Redneck Liberal

Barack Obama, Best Republican President in the Last 30 Years?

2010-12-16T13:38:00.000-06:00

I feel the need to apologize for the post I made back on 4 November, 2008.

Sorry, I was just giddy thinking that after eight years of George W. Bush the country was about to do a one eighty thanks to the fiery, young, go-getter we'd just elected as our President. Is my face red!

I mean, the chance to be one of the really great ones was right there and if even an semi-literate country boy like me realized it, then surely the erudite, Harvard Lawyer would jump right on top of it.

Hell, all you had to do was to go after the Bush Administration to show the American People that shady goings-on, read that probable criminal activities/definite unethical actions, were not to be tolerated, even at the highest levels. History backs this up, just look what happened because Tip O'Neill thought that the country didn't need an investigation into Iran/Contra, most of the crooks involved in that wound up in
W's administration, at least the ones that didn't have a job at Fox News.

OK, maybe Barack's just not as bloodthirsty as I am, maybe he just wants to show what a nice guy he is or maybe he just wants to show the Republicans that he is willing to work with the people who everyone knows have absolutely no intention of doing crap for him. And to prove his good intentions he even waters down the Stimulus Package, the one thing that would create jobs and keep the economy ginning to get a little love from the Right. Right.

But now it's time to finally catch America up with the rest of the civilized world and get universal health care. Barack promptly sat on the sidelines and let conservative Democrats or Blue Dogs and Republicans draft the legislation while health industry financed "grassroots" Teabaggers to yell inanities and frame the argument. So we got more of the same with minor improvements and major perks to the Health Insurance Industry.

Iraq and Afghanistan, the money hungry, unnecessary wars that should be history, ain't. Guantanamo, yes, American justice for all, no. Prisoner renditions and spying on American citizens still going on.

No doubt, except in Right Wing Fantasyland, Global Warming is the biggest problem facing the planet today, Barack talked the talk, however ... Well, you know.

The biggest problem facing the country is the widening income gap between the incredibly wealthy and everybody else. Honestly, you have to be Teabagger stupid not to understand that 1% of the population getting 24% of the income is a major economic problem, not for the 1%, of course. Barack's solution?
Keep shoveling the money to the top 2% like a Republican wet dream.

In his defense Obama knows where the real fault lies and he's not bashful about letting everyone know who's really at fault here. Now think about this, it was the left that supported Obama, sent the money for his campaign and stood firm while the Right Wing Propaganda Machine lied about everything he was trying to do, the GOP and Blue Dogs on the Hill wouldn't lift a finger to pass good legislation, so naturally Obama rags on the left.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs scolded what he called "the professional left" for its vocal objections to President Barack Obama's record. "These people ought to be drug tested," Gibbs said. "They will be satisfied when we have Canadian health care and we've eliminated the Pentagon. That's not reality. They wouldn't be satisfied if Dennis Kucinich was president." Later, Gibbs said he had spoken "inartfully."

“This is the public-option debate all over again,” Mr. Obama complained, adding: “Now, if that’s the standard by which we are measuring success or core principles, then, let’s face it, we will never get anything done. People will have the satisfaction of having a purist position and no victories for the American people. And we will be able to feel good about ourselves and sanctimonious about how pure our intentions are and how tough we are, and in the meantime, the American people are still seeing themselves not able to get health insurance because of pre-existing condition, or not being able to pay their bills because their unemployment insurance ran out.”

Yeah, it kinda is the public-option debate all over again, I mean you pretty much whiffed on that one and we we're kinda hoping that you'd learned not to give up the farm for a crap piece of legislation and an illusional sense of accomplishment.

Actually, not getting anything done would be an improvement. For those of us in the lower four quintiles going back to the pre-Bush tax cuts wouldn't be much of a stretch, hardly any of us noticed them and if it would help the deficit, then go for it. But looking at the big picture here...

Sorry, 2005 was the best I could do, trust me those top lines have gone even higher in the last five years.

Take a look at how the lower four quintile's incomes have gone up maybe 20% and mostly less since 1980, while the top quintile went up close to 80%. Now this top quintile was supposed to be creating jobs with those tax cuts and we all know how that worked out.

