Speaking at the demonstration, Gov. Ventura had this to say…

“It hasn’t yet, but if it continues and grows it will. Absolutely. And I hope that it does,”

The demonstration was described as peaceful and relaxed reporting no issues between police and participators. And, yet, Hennepin County Commissioner Jeff Johnson just could stand the idea of his city being overrun by a bunch of “clueless, obnoxious and frankly very messy anarchists or socialists or flower children or whatever they call themselves”. They’re called voters. And taxpayers. They are called the people you vowed, as a public servant, to serve and listen to. But you seem to be under the mistaken impression that the citizens work for the government and are obligated to do what you tell us and behave as you wish us to behave. You might want to audit a Civics 101 course, sir, because you are terribly confused about your job.

The media has been painfully dismissive of the entire Occupy wall Street movement from the beginning. We all learned more from Facebook about the events taking place than we ever did from CNN or Fox News. When they did speak about it they blatantly painted it to suit the story they felt like telling. When protesters in New York were kettled, a practice some call “perverse”, on the Brooklyn Bridge, the New York Times even changed a story after it was published online to shift blame on to the protesters.

As peaceful, non violent protesters were pepper sprayed, beaten, and arrested by our own police forces the world has noticed. It is being called The American Autumn. Our media is ignoring it. Our government is ignoring it. It’s time we make them take notice. This is our country, our lives, our rights and our future.

Remember, we ain’t got time to bleed….

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace

As many of you know there has been an additional delay with some of your orders from the OUTPOST.  Some of these delays have been upwards of 4 weeks later than the 6-8 week delivery time frame stated when you ordered. We have been working very hard and as fast as possible to get the shirts out to everyone while retaining the quality of both shirts and printing that we feel you deserve.This takes time.

We are committed to providing a quality product for your money while only producing the shirts to-order. This means when you order an official Jesse Ventura shirt from us it will be printed just for you. This is done to avoid waste and keep quality as high as possible for a reasonable price.

If you have have a pending order please know that they are all being custom printed right now and will be shipped as soon as they come off the presses.

Thank you all for your patience and support!

All that security the big banks are touting all the time. They want you to use their “app” on everything from your phone to your laptop. Integrated into every aspect of your life. Which sounds great when you think of all the things it could help one do. Except, we all know they are never really as good as the commercials make them out to be. With the amount of glitches and hacking that goes on in the big banks these days you’d think everyone would be moving out of these convenience technology for the sake of the safety and security of it’s customers. That’s what some of that bailout money was supposed to be for! Updating woefully outdated systems to protect us from terrorists or whatever we were supposed to be terrified of that week. So how is it a reporter from a consumer site managed to access Bank of America accounts with simply a customer’s phone number and the final four digits of their credit card?

Those cute little flashmobs the kids on that Glee show are always having are starting to get ugly. Groups are organizing flashmobs as a distraction to go in and rob unsuspecting stores. Seems it’s been an ongoing problem as teens turn a once fun distraction and You Tube sensation into a crime spree. The escalation of destructive teen behavior is shifting from the social classes and areas many have been comfortable allowing them to fester to the areas many have never seen before. Kids are surrounded every day by angry adults constantly talking about how there is no future and everything is terrible. Is it really any wonder they have little respect for their communities and neighbors?

Actress Margot Kidder was arrested at a demonstration against a proposed Tar Sands oil pipeline linking Texas and Canada. Now, whatever your views on the issue of drilling and the oil industry, one item seems to be overlooked in the coverage of the even. Well, it’s actually hiding in plain site. In a post on the CBC News website out of Canada is a photograph of some of the 30 women arrested in the demonstration along with Kidder. In the center picture, which you can see HERE, a woman is being “searched” by police in the open while cameras snap pictures. Quite an invasive procedure for a non violent arrest of “protesting on the sidewalk”. Hate to see what they do to people actually posing a security threat.

Those cheeky corporations are at it again! The behemoths who hold us hostage, take our bailout money and share the rights of an individual are asking for a tax break. Another one. Oh, this one is to “create jobs” though so it’s cool. Wow! Great! How many jobs you ask? Uh…..

