Bernie Sanders Rally in Tucson

Sanders Covers Wide-Ranging Topics in Tucson #ICYMI (video)

Bernie Sanders Rally in Tucson
Tucson feels the Bern.

I wasn’t prepared for Bernie Sanders’ 90-minute lallopalooza in Tucson on October 9, 2015.

Besides logistical issues, like not having a spare camera battery and running out of juice, wearing the wrong shoes for 90 minutes of standing, days of hounding the Sanders campaign about a press pass (only to find out that the Star was having the same problem as BfAZ), and the nagging feeling that one hand of the Sanders campaign didn’t know what the other was doing, I wasn’t prepared to like the event.

I have been on the fence about the Bernie Sanders vs Hillary Clinton race for months. I have liked and followed Hillary since she became the first First Lady to be a media punching bag because she had ambitions beyond serving tea and cookies. I can relate to her because we are both from the Midwest, we came of age during the same time period, we are both strong feminists, and we both spent our lives like Ginger Rogers— dancing backwards and in heels up the career ladder toward that ever-present glass ceiling. I like Sanders’ income inequality message and his proposals, but I have two primary questions: 1) How can he accomplish eve a quarter on what he proposes without a 100% progressive Congress (not just a Democratic Party Congress) and 2) Who will finally end decades of struggle for women’s equality— another long-term male politician or the first woman President? (Still waiting for answers on these.)

Bernie in Tucson videos after the jump.

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Hillary Clinton

Hillary Clinton Crushes Politically Motivated #BenghaziCommittee #8

Hillary Clinton
One of the best parts of the hearing was all of the candid photos of Secretary Clinton’s many facial expressions.

Republican logicTwitter was ablaze yesterday with negative comments about the 11-hour Benghazi Committee hearing with former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. According to the Maddow Blog, even conservatives Tweeted strings of negative comments about the GOP’s poor performance.

Most left-wing Tweeters hammered the Republican-controlled committee for wasting taxpayer funds on a witch hunt. If seven Benghazi Committees found nothing, why #8? By their own admission, the purpose of the marathon fiasco was to bring down the front-runner in the Presidential race.

The result of the multi-million-dollar Benghazi fiasco? Republicans looked like fools, and Secretary Hillary Clinton looked poised, prepared, and smart— in other words “Presidential”. Today’s social media is flush with stories about how badly the Republicans blew it and how well Clinton did under the pressure of an 11-hour Congressional hearing.

Vox said that the 11-hour hearing was Clinton’s “best campaign ad yet.”

Rachel Maddow said that the left and the right agree that the Benghazi Committee “blew it”.

The Borowitz Report [humor] said that Clinton issued a statement thanking the committee for their invaluable service to her campaign.

Clinton is on the cover of Politico’s Magazine with a headline saying this has been her “best week yet”. More links after the jump.

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Oak Flat

Oak Flat: Kirkpatrick Stands with McCain, Flake, Gosar, Salmon, Schweikert & Franks (video)

Oak Flat
A view of Oak Flat from the video below. Educate yourself. Watch the videos below.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower, a man revered in my household when I was a child, made a promise to the San Carolos Apache back in the 1955 that there would be no mining at Oak Flat. He made this promise when he opened up other Northern Arizona acreage to copper mining, and you can see the consequences of these promises decades later.

In 2014, Arizona Senator John McCain (AKA Despicable Me) attached an Oak Flat rider to an unrelated defense bill — thus clearing the way for mining on sacred Apache land by Resolution Copper, a foreign company– the land that Eisenhower promised would be saved from mining. The Tucson Weekly’s headline is 100% accurate, it was a “new low” for McCain.

Until this week, I had blamed McCain and fellow Arizona Senator Jeff Flake for this travesty, but then I stumbled upon a link revealing that Democratic Congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick stood with the entire Arizona Republican delegation on Oak Flat— and against the Apache. (You’ll remember that Kirkpatrick has had long-time support from Native Americans.)

This story is from Kirkpatrick’s own website: AZ Republic: Gosar, Kirkpatrick join forces for Ariz. copper mine. This is really disappointing news about Kirkpatrick because I was ready to back her against McCain for the US Senate, but this Oak Flat slight of hand by the Congress is morally wrong.

Copper mining has devastated large swaths of Arizona. Why does this industry also need the ~700 acres at Oak Flat?

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Paul Ryan

Paul Ryan Holds Tightly to His White Male Privilege

In a stunning display of hypocrisy and white male privilege, Congressman Paul Ryan said that if he gets the nod for Speaker of the US House, he wants to make sure he can preserve family time with his wife and three young children, who live in Wisconsin. You’re sounding a bit entitled, Mr. Ryan; after … Read more

Feminism, Socialism, Hillary, & Bernie

World leaders when the men are photoshopped out of the picture.
An Islamic leader infamously had German Chancellor Angela Merkel Photoshopped out of a group photo of world leaders because she was not wearing a veil. Here is a group photo with male world leaders Photoshopped out of the picture. This is the problem.

While many American progressives swoon over Presidential Candidate Bernie Sanders’ laundry list of economic reforms– like free college education, taxing the rich, and redistributing the wealth– others support the progressive woman candidate, who has been leading in the polls for months.

Baby Boomer feminists like myself have been fighting for equality and punching through the glass ceiling of sexism our entire working lives. Hillary Clinton is one of us. She is poised to punch through the thickest glass ceiling in the world– the US presidency.

1960s

In the 1960s, when I was in the eighth grade, I told my guidance counselor that I wanted to go to college. He asked why– since girls really didn’t need to go to college. He finally acquiesced and ask, “So, do you want to be a teacher or a nurse? Those are the only professions for which women need a college degree.”

1970s

In the 1970s, I sued an employer for wage discrimination and won, but…

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