Now take a look at the top 1%, two freaking hundred percent increase in income and this has accomplished what? An accumulation of this country's finite wealth in the hands of fewer people. This is a policy that you want to continue, Mr. President?

I voted for change not lame and I the one who's supposed to be on top of this. So I apologize for letting myself be fooled by another so-called Democrat who would seem to rather roll over than stand for principles.

BTW, unemployment benefits would have been extended regardless. Hell, even the GOP knows what would happen to them if they put millions of Americans out on the street.

Later

100 Reasons Not To Vote For Dan Boren.

2010-06-30T21:36:00.001-05:00

If you're a real Democrat here's 100 good reasons not to vote for Dan Boren. Over just the last two years Dan has voted against his party 100 times, I don't know how you feel about your Democratic Congressman voting with the other side, but as far as I'm concerned I've already had way too much of our Republican Lite.

Later

Dan Boren Does It Again.

2010-06-27T18:42:00.001-05:00

OK, so this is not about health care, but I've already used my favorite Blue Dog pic and I figured you could handle the extra information.

Besides, this is just an adjunct to the last post on Dan Boren, my Democratic Congressman who votes like a good Repubican.

Here's the latest from the man I personally heard say just the other day that he "votes for Oklahomans", yeah, I know, I gagged when I heard it.

Anyway, he has just shown where he really stands when it comes to his vote. Care to guess? With Oklahomans (other than the Tea Party variety)? With the Democrats? With the People? Or none of the above?

This morning at the Democratic caucus, the message from leadership to Blue Dogs unwilling to support a new campaign finance measure requiring more disclosure in political advertising -- wise up.

The bill -- a response to the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision -- passed this afternoon, 219-206. There were 36 Democrats -- members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) and Blue Dogs -- who voted against it. Many Blue Dogs feared retribution from the business community in an already tough election year if they had voted for the legislation.

So in a huddle with rank-and-file members this morning, Democratic leaders told Blue Dogs they should ignore threats from the bill's chief opponent, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber endorses the occasional Democrat, albeit infrequently, but leaders made the case that Blue Dogs aren't likely to be rewarded by the usually pro-GOP group for blocking the bill.

"The Chamber is playing hardball to derail this bill," a Democratic leadership aide told TPMDC. "Why give them an upper hand in elections by not forcing them to disclose who is funding their ads?"

Leaders also have been telling members privately they should be on the same side as President Obama, "not Karl Rove and Rush Limbaugh," the aide said. The bill would require CEOs to stand by their ads, in addition to other transparency measures, and Democrats believe it will be an election-year victory to show that they side with the people while GOP tries to protect corporations.

Well, you have to give Dan credit for firmly standing by his $principles$.

Late Update: Rep. Dan Boren (D-OK) is among the Blue Dogs to vote "Nay" today. He was endorsed by the chamber yesterday.

I have a lot to thank Dan for, George W. Bush used to practically write this blog for me and now there's another clueless Rightie to do my work for me.

Later

Dan Boren, Democrat? Not Really. Blue Dog? Oh, Yeah.

2010-06-26T03:25:00.000-05:00

I first blogged about Dan Boren back in 2006, I was getting a little tired of my supposed Democratic Congressman voting with the Republicans. Four years later nothing has changed.

You would think that even the folks who don't keep up with political goings on would have noticed something when Dan voted against the people in his district and for the Health Insurance Industry on health care reform. Dan's going to vote for the people who pay him, not for the people who vote for him.

Industry Total Indivs   PACs

Oil & Gas $150,200 $51,950 $98,250

Lawyers/Law Firms $56,699 $47,699 $9,000

Casinos/Gambling $51,450 $50,450   $1,000

Health Professionals $42,000 $32,500 $9,500

Insurance $29,000 $2,000 $27,000

Retail Sales $26,250 $250   $26,000

Commercial Banks $25,150   $20,150 $5,000

Electric Utilities $23,750 $1,250 $22,500

Democratic/Liberal $20,500 $500 $20,000

Hospitals/Nursing Homes $18,800 $4,800 $14,000

Lobbyists $18,262 $17,050 $1,212

Crop Production & Basic Processing $18,050 $1,550   $16,500

Telephone Utilities $16,500 $0 $16,500

Food & Beverage $16,500   $1,000 $15,500

Mining $16,400 $0 $16,400

Misc Finance $15,900 $15,900   $0

Building Materials & Equipment $14,325 $2,325 $12,000

Real Estate $14,200 $10,200 $4,000

Human Rights $13,850 $13,850 $0

Business Services $13,850 $12,850 $1,000

Big Oil, Big Banks, for profit Health Care Industry, the Big Telecoms over Net Neutrality, in other words, the Players over the people.

