As the time for new business at the Amazon shareholder meeting Thursday morning arrived, the audience grew restless. For those of us holding legal proxies or actual shares, a confrontation was coming on issues around political disclosure, climate change, ALEC funding, workplace conditions and Amazon's corporate taxes.

Two shareholder initiatives had qualified for the official ballot: Climate change transparency and accountability and transparency about corporate political contributions to candidates and organizations.

In addition to Jeffrey Bezos, Amazon's board of directors consists of venture capitalists and corporate CEOs, which is fairly typical for a public company. That group, for whatever reason, decided to recommend against political transparency and a climate change disclosure and transparency policy.

Amazon and Political Transparency

Bruce Herbert is founder and CEO of Newground Social Investment, and he was the author and filer of the political disclosure resolution, which he read aloud at the meeting. The resolution called for disclosure and review of all corporate political contributions, who they were paid to, identification of the Amazon official authorizing the disclosure with a statement of their purpose in authorizing it, and for all information on these expenditures to be posted on the Company website.

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Forgive the cheap riff on Olbermann's Worst Person in the World designation, but if the epithet fits, no one wears it better than Glenn Beck.

All that apologizing for racist comments he did last year? Yeah, not so much. Now listen to the clip at the top and try to count how many dog whistles he jammed into 64 seconds.

With regard to President Obama:

BECK: When you see a typical person like the president of BP, he [Obama] has a reaction that has been bred into him.

Now that actually kind of works. It does, if you understand who his parents were, and who his grandparents were. Because they're not really the typical white people.

His mother wasn't. His mother was a revolutionary.

His father wasn't. A revolutionary.

His grandparents, they went to the communist Little Red Church just outside Seattle. They had communist friends.

So it's almost like Marxism has been bred into him.

Yep, piling scum on scum: Beck is once again viciously and falsely smearing Obama's parents. Doesn't he claim to have a rule that "you leave the families alone"?

I really hate writing about Glenn Beck because I'd like to make him a footnote on the back end of history. He's the equivalent of a two-bit carnival barker with a shape-shifting magical box, where he can put facts in and pull them out as bull.

But after reading Over the Cliff and previewing Bill Press' new book, the emerging trend is too scary to ignore.

With each passing day the rhetoric gets more violent, more ridiculous, loaded with even more hyperbole and scary images, with the sole intention of stoking fear, anger, and loathing into those with ears to hear.

If they win the propaganda war, it will be because we didn't call it out when we saw it and call it what it is: bare, naked racism blended with a scary witches' brew of long-standing key terms, fears, and biases.

This is why law student Angelo Carusone listens to four hours of Glenn Beck every day and then pushes advertisers to drop their ads from his show. It's his mission: to make it more and more difficult for Beck to have a platform to spew this nonsense.

He's successful, too. He's gotten hundreds of advertisers to drop their sponsorship. In the UK, Beck's show has NO advertisers. None. While this might not cause Fox to drop his show entirely, it does expose the Murdoch agenda quite clearly. After all, any businessman without an agenda would have dropped him like a hot potato when the revenue to support the show dried up.

But no. Beck is such a lowlife scumbag that he just ramps up the nasty a few more notches and carries on, while all the time claiming to be a patriot.

What he is is a whore. Plain and simple.

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I have to give Max Blumenthal, who I had the pleasure of hosting here in Seattle this past week, credit for coming up with the ideal question to ask the fans of Glenn Beck who showed up Saturday in the Seattle area to root for their favorite right-wing fearmonger:

Do you think President Obama hates white people?

The first person I asked was Sean Salazar, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate -- he wants to take on Sen. Patty Murray, and so far appears to be leading the GOP field -- standing outside Safeco Field, where Beck's Seattle event was held.

Salazar, as you can see, hedged and stammered and then quickly found someone else to talk to. But he typified the response in Seattle: "When did Glenn Beck say that? Really? He said that? Well, I need to see the context." One woman said that "Beck explained that," but I pointed out to her that all he said was that he was sorry how it was worded, but that it's still a "serious" question Americans need to be asking. So I was asking them.