*crickets*

…a bunch. The last thing these guys want to do is tell the truth about exactly how many jobs they will create here and how many they will continue to shift overseas. That could be awkward for them. Too bad all the information needed to see how each of these companies will use savings is all in a report called “Outsourced”. Give you three guesses what it’s about.

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace

While there is a legitimate argument to be made against the bus having been manufactured in Canada it was done so under trade agreements we’ve had in place for decades. The point of those trade agreements was to allow American companies to use vendors outside of the country when affordable or suitable vendors could not be found here. This is one of the results of the Bush administration’s blessing the outsourcing of American jobs with it’s policy making. The biggest problem is, everyone seemed to agree with him, including Bill Clinton and Alan Greenspan. The mainstream media and politicians are so in bed with each other there is very little either says that comes with much credibility and this is another example.

Donald Trump still has lots to say about how things should be run, even if he isn’t running for President anymore. If he ever was. According to Trump…

“…almost every aspect of our country is doing poorly.”

That’s some pretty tough words for someone who only stayed out of the mortgage disaster because the guy he hired to run Trump Mortgages LIED on his resume. Trump and the big businesses like him feel they have the right to tell us all how to live and think. They don’t have they power and they do not have the right. Trump wanted desperately to not just get into bu rule the one industry that crippled this country and his plans to run it were right on par with what the market was already doing. As he calls our country a failure and our president “grossly incompetent” his own shortcomings are the only thing that kept him from losing the shirt he insists China is trying to steal from him. Which is a super weird thing to say since Trump’s own shirts are made in China! The one good thing about the mainstream media, they archive everything these days.

As marketers worked harder and harder to sell things to us at ever increasing prices they had to get trickier. During the course of a study it was shown that people are losing their ability to recognize the differences in numbers. One example used was that consumers see a 95 out of 100 rating as better than 9.5 out of 10. Even though that are the same thing. The good thing, once it was pointed out people didn’t make the mistake again with other examples. So remember to read those offers twice and keep in mind, someone is trying to sell you something.

Now, remember all those people who got into mortgages they didn’t really understand the terms of? The ones who felt they had been manipulated? Looks like they probably were. And what’s worst part of it all? The government could have stepped in and helped out the American people while bailing out the banks in the process. They chose to give the banks $1.2 Trillion instead. You know what also adds up to $1.2 Trillion? The amount U.S. homeowners currently owe on 6.5 million delinquent and foreclosed mortgages. That’s right. They could have bailed out the PEOPLE but they chose to bail out CORPORATIONS. The banks would have had their money, people would have had homes and for once the government could have directly helped it’s citizens in an unprecedented act of community and humanity. Looks like the folks in Washington failed to realize that the assistance should have gone to those with too little to fail. And corporation can’t vote. Yet. We’ve got our eye on you.

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace

“As the cost of the American Dream kept rising while real wages did not, households borrowed (mortgages, credit cards, student and car loans). Debts accumulated on the basis of stagnant real wages. That unsustainable credit bubble blew in 2007. Nothing since has significantly relieved or alleviated that basic contradiction.”

The richest people in America made their wealth off of the backs of the poor and working class. As the government insisted everything would turn around we, for some strange reason, kept believing them. For the last 30+ years we have been encouraged to spend and spend more. The fate of the economy always seems to rest in the hands of me paying full price for some new bed sheets I don’t need. If we don’t spend money in the stores they can’t pay the workers and then the factory shuts down and no one wants that. It’s a lot of pressure. But, they just rolled out all this credit and said, hey, we know you’ll eventually pay it back. Mostly. And we have insurance if you don’t. Go ahead, buy that new car you can’t afford, everyone is doing it. And we bought it.

Jobs aren’t going to come soon as the turmoil in Washington is causing businesses to delay hiring until they get some straight answers from the government. Even when they are doing better. Except the same people who promised us the moon didn’t think about wages. Our wages. The ones that haven’t even remotely caught up with inflation. Yeah. You want to bleed us dry but we just don’t have anything left. Eventually, even the cow runs out of milk if you don;t take care of it properly. So here we are watching the finance guys freak out because the big plan to save their beach homes isn’t looking so hot anymore. Perfect. When they come bellowing for their money and we still don’t have it because we have still have no jobs they can decide it’s time. They will not fix this issue until the people of this country stand up and change how we do business with them. They only speak dollar signs and maybe it’s time we took some of them away.