Since 1990, Big Oil has invested around $144 million in the careers of congressmen, almost all conservatives. Almost 70% of the payoff have gone to Republicans. And among current members of the House there's only one Democrat in Big Oil's Top 10: Dan Boren ($565,460). As you can see, Big Oil is, by far, the biggest source of cash for his political endeavors. What you haven't been able to see, until Fox caught it on tape, is that Boren, who bragged about not voting for Obama and who has voted against virtually every piece of Democratic legislation since Obama has become president, has never found anything in the oil industry's agenda that he didn't get behind.

Take a look at Boren's Interest Group Ratings. If you happen to be a paranoid delusional who believes that everybody's trying to take your guns away, then Dan's your man. Well, actually he's the NRA's man, but they'll both be happy to validate your paranoia and delusions.

A couple of the more interesting things in the Interest Group Ratings is his high score among the Religious Right, like the Family Research Council, an anti-gay, anti women's rights group who would gladly do away the the Constitution and replace it with their particular interpretation of the Bible.

Another is the American Family Association, anti-gay, anti-women's rights and anti-labor and doing the Lord's work in deregulating the oil industry. Seriously. And Dan scored 100% with them.

The American Family Association (AFA) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that promotes conservative Christian values[1][2][3][4] such as traditional marriage, anti-pornography, and pro-life activism,[5] as well as other public policy goals such as deregulation of the oil industry and lobbying against the Employee Free Choice Act.[6]

My personal favorite is the 83% Dan got from ACT! for America. You know it's good stuff when it's featured on Loonwatch.com.

ACT! for America has a problem. Its first problem is that it was founded by Brigitte Gabriel. Yes, the same Brigitte Gabriel the New York Times called a “radical Islamophobe” and who in the past has made statements like “Arabs have no soul,” and “Arabs are barbarians.” She might be novel eye candy for some (which I’m guessing is the reason Bill Maher had her on his show) but it is clear that Brigitte Gabriel is a whacked out fundamentalist with a seething rage against Muslims and a determination on the one hand to destroy Islam and on the other to make as much profit in the process.

Just a piece of Boren's more recent voting record, he voted no to beefing up the Endangered Species Amendment and voted yes on anti-enviornment Richard Pombo's (R-CA) Endangered Species Reauthorization Bill. Pombo believes that land developers are endangered.

Dan voted no on Employment, Infrastructure, and Transportation Appropriations, read that job creation and unemployment extention. Democrat bill.

He voted no on oversight of this country's financial institutions. Democrat bill.

Voted no on capping carbon dioxide emissions. Democrat bill.

Voted no to allow federal judges to reduce interest rates or extend repayment in order for people to keep their homes. Democrat bill.

Voted no on hate crimes and employment discrimination. Democrat bills. Boren did vote yes on a couple of employment discrimination amendments.

Voted no to keep the Fed from interfering with state marijauna laws. Obviously a Democratic bill. And as a former chemo patient, trust me, those state laws are a wonderful thing.

It looks like Dan is pro-war, pro-permenant military bases in Iraq and Afghanistan and pro-torture, judging by his vote on this Democratic bill. Iraq Related Provisions such as a Troop Withdrawal, a Permanent Base Ban, and Limiting Interrogation Techniques

Voted no to expand the G.I. Bill. Democratic.

Voted no to an Equal Pay bill with some teeth in it. Another obviously Democratic bill.

Voted no to oil companies being environmentally responsible or responsible, period.

To be honest, not all of Dan Boren's votes are bad. But the ones that are effect women's rights, gay rights, labor, the environment and almost always favor Big Business over the working class. It's not just Dan, it's the whole Blue Dog Democrat Coalition, they are little more than Republicans masquerading as Democrats.

