From Judy Gumbo Albert:

Forty years ago this week I was in Chicago at the Democratic Convention– not as a delegate but as a member of the theatrical, countercultural, media-savvy  protest group known as the Yippies. Then, as now, the Democratic Party was severely internally divided -- about race rather than gender, but especially over the war in Vietnam. We – Yippie leaders Abbie and Anita Hoffman, Jerry Rubin and Nancy Kurshan, my then boyfriend and later husband Stew Albert, the folksinger Phil Ochs and journalist Paul Krassner -- came to the Convention to hold a Festival of Life and nominate a pig for president. Our candidate, Pigasus, would, we believed, be infinitely more attractive to young people than the Democrat’s pro-war candidate Hubert Humphrey.   Abbie, Anita, Jerry, Phil and Stew are all gone now, and, although I don’t expect the events described here to occur in Denver, our country is, as in 1968, engaged in an immoral and illegal war overseas that has been used by our current elected officials to put more draconian restrictions on dissent and freedom of speech than I once faced confronting the Democrats in Chicago. What follows is my recollection of those events.

    It’s always the old
    Who lead us to the war
    It’s always the young who fall
    But look at all we’ve won
    With a saber and a gun
    Tell me is it worth it all?
    I ain’t marchin’ any more
    No I ain’t marchin’ anymore

    Phil Ochs

Read more of Judy Gumbo Albert's experience of the 1968 DNC at CounterPunch.

American Rights at Work launched a national television ad campaign to educate the public on the critical issues facing America’s struggling middle class. The ads, which begin airing on Monday, Sept. 1, will build on the broad public support for the Employee Free Choice Act, a bipartisan bill in Congress that will help workers achieve the American Dream by giving them the freedom to choose a union.

American Rights at Work is releasing these ads in celebration of Labor Day as part of a huge, new coordinated effort among workers' rights advocates, progressives, and labor unions to champion this legislation, which passed the House last year and garnered majority support in the Senate. The effort includes paid advertising through national cable outlets and states throughout the country, including Oregon, Alaska, Louisiana, Mississippi, Minnesota, New Hampshire, and Maine. The state-based ads will focus on educating the public on the positions’ of political leaders, and urging the public to call them to express their support for the legislation in the Senate.

Join in: meetthebloggers.org

Legendary activist filmmaker Michael Moore returns today to talk about the broken election system and the first ten things the Obama administration should do if elected. Joining Mike will be nationally syndicated author and blogger David Sirota, as well as Cheryl Contee of Jack & Jill Politics.

Next week, September 5th 2008, the guest host will be musician/actor Henry Rollins! Tune in on Friday at 1pm ET for the live webcast.

http://meetthebloggers.org

If you found yourself saying last week's episode of Meet the Bloggers wasn't long enough, then you're in for a real treat. Legendary activist filmmaker Michael Moore returns today to talk about the broken election system and the first ten things the Obama administration should do if elected. Joining Mike will be nationally syndicated author and blogger David Sirota, as well as Cheryl Contee of Jack & Jill Politics.

Meet the Bloggers is a viewer-driven show, which means we need you to sound off and voice your opinions in our live blog and online polls during the show. We need you to submit comments and make suggestions about which guests you'd like to see in the future, or which issues you'd like to have discussed. And we need you to build this show by getting your friends and coworkers to check it out.

No other news show offers the same level of in-depth analysis that is enhanced by comments from its audience. So tune into Meet the Bloggers today at 1pm ET/10am PT, and help us raise the level of political discourse in our country. And if you missed any episode of the show, you can always check them out in the Meet the Bloggers archive.

From Andrea Batista Schlesinger:

Is all of the House of Representatives and one-third of the Senate up for election in November? In the midst of all of the talk of vice presidential choices, Paris Hilton and who is the real celebrity, and how much was raised this quarter by the DNC and RNC, I almost forgot.

Well, I didn't forget. I can't forget. But things are seriously amiss when it comes to the attention paid to The Other Election day happening on November 4 - and, frankly, on how much people know or follow Congress at all. When 72% of middle-class Americans can't name a single bill passed by Congress in the last two years that benefited them or their families, we have a problem on our hands.

Now I'm not expecting people to have encyclopedic knowledge of the voting records of their representatives, but in a time in which the minimum wage was increased and college made more affordable and a stimulus package passed, that percentage speaks to a profound disconnect between people and their policymakers that festers in a culture in which reporting on Congress is confused with political horseracing.

Join us: meetthebloggers.org

Michael Moore will be the guest next Friday, August 22nd at 1pm ET.

On this week's Meet the Bloggers, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) talked about the collapse of the middle class in our country, the growing class war, and ways of ending the economic crisis.

Sen. Sanders was joined by bloggers, including Isaiah Poole (Campaign for America's Future) and Amanda Logan (Center for American Progress).

From Media Matters' Eric Boehlert:

Coveted assignments for presidential debate moderators were handed out last week, and guess who was left off the list ... again.

After suffering the bitter, and unprecedented, blow during the Democratic primary season of having candidates refuse -- twice -- to appear in Fox News-sponsored forums when bloggers raised hell about the news organization's lack of legitimacy, Rupert Murdoch's news channel was again left off the list of news anchors tapped to moderate the must-see TV events in the fall.

Instead, the questions during the three presidential forums and one vice presidential debate will be posed by PBS' Jim Lehrer and Gwen Ifill, as well as NBC's Tom Brokaw and CBS' Bob Schieffer.

Unlike the primaries, Fox News this time won't be locked out entirely; all the networks will be able to broadcast the debates. But the snub means that once again Fox News will be denied the chance to leave its imprint on the all-important debates. It won't be able to build its brand on the back of Democrats who have injected extraordinary passion and interest into the White House run. 

Take part: meetthebloggers.org

The first episode of Meet the Bloggers. Host Cenk Uygur, guest Arianna Huffington and bloggers Marcy Wheeler, Nico Pitney, Liliana Segura, Roberto Lovato, Baratunde Thurston discuss whether Karl Rove should be sent to jail for failing to comply with the House Judiciary Committee's subpoena

Join us: meetthebloggers.org

Host Cenk Uygur and guest Senator Harry Reid, along with bloggers Kevin Grandia, Nico Pitney, and Matt Stoller discuss the energy crisis and the notion of offshore drilling.