The SEC really knocks one out of the park with this one. Less than a week after releasing new rules to protect whistle blowers someone blew the whistle on THEM! Now, remember the banks and bankers we talked about? The ones who probably caused the financial crisis we’re in now? Well, the SEC allegedly shredded over 9000 pages of documents that proved it. In pure SEC fashion they say they were supposed to shred those documents and it happens all the time. They claim it is nothing more than the way they file things after the case is closed. Shredding them. Aren’t these the guys always busting people for shredding documents?

Looks like, even if all those illegal immigrants had gone down to the old U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services offices they would have just found a bunch of people hacking into each others email and snooping in files. Computer fraud within our government. At least they aren’t outsourcing it anymore.

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace

In today’s news, a whole bunch of people insisting they are ready for the responsibility of running the country, change their minds about some stuff and ignore some other things! Newt Gingrich has decided he hasn’t changed his mind enough about Libya so he’s going to do it some more. The guy can’t seem to make up his mind about making up his mind. Rick Perry is preening over his great job making sure the sanctity of our public schools is protected by making sure every Texas school child learns about evolution AND creationism. Being balanced is super important in this election, you see, and he has to appeal to a wide range of people. Which would be great if Texas didn’t just approve the purchase and use of science books featuring evolution only materials. Remember the days when politicians at least pretended to follow what they said? Me neither.

The Super Congress tasked with deciding what should happen with those tax breaks for people making over a million dollars a year? Their median net worth is $1.2 million, over 10 TIMES that of the average American. Across the board these are people with at least a six figure salary tied to a job that is predicated on the support of big businesses. There is a single person on this committee who won’t directly benefit financial and/or professionally by keeping the Bush-era tax cuts that are crippling our economy. Once again, the most important decisions regarding the fate of our country are in the hands of the wealthy and privileged. The people have no say, no vote, no voice. We are handing over our futures to a room full of people who, for the most part, are in the pockets of corporate America and their special interests.

Members of our elected government seem to think that if they just don’t mention that big check it will go away. The trend in campaign contribution now is “bundling”. It’s where rich people get a whole bunch of other rich people to write checks and then they put them all together. Clever way to get around personal and corporate contribution limits. And practically everyone running does it. Obama has some of the slickest bundlers on his list. Of course, he’s not the only one doing it. He does seem to be the only one admitting to it openly though. Republican nominee Mitt Romney has raised over $18 million dollars, 94% of which came from what they call Large Individual Contributions. These aren’t the $20 sent by your Aunt Gertrude because the man on the flyer looked nice. These are anywhere from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars. At some point you have to wonder how so many people can afford those amounts in this economy. And, I’m sure many of them can’t. Let’s hope it’s money well spent for them.

We should ALL be taking a much closer look at the money behind each and every one of these candidates. Take a gander at what “special interests” your elected officials are receiving cold hard cash from. When you’re done with that, take a look at their voting records. If you find something odd, email them, send them a letter, call them out on Twitter and Facebook, too. Let them know someone is watching them. The mainstream media surely isn’t going to be shining any lights on these people.

Speaking of things we should all be keeping a closer eye on, the Department of Homeland Security is keeping secrets for the TSA again. Joining forces, they are devising plans to install secretive body scanners in a variety of public places and even in mobile units driving around cities. Ignoring the Freedom of Information Act the DOH released a series of redacted and incomplete documents in response to a request made by watchdog group EPIC and EPIC is not having it. They have filed a lawsuit against the DHS to get them to release the 1000 plus pages of documents that may prove corruption with private industry and a plan to invade the privacy and civil liberties of every American in every step of their lives. The entire world is seeing facial recognition technology and closed circuit surveillance cameras being installed at a dizzying pace in their communities. These technologies are not out there to catch terrorists and even the experts agree that they don’t work in doing so even if they were. Once again the threat of terrorism is being used to cull the population into submission. If we are surrounded in every aspect of our lives from home to work by machines to catch those hidden bad guys then we must assume there are a lot of hidden bad guys. Otherwise, why would anyone go to so much trouble and spend so much money? And they wonder why keep invoking the phrase “police state” when discussing their actions?