Dan will probably win, but it's a shame that Oklahoma doesn't have a real Democrat in D.C.. The Blue Dogs claim to be fiscal conservatives, but that's just better than saying that they sell their vote to the highest bidder. You know, just like Republicans.

Later.

ECON 101: Democrats, Not Republicans, Are The Real Fiscal Conservatives.

2010-06-08T01:07:00.000-05:00

OK, the Right has been putting out their "Tax and Spend" garbage about Democrats for a lot of years now. But like most of the stuff that comes from the Right it has very little to do with, well actual reality, as you can see from the graph above.

Keep in mind that the hero of the Right and most Teabaggers, Ronald Reagan, is considered the prototypical model of the ideal president, no "Tax and Spender" was he. Of couse, this is mythology. Ronald Reagan was no taxer, he cut the taxes for the richest among us and left the rest of us to take up the slack. But Ron was a spender, a bigtime, Hollywood Blowout kind of a spender. He tripled the national debt and turned this country from the largest lender in the world into the largest debtor in the world.

In order to cover new federal budget deficits, the United States borrowed heavily both domestically and abroad, raising the national debt from $700 billion to $3 trillion,[21] and the United States moved from being the world's largest international creditor to the world's largest debtor nation

So remember this when you see our teabaggin' friends out prostesting the socialists and yearning for the Reagan years. BTW, those socialists that they're protesting against are us.

And Obama owns all the national debt now, according to the Right. It's an interesting phenomenon that the Right only discovered the debt after Bush was out of office. You can see by the chart below that Obama does own part of the debt. But the choice was clear, either spend or enter another Great Depression. And since those of us on the left have functioning hearts and brains, we opted to spend and we'll have to spend more if we want to generate the economy in order to create jobs. I don't mean spend on Wall Street and Big Banks, but spend on the mainstreet level, spend on research for new job creating technologies, spend putting people to work fixing our crumbling intrastructure. Or we could use the other side's model of letting the market sort every thing out. If we did that, my guess would be that we would become a wholly owned subsidiary of China and that the Right would be first in line to suck up their new masters.

And now for someting completely different, 10 Lessons for Tea Baggers.

Later.

Progressive Jim Wilson Will Run Against Dan Boren.

2010-06-07T00:03:00.001-05:00

It looks like we'll have a chance to replace our resident Republican Lite, Blue Dog Democrat with the real deal in the July 27th primaries.

Very few Democrats in Oklahoma have what it takes to stand up for what's right. For some reason, a good many of our Democratic politicians and party leaders feel that keeping someone who wets their panties when the Right says "boo" is preferable to a principled individual who will fight for the working class.

Win or not, the good news is that we have a few good people in the state who won't knuckle under to conservative pressure.

The bad news is that we may not have enough voters in the electorate who have not totally succumbed to the omnipresent right wing propaganda to understand that a vote for Boren is a vote against their own best self interests.

From Okie Funk.

It’s probably an understatement to argue that this has not been a great year for progressive Oklahoma Democrats so far.

No viable Democratic candidate has emerged to challenge U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn. Both Democratic gubernatorial candidates, Lt. Gov. Jari Askins and Attorney General Drew Edmondson, trail U.S. Rep. Mary Fallin in polling. The Republican-dominated legislature continued its destructive, ideological spree at the state Capitol pretty much unabated and sometimes helped by conservative Democrats.

So it was fantastic news for progressives to learn that state Sen. Jim Wilson, a Democrat from Tahlequah, has announced he will challenge Blue Dog U.S. Rep. Dan Boren in the Second District Congressional Democratic primary.

Even more fantastic is this: Wilson, in the words of one blogger, Howie Klein, who interviewed him, won’t be running as “another Republican-lite reactionary.” This means he could challenge Boren on his Republican-like stances on issues such as health care reform and taxation during the campaign. Wilson is a viable candidate who could make Boren respond to criticism that his conservative votes have not always been in the best interests of his constituents.