I also asked the man who was carrying the big sign making fun of Beck. He pointed out how white the crowd was. And it was true, particularly inside the stadium (more on that shortly). Eventually, I did manage to find an African-American man who was outside gathering signatures on behalf of Ron Paul's "Campaign for Liberty." He said he wasn't going in to see Beck.

Finally, right at the end, I did encounter one honest soul. As you can see.

I met many, many more of these folks at the Beck rally in Mount Vernon later that afternoon and into the evening. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to capture most of them on video (a camera burp) -- just one couple towards the end of the evening. But I had at least five different people at Mount Vernon, supporters of Beck's, tell me they firmly believed Obama was a racist who hated white people.

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The scene at Mount Vernon was radically different from the one in Seattle. Outside Safeco, there were only 30 or so anti-Beck protesters. Everyone evidently saved their energies for Mount Vernon, where the mayor, a Republican named Bud Norris, unwisely decided to give the hometown-boy-gone-bigtime the keys to the city.

Locals chanted: "Change the locks! Change the locks!" And there were hundreds of them; the crowd estimate was at about a thousand, including several hundred pro-Beck counter-protesters. Those were the folks I talked to the most, and the toxic Obama-hatred was far stronger among this group than it was with the attendees in Seattle.

Fortunately, they were badly outnumbered.

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I've been in California this week, but my friend Goldy back in Seattle managed to make it out to last week's massive rally in support of health-care reform.

There were several thousand people there, with only a tiny smattering of teabaggers opposed to reform. Goldy has photos and reportage on just how large the support for a public option was.

And yet, guess what? The media completely ignored the rally. Even the local paper -- the ostensibly neutral but in fact Republican-run Seattle Times -- ran not one single word about it.

Of course, forget about the national media bothering to report this, too.

They've been too busy telling us that the public option is dead because of the supposedly massive opposition to it created by teabaggers.

As Goldy says:

None of this happened yesterday in downtown Seattle because no ex-marine angrily yelled down a congressman and nobody got the tip of their finger bitten off and nothing apparently is going to get the media to move from the well-entrenched meme that support for reform is steadily slipping as the public turns against Obama and the Democratic Congress… not even a show of force by the public itself.

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There are some things that are always constant. It rains a lot in Seattle, their coffee is great and it's north of California. And whenever Bill O'Reilly feels threatened he summons Juan Williams to appear on The Factor to apologize for BillO's actions. Last night Juan did his job well. He plays a good faux liberal when BillO needs one. Just remember, "when O'Reilly's in a jam, who's he gonna call? JuanBusters." Check this out.

Williams: There are people who are going to try and use this now to make others who have critical of a women having the right to choose, make that into a political tool to beat people up and to try and convince people that these are all extremists and the fact is that you're not extremist. There are a lot of people who by a matter of conscience are troubled by abortion, especially late term abortion and I know you O'Reilly, what you did is you said it bothered you personally and there's nothing wrong with that.

----

But let me just say, they're going after you, Bill O'Reilly and I've never heard you say to block a clinic , I've never heard you say to create violence to intimidate women who are legally seeking an abortion. I've never heard you say go after the doctor's, berate them, certainly not kill them. Never. Never! Not true.

No, he just used his ambush producers to stalk him.

Oh, my friend Brian Russell was on that segment.

And of course he doesn't want to be a vigilante but...

And if I could get my hands on Tiller -- well, you know. Can't be vigilantes. Can't do that. It's just a figure of speech.

David Neiwert has an excellent post with with some great video.

Bill O'Reilly has Dr. George Tiller's blood on his well-stained hands

O'Reilly similarly accused anyone who refused to buy into his accusation of coddling killers:

I don’t care what you think. We have incontrovertible evidence that this man is executing babies about to be born because the woman is depressed…if you don’t believe me, I don’t care…You are OK with Dr. Tiller executing babies about to be born because the mother says she’s depressed.

O'Reilly later attacked Kathleen Sebelius for her refusal to prosecute Tiller. And he kept it up. As recently as this spring he again spent a segment excoriating Tiller as a murderer. Priscilla at Newshounds ran through the file in March.