Drop your representatives a line! They’ve all yelped about transparency for long enough without walking the walk. Let’s get them moving.

The alleged raid and subsequent assassination of Osama Bin Ladin on May 1^st, 2011 has remained a secretive operation. Very little concrete information was given in the first days. The story of what actually happened changed and morphed with each press conference. A straight story has never truly come forth and it seems as if the official government stance on the subject is “case closed”. However, someone apparently got the inside scoop because The New Yorker had a pretty detailed account of the participants, the raid and everything that went down. Only problem is, that Pulitzer Prize-baiting article is nothing more than glorified fiction. Nothing he says can be backed up because he never actually talked to a single source himself. The article is not a piece of investigative journalism. It’s a movie pitch.

As Ron Paul scares the media and Herman Cain claims he would totally impeach Obama if they didn’t expect there to be an actual reason, Tim Pawlenty quietly dropped out of both the Presidential and upcoming Senate races. Maybe that glitter actually got to him.

Of course, Rick Santorum has a brilliant economic theory involving the morals of capitalism. Basically, he thinks if people stopped trying to be gay the economy would recover. See, the breakdown of the FAMILY is our problem. Not the billions we have been spending on the war machine and the young men and women you’ve been sending in to the slaughter both physically and mentally. Nope. It’s because two people who love each other want to make a financial and emotional commitment to one another and allow the government to track it. Clearly, the biggest threat to the bottom line of our budget woes.

As the GOP readies itself for what they think is going to be the easy task of wooing Latino voters, they might want to ready themselves for a challenge. Republicans have historically done well with Latino voters on certain issues but in the wake of two straight years of immigration debate, Latino voters are much more wary. They are in no mood to be pandered to and they are expecting it. I think Miguel Perez of the North County Times said it best…

“They might…bring mariachis to perform at one of their campaign events. But if they have spent years bashing immigrants —- or even looking the other way while the extremists in their ranks behave like fire-breathing bigots —- Latino voters are not likely to sing along with their mariachis.”

It isn’t only the GOP that will struggle to gain the Latino vote but the Democrats and Tea Party might need to start worrying about losing precious numbers to The Tequila Party. They are a growing movement based on the ever increasing sentiment amongst Latinos that they are being marginalized by the political climate. And, instead of recognizing a segment of the population that is lacking a voice and joining forces with common causes, many are just blatantly marginalizing the movement itself. Mark Meckler of the Tea Party Patriots had this to say about The Tequila Party and it’s missions.

“These groups trying to organize like the Tea Party show how terribly they misunderstand the Tea Party movement. Nobody chose the name and decided, ‘Oh, gosh, we need to start a movement.’ It was organic. You can’t force these things. They are trying to force something to look like or have a movement like the Tea Party. It’s simply not possible.”

Pretty sure he just called them “posers”. That’s right, Tea Party Patriots are an organic wonderland of morals and ethics that sprang from your head like a lone dove of peace and understanding. Or a really big scam. Meckler and his fellow “patriots” have done nothing but allow themselves to become a campaign source for a few egomaniacs hell bent on being President. We don’t see them out building houses or cleaning communities. They aren’t hosting food drives or job fairs. They aren’t speaking up against anything but the depiction of their candidates by the media. They are not a party. They are not a movement. They are a street team for right wing extremists.

Where was the Tea Party when Arizona mayoral candidate, Loren Nichols called for the capitol punishment of illegal immigrants. And to be sure this isn’t just one line taken out of context as Nichols went on to say that “(Illegal aliens) should be shot at the border. That’s how much I value America”. It was these, and more remarks, that lead the Tequila Party to stand up and call out the remarks and the sentiments behind them as a clear threat to the community and it’s Latino citizens.

It is these kinds of “politicians” who are bringing down this country in a blaze of ignorance and arrogance. As a leader of a community, no matter how large or small, it is your responsibility to protect both their safety and their liberty. By knowingly inciting hatred, dissent and violence within your community for your own personal gain one proves that the community means nothing to them except in it’s capacity to serve their own self interests and ideologies. Eventually these people will get bored with simply pushing out Latinos, infringing on our personal rights and brokering billion dollar deals for their rich friends. It’s hard to say who will be next on their list to conquer and eliminate.

