Etc.

I would not want to live in Detroit right now. It appears to be under a dictatorship:

The Detroit City Council voted 5-4 Wednesday to support a consent agreement proposed by Michigan’s Republican governor Rick Snyder and Democratic State Treasurer Andy Dillon, which gives city officials dictatorial powers to rip up union contracts and impose drastic cuts in social spending.

The agreement already had the full backing of millionaire Democratic Mayor David Bing and Deputy Mayor Kirk Lewis who is serving as acting mayor while Bing recuperates from surgery.

The vote came one day before the deadline set by Snyder to accept the agreement or face the appointment of an Emergency Manager with the power to unilaterally impose cuts, sell city assets and remove elected officials under provisions of Michigan’s Public Act 4 enacted by the legislature last year.

Tell me there is a difference anymore between Democrats and Republicans.
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It's time to take a very close look at those lies coming from the top 1%.
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One Walter to Another: Speaking of lies, Walter Talackova knew from an early age he was one fucked up kid. This fucked up kid became an adolescent, and then he just had to "change his sex" to try and pass as a "woman." Or, more accurately, try to convincingly playact a female stereotype but without the messiness of menstruation, pregnancy, or menopause to complicate matters.

The deceit worked for awhile until somebody along the line got suspicious of Walter's real sex (or "gender" as some PC types call it). At first it looked like he could get away with lying on pageant applications, but those legs, those feet, and at times, that voice, gave the whole fraud away.

This is nothing short of child abuse. Where the hell were the parents in this?

By the eighth grade, she had grown her hair long and was wearing feminine pants. At the age of 14, she started hormone treatments, which helped her develop breasts and gave her skin a more feminine quality.

The treatments “made me feel better, mentally,” she said.

After years of counseling, Talackova obtained letters from doctors testifying that she qualified for sex reassignment surgery — surgery that the Canadian health system paid for.

The procedure used the skin of Talackova’s penis to create a vagina. She called the surgery “intense” but ultimately “rewarding.”

“It was terribly painful, but seeing something on your body for that long and not being able to look at myself in the mirror because I couldn’t stand seeing the other part, it was actually very rewarding, too,” she said.

Talackova also had other surgeries — she was given breast implants and also had her Adam’s apple removed.

Those who run the Canadian system should reconsider paying for surgical mutilations to treat mental illness.




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That Sinking Economy

Detroit residents lined up for hours trying to get housing assistance. The unemployed are hurting there, just as everywhere else in the country.

Jalonda Terry, a former student and restaurant worker, said her unemployment had run out, and she has nowhere to turn, so she came to Cobo Hall for help. "They're talking about extending unemployment for another 13 weeks," she said, "but that's nothing. Most people out here have been unemployed for months and won't find any work soon."

"People are going to be starving and homeless," she added. "People are going to die. Why doesn't the president just give every family stimulus money. Why do we have to wait in the cold? Why do we have to fill out these stupid forms?"

Jalonda's mother, Kadeja, said, "There should be people helping to organize the line. There are kids here in the cold."

Angella Murphy, a former GM worker, related cutbacks in the city to concessions by workers at Chrysler. "They're closing all the schools down, and now they're cutting optical and dental benefits from the auto workers. Obama gave all that money to the banks and not to the people. Why doesn't he start a job-creation program?"

Why, indeed. Obama should have tackled joblessness the first thing.

The Booming Economy.

In the first of a series of reports the WSWS reports on the social crisis in Detroit, beginning with the outrageous cost of food.

Speaking of Detroit, Obama tried to play the populist card while all the while representing the corporate/financial elite's interests.