in the limelight, has a gut instinct for what a sizable fraction of the country finds appealing, and does not mind whom he offends, running for president without having to beg people for money is an ideal occupation, especially since he can say whatever he wants and the media will cover him.
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Removing the stigma around abortion

As I wrote a few days ago, as part of a nationwide effort called Breaking Our Silence, I will be reading a story by a woman who had an abortion and neither regrets it nor feel ashamed about it. More details of the event to be held tomorrow at Beachland Ballroom, 15711 Waterloo Road, Cleveland, OH 44110 from 6:00-8:00 pm. and is free and open to the public can be found at the above link.
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Fighting ‘history and tradition’ racism

Those who try and change racist symbols and names like that of the Washington football team immediately come right up against that brick wall of the ‘It’s our tradition and as long as we think its not racist, it can’t be racist’ argument. I cannot afford to laugh at such ridiculous arguments because the people of Cleveland use that same argument to defend the racist Chief Wahoo baseball logo.
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Kalle Lasn talks about the Occupy movement

Kalle Lasn is the editor of the magazine Adbusters that is credited with being one of the brains that inspired the Occupy movement that in 2011 resulted in huge numbers of people occupying public spaces in New York and other cities to protest inequality and financial corruption. While many people have argued that the dispersal of the movement signaled its failure, when Jake Whitney interviewed him for the December 2015/January 2016 issue of The Progressive magazine, Lasn disagreed with that conclusion and said that the spirit of Occupy is very much alive.
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Who gets endorsed is influenced by who decides

This is the time when organizations and individuals start endorsing candidates for the presidency. It is not clear that endorsements matter these days as much as they were reputed to do in the past. Nowadays people have greater access to information and are less likely to vote the way that some organization tells them to, even if they belong to that organization. What endorsements do is indicate a vague general alignment of views between the candidate and the endorser.
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