On a positive note, the Earth is not, I repeat, the Earth NOT expanding!

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace

“Sorry, Jon Stewart, Ron Paul Is Not in the Top Tier”

And they say they’re not elitist? They even manage to confuse their own excuse by first claiming he didn’t really do that well but even if he did….

“Just because Paul performed well in yet another straw poll doesn’t mean we have to pretend that he’s going to compete in the GOP primaries on the level of those three. He’s not, and we all know it.”

So, what the mainstream media has just told us  is that they will decide FOR us what information is deemed important enough for us to know. They will make this decision, not based on factual analysis or even by holding themselves to their own rules of ethics and integrity but by what amounts to “market price”. If they can make ratings with it, you get to know it. Otherwise, don’t worry your pretty little heads about it. They’ll sift through it for us. The abysmal coverage of Ron Paul has not gone unnoticed by those keeping an eye on the ever crumbling ethics of journalism even going as far as to call it  “outrageous and corrupt” and others saying he is “media poison”.

The mainstream media is a series of big corporate media conglomerates that are beholden to big government in order to keep operating. Every tax break, regulation and trick of accounting can’t change the fact that most of the companies running the news media are, in fact, in violation of anti trust laws. They are allowed to operate because lobbyists get politicians to keep raising the bar for what is too big so no one ever really hits the ceiling. If they do, we give them a whole bunch of money and let them go back to business as usual! And these are the people asking us to trust them and what they report without question.

In Iowa it’s all about corn dogs. Well, it’s mostly about the Republican candidates taking pictures at state fairs which is where they keep the corn dogs. Oh, and threatening the current Chairman of the Federal Reserve to a meeting at the bike racks after school.

When a billionaire asks you to raise his taxes maybe you should have the good sense to thank him and not be ungrateful and condescending about it. Michelle Bachmann’s response to Warren Buffett’s call for an end to tax breaks of those making over a million a year was this.

“Write a big check today….There’s nothing you have to wait for.”

Yes, Michelle, there is something he has to wait for. You would know this if you and your colleagues from every side of the aisle in Washington bothered to spend even a millisecond doing your jobs instead of simply applying for the next one.

Politicians today refuse to spend more than a term in office before barreling their way to the top by sheer force. Instead of buckling down, learning to do their jobs really well and being rewarded for that by election to higher office they expect it to happen right away. We are living longer than any time in history and these politicians act like if they don’t get their sticky fingers on a seal by 45 something is wrong. And yet, these same people expect us to allow them to use our name and votes to power their own self interest and agendas. It’s time every elected official in our government had a job performance review done by their constituents. Sure, some might have middle management written all over them but we need to weed out the ones who have just been hanging around mumbling nonsense. Our government is filled to the brim with people who, at their core, believe they are entitled to the positions they hold for a myriad of reasons. Not enough of them realize they are there to SERVE the people not RULE them. There is a difference and these people should know that.

Looks like some of the mainstream media is finally getting around to reporting on the subject of the TSA racially profiling men and women of color based on their hair. Once again the TSA hides behind their very high tech guidelines of hand searching anything “too poofy”. Billions we’ve spent on writing these guidelines, people. BILLIONS.

The ATF sells guns to Mexican drug cartels and the agents involved get a promotion. Seems logical. These are the people who named the operation after a Vin Deisel movie so I guess we can’t be too shocked.

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace

In a strange twist of fate, Ron Paul has gone from the mainstream media’s go-to crazy guy to Mr. Invisible. Cover upon cover of newspapers and magazine in-depth analysis of every blink and murmur from the other candidates and not a peep about Ron Paul. In all those hours covering every mistake, gaffe and silly pose the ever growing menagerie of whacky politicians makes for amusement and ratings they forgot to, maybe, ACCURATELY REPORT THE NEWS. It’s disturbing how the mainstream media has been allowed to continue to ignore their basic responsibility as journalists and yet keep making billions on it.