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Both in his Talking Points Memo segment and later on in "Policing the Net," Bill O'Reilly is shocked, shocked that those dirty-minded liberals at that competing network actually had a little fun with the "Tea Bag" protests.

In the later segment, O'Reilly brings on Amanda Carpenter, who can't bring herself to openly reference "teabagging," and the Gallant Sir O'Reilly won't let her go there. Of course these scumsucking perverts earn nothing but contempt from him for their dirty-mindedness and low sexual mores.

So sayeth the author of Those Who Trespass:

"Say baby, put down that pipe and get my pipe up."

"I would like you to unhook your bra and let it slide down your arms. You can keep your shirt on."

"Cup your hands under your breasts and hold them for ten seconds."

Funny thing: I always thought it was liberals who lacked a sense of humor.

We can only hope they don't decide to hold any Bareback Parties, or Fudgepacking Parties. Or even worse, Santorum Parties. It will drive us all insane with suppressed laughter.

Meanwhile, I'm sure Amanda and Bill will be appalled, but I had to share this shot from a lonely liberal who showed up too early yesterday (like me) at Seattle's Tea Bag party site:

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I went to Seattle's "Tea Party" last night and hung out and took some not-very-good video. I'm still working on that skillset. But I thought I'd share it anyway.

But I did manage to ask a few interesting questions. I especially enjoyed talking to the Birther couple.

I'll have some thoughts about what it all means later.

I'm supposed to go to a Santa Monica tea party, but I'm swamped here. Neiwert went to one in Seattle. In Chicago the wackos are out in force.

Wingnut: He's a fascist.

Roesgen: Why do you say he's a fascist? He's the President of the United States. Do you realize how offensive that is?

Wingnut: I think he's a fascist.

Roesgen: Why?

Wingnut: Because he is.

She then questions a man asking him what does any of this have to do with taxes...

Then we have this: Parts of WH in lockdown after tea bags thrown over gate. Protestors yelling death to president. #teaparty

Amanda: MSNBC: White House lawn evacuated bc someone threw a tea bag over the fence.

The crazies are out in force today. be careful.

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The Seattle Times: (h/t miss kitty)

Eighth Congressional District candidate Darcy Burner's Eastside home went up in flames today.

The fire started between 7 and 7:30 a.m. on the 3600 block of West Ames Lake Drive Northeast near Redmond, fire authorities said.

The cause of the blaze remains unknown.[..]

Her 5-year-old son, Henry, came into her and her husband's bedroom around 7 a.m. screaming there was a fire in his room, Burner said.

"I scooped him up and got him out of the house," she said. Everyone, including the family's golden retriever Bruce Wayne, made it out uninjured, but their cat did not survive.[..]

Burner said she hadn't yet considered whether the fire would impact her campaign.

"I am today focused on my family and just really grateful that my family is OK," she said. "Tomorrow I'll wake up and figure out what comes next."

Goldy has more...

UPDATED: If you'd like to help, www.helpdarcy.com has been launched: (from email)

People can leave comments of support (we'll collect a large sample and put them on a physical message board which we will give to the family) upload photos of the family to replace the recorded memories that burned, use the actblue link to make a contribution, etc. Eventually we'll also post a list of things the family needs when Darcy gets that to us. We'll also add more tools and features as needed.

Never Make Your Move Too Soon from the album of the same name (h/t miss kitty)

More Ernestine Anderson here, here and here.

EURweb:

Jazz vocalist Ernestine Anderson, who once worked with Quincy Jones and Ray Charles, is facing foreclosure on her home in Seattle after falling behind more than $30,000 in payments and penalties, public records show.

Family and friends of the singer are pleading for $45,000 in donations to save her Central District home, reports the Associated Press.

James Kelly, president of the Urban League of Seattle, said counselors will try to find out how Anderson got a loan that now asks for a monthly payment of $5,000. Gayton said Anderson's monthly income is $1,000 from Social Security, and at her age of 79, her performances are limited

Ms. Anderson has only until June 30 to come up with a payment or lose her home. An account has been set up at Bank of America. Donations can be made at any branch to The Ernestine Anderson Fund.