This is what Wilson had to say in a recent press release about the relationship between medical record management systems and health care reform:

"For years, the debate on true health care reform has not been fact-based. It has been fear-based, driven by the greed of those who profit most from a broken system. As a result, hundreds of thousands of working Oklahomans have not been able to afford insurance. Even those fortunate enough to have it often find that after years of faithfully paying premiums, the companies will do everything in their power to avoid providing the care patients need. With proper reform, there will be no additional cost to Oklahoma, but the benefits will be innumerable."

Boren, of course, voted against the recent federal health care bill, arguing it costs too much money. Wilson argued the federal government was forced to step in to do something about health care and that any costs to Oklahomans “could be easily offset by eliminating waste, fraud and utilizing better management of medical records.”

Wilson, a Vietnam War veteran who served in the Marine Corps, is going to draw a sharp distinction between himself and Boren on the campaign trail. This alone is good news for progressives.

The Second District encompasses 24 counties in the eastern part of Oklahoma. Some of the major cities in the district are Durant, McAlester, Muskogee, Tahlequah, Claremore and Miami. It includes the Little Dixie region in southeastern Oklahoma.

There’s little doubt that Wilson faces a real battle to win against an incumbent with huge family name recognition. Boren is the son of University of Oklahoma President David Boren, who is a former Oklahoma Governor and U.S. Senator. His grandfather, Lyle Boren, was a former U.S. Representative as well.

But with enough financial support and a good ground campaign, Wilson can win, and he can win without siding with the fear mongering and corporate worship that defines the current GOP and conservative Democrats, such as Boren. Wilson also has his own Oklahoma credentials and following in his Senate district and surrounding areas. He has also served in the Oklahoma House.

You can contribute to Wilson’s campaign by going to the Bad Dogs page on ActBlue.

Progressives/Liberals Alive And Well In The State That Sends Idiots To Washington D.C.. It's Funny, We're Outnumbered But We're Not The Paranoid Ones In Oklahoma.

2010-05-14T03:03:00.002-05:00

I'm submitting this as proof that there are actual liberals in rural Oklahoma.

On your left you'll notice a rather large hill rising somewhat less than majestically into the clouds. This is Cavanal Hill located in Poteau, OK.

This hill is also what I see when I go out my front door, albeit from 10 miles away and not from this angle.

However, this is the perspective I see almost as much as the one I see from my house, because this exact spot is the entrance to the local Wal-Mart.

Can't get much more Okie than that.

Now I have three more leftist Okies who, I assume, have more shopping options than I do. I know they do since they're from OKC and Tulsa. If we had the people who write these blogs running the Democratic Party in Oklahoma the state wouldn't be line dancing back to the Dark Ages.

Just Not Right is written by the kind of guy that makes the Righties in OK want a state formed milita. His posts are right on the money. You're going to like Just Not Right and if you have a delicate, purintanical disposition, don't bother.

Tim McVeigh stalagmites hate Democracy and America so violently they seek to overturn a massive landslide election by force. Teahadist's in Oklahoma are in serious conversation with wackjob local politicians to form a local armed militia to defend Oklahoma from the will of the people.

Teabag suckler and GOP wannabe for Governor, Randy Brogdon, R-Owasso, thinks armed hooligans running amok promoting armed coups is a swell idea.

Double dip nut sucker state Rep. Charles Key, R-Oklahoma City, said he believes there's a good chance of introducing legislation for a state-authorized militia next year.

Yes, as I write this, we rest a week shy of the 15th anniversary and in the waning shadows of the survival tree, where an anti-government fanatic blew up the Afred P. Murrah building, killing 168 Americans.

And now, we have a bunch of losers, who hate losing so much that they are willing to get a gun to show how unpatriotic and un-American they are by imposing their will by bullets instead of
the ballot.

Ok, I left out the good stuff.

And from Tulsy Town,

Alternative Tulsa

News and Views for Tulsa's Reality-Based Community: Ideas, Politics, Letters, Art, Environment

Hint, that reality-based thing is kinda code for non-teabagger. Here's more.

Alternative Tulsa presents ideas and commentary for people in Tulsa and Northeastern Oklahoma who want a different view of politics and culture. Our philosophy is independent, rational, literate and open-minded. At AltTulsa (or AT), we want to highlight ideas and opinions that provoke and enlighten, doing our small part to publish the truth as we see it and, as the saying goes, to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

Once again, that whole "independent, rational, literate and open-minded" thing pretty much means "We ain't frigging Republicans". Good news and a good blog from Oklahoma's Second City, third college football team.