Americans hear the loud push in Washington for austerity-only measures to be taken with the government spending issues but they fear that courseof action could lead to riots like those in London. And yet, politicians still keep on insisting that it’s the “will of the people” to stand their ground. Which, once again, serves to prove the will of the people is not on these people’s minds at all no matter what comes out of their mouths.

Rural America is headed in all the wrong directions and we all seem to be oblivious to it. The people tasked with overseeing our food, fuel and manufacturing needs are having some of the hardest times ever. Maybe we can put the needs of the middle class on hold for a minute while we try to keep children from starving in our own country. Just an idea. Obama’s grand plan to create the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness, which sounds far more Orwellian than any of us needs right now, has done next to nothing aside from have a couple of meetings to schedule more meetings. The jobs programs this is supposed to put forth are essential to turning things around but with the state of Congress it’s a toss up whether they will show some force and push them through or ignore them until after the elections. In the meantime, millions wonder how they are going to buy a loaf of bread tomorrow.

If the government can’t get these areas of the country back on track the corporations will do it. And it will be nothing short of peasantry and corporate landed gentry across the backbone of America. They will own the factories and farms that produce the food. They will own the land. They will own the apartment or house you rent. They will own the mortgage on your house. They will own the loan on your car. They will own the factory that makes your car. They will own the town hall and the local baseball fields. The culture, history and heart of rural America will be painted with Citi-fields and Target-Highways. Individual citizens will no longer be able to afford to live without immersing themselves into the corporate soup. You used to be able to choose who got the money you earned. Now we are left with Big Greedy Conglomerate #1 , Big Greedy Conglomerate #2 or Shady But Outwardly Socially Conscious Corporate Subsidiary for every choice from phone lines to oil changes. All because every dollar we give to the shadiest of the big corporations goes straight to Washington to keep the machine running. Great system. Can’t imagine why we might want to fix it.

An American diplomat in India managed to refer to her own unwashed skin as being just like theirs. Get it? She was dirty from the train ride and looked BROWN. Like the poor people in India. Racial awareness is tough. We pay these people, right? Clearly, money well spent.

Finally, a good teacher voluntarily left his job at a Christian university after publishing a paper daring to suggest SCIENCE might have a point when it comes to taking the whole Adam and Eve business literally. Now, it’s a private university so they are free to do whatever they want and be as inclusive or exclusive as they see fit. As soon as they start paying taxes instead of getting a break because they “work for God” we can discuss their freedom to let amazing, dedicated educators go because someone wants to believe in a tale about an evil fruit tree.

*Image Source

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace

The new summer blockbuster, Super Congress, is coming together nicely. Looks like it’ll be a well balanced, focused group of people ready to get in there and start arguing over what an entitlement is and who should get them. Hopefully they get a dictionary or something to help them out.

In case you weren’t aware that whole Freedom of Religion thing? Yeah, that’s, like, totally just for Jesus-types. Silly me I guess I’ve been reading the darn thing wrong this whole time. I mean, I guess it must be in there. That seems like an awfully big thing to leave out. Oh, right, this is coming from the spokesman of an organization designated as a “hate group” by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Seems like the only way to not get into a scuffle over religion is to be an Atheist, right? Nope. Take the Director for the American Atheists, Blair Scott, who appeared on Fox News recently and has now received more than 8000 DEATH THREATS on the Fox News Facebook Page alone. Most are unintelligible blather but the ones that name what gauge rifle they would use to kill Atheists with only brings the point home. We need to calm down.

If the recent riots in London teach us anything it is that we are terrible examples for our youth. Wretched, really. We scream and yell and refuse to acknowledge facts an infant could comprehend. There’s fighting for what you believe in and there is believing you are owed a fight because of it. It’s becoming clear that the people in our government are far too busy stroking their ideologies for the camera like every day is fight night.

The country needs revenue. Why not just go full steam and make the legislative process a Pay-Per-View brawl. It’s pretty much already just a bunch of adults dancing around, screaming nonsense and threatening to beat each other to a pulp. At least this way we’d get some amusement out of the whole thing.

Have a great weekend folks and remember…

“You measure a democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists.”
-Abbie Hoffman

Keep fighting. Keep talking. Keep Asking.

Byline: Team Ventura & Tabetha Wallace