Portland, Oregon - Democratic Party of Multnomah County 2010 Dick Celsi Dinner -- 2/12/2010
6:00pm - 8:00pm
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Jim Hightower
"The less a statesman amounts to, the more he loves the flag." -- Kin Hubbard
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Hightower Lowdown:
How corporate money took over Washington--and created the mobs who rant against reform
Despite a constant racket from the forces of the far-out right (Fox television's yackety-yackers, just-say-no GOP know-nothings, tea-bag howlers, Sarah Palinistas, et al.), the great majority of Americans support a bold progressive agenda for our country, ranging from Medicare for all to the decentralization and re-regulation of Wall Street. Indeed, in the elections of 2006 and 2008, people voted for a fundamental break from Washington's 30-year push to enthrone a corporate kleptocracy.
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The General Store
There's Nothing in the Middle of the Road but Yellow Stripes and Dead Armadillos
"I make a lot of money these days speaking to corporations, so I'd really prefer not to admit how...
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Thieves in High Places - Hardback
America is at an historic divide between rulers and rulees and the rulees are restless. Hightower...
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Swim Against the Current
The New York Times bestselling author and America's funniest activist gives the lowdown on...
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Have a gander at the whole store here...
A SOFT LANDING IN ROUGH TIMES
These are rough times. How rough, you ask? So rough that even the relative roughness of toilet tissue has arisen as a question of economic and political fairness.
This pressing issue is being played out in California (naturally) – a state that is always in the forefront of public policy debates. Specifically, the county of Riverside is grappling with the delicate matter of tissue texture.
It all started a couple of years ago when county employees complained that the one-ply toilet tissue being used was... well, rough. So, the county supervisor rolled out a new policy of putting two-ply in all stalls. Employees beamed with smiles of comfort.
But not for long. The county's 18,500 employees recently learned that a double level of tushy cushiness has been delivered to the toilet stalls used by the top 10 elected officials and the executive staff. These special ones are blessed with a four-ply tissue, sold under the brand name of "Angel Soft."
Why do these 100 or so executive-level employees get twice the softness that we do, demanded the other 18,400 county workers? There was no good answer. A county spokesman could only say, "There was a texture test, and then the Facilities Management Department decided that Angel Soft would be utilized for elected officials and their guests."
This did not sit well with the two-ply crowd, which was already feeling shorted by having to take a 10-percent pay cut due to budget constraints. After all, every three sheets of Angel Soft cost the county a penny more than three sheets of the common tissue, so it also became a matter of budgetary integrity.
Good News – top county officials now say that, in the interest of tissue egalitarianism, they'll revert to two-ply! Once again, California has put itself on the cutting edge of social progress.