The third blog is from a honest to goodness out of state agitator who, from what I can figure, found herself in Oklahoma when the 'shrooms wore off and has been stuck here ever since. But fortunately, she's been showing us locals how to have fun since '03, er 2003. She goes by Rena and her place is Peace Arena. It's probably the only spot in Oklahoma where you'd find an article with a title like;

A thousand (plus) words worth of progressive schadenfreude

We may not know what that means, but back when we could beat Texas we appreaciated the concept without realizing that there was a name for it. So Rena is raising our collective IQ, thanks Rena.

Just wanted folks to know that there are some people who are able to use their minds for the intended purpose here in the state where hunter/gatherer is quickly becoming a good career choice.

Check out these points of lights from the right wing darkness.

Later

Oklahoma: More Than Just Ignorant Rednecks Thinking It's Someone Else's Fault That They're Not Banging Taylor Swift.

2010-05-10T03:08:00.001-05:00

Really been laying off the blog lately. Spending most of my time being called a socialist over at Stumpburners, a local spot I would recommend to everyone.

Being a liberal, or as they say now "progressive", in a state where a lot of folks value ignorance as a virtue can kinda give a person that lonesome feeling. You know, when a good percentage of so-called Democrats are pandering to the dupes of the corporate special interests, some call them Tea Baggers, it gets a tad depressing to say the least.

But fortunately, I've found out that Oklahoma's not nearly as stupid as I have been wrongly accusing it of being.

As I've found out there is a thriving community of honest to goodness lefties/liberals/progressives in Oklahoma. And they do this much better than I do. So, I'm adding an Oklahoma Progressive Blogs widget to the top of Redneck Liberal to gladly show the world or the five or six people who actually read it that Oklahoma is not the intellectual wasteland (current politicians excepted) that it is portrayed on, well, pretty much everywhere.

Believe it or not, here in Oklahoma topics of conversation can go beyond our guns, our hunting dogs, our last deer kill, our pickups or our old lady's little sister is really hot, while drinking 3.2 beer and believeing that it's actual beer. No, here in Oklahoma we have plenty of what the Right says is the "intellectual elite".

The first Progressive Okie Blog that I hope everyone checks out is Okie Funk: Notes From The Outback. It's written by Dr. Kurt Hochenauer, a Brit Lit teacher at the University of Central Oklahoma, here's his bio. Here's his mission statement:

This is a blog of populist and liberal information and ideas, advancing the cause of truth and justice while fighting the ugly tyranny of right-wing oppression in Oklahoma and its surrounding environs

This dude's got a clue. Here is some of his blog. The Oklahoman is owned by the Gaylord Family of Oklahoma along with the Grand Ole Opry, The Nashville Network and the Country Music Television. Needless to say, they're good Republicans.

Here’s two questions the editorial writers at The Oklahoman will never directly address in any detail:

How does giving tax credits to the state’s big oil and gas companies represent true free market principles? If oil and gas companies cannot make it without special tax treatment not given to regular middle-class taxpayers, then shouldn’t they be allowed to fail under market fundamentalism ideology?

On Friday, The Oklahoman published an editorial (“Tax attacks: Incentive review revs up rhetoric,” May 7, 2010) that criticized state Rep. Scott Inman (D-Del City) for even suggesting tax incentives for oil and gas companies here should be reviewed given the state’s massive budget crisis, which has led to vital program cuts and could lead to massive teacher layoffs.

So here’s one key snarky paragraph in the editorial:

Inman will be the top House Democrat next year. He’s already matching the rhetoric to the responsibility. It’s expected. We hope that rational thought is also a job prerequisite.

Note the phrase “rational thought.” This is coming from a SERIOUS newspaper editorial page that refuses to speak out consistently and rationally against Republican extremism at the legislature, a SERIOUS editorial page that almost always labels recent health care reform “Obamacare,” a SERIOUS editorial page that rails against teachers and supports chronically low per pupil spending even as it argues good educational systems are vital to Oklahoma’s future.

The next Blog is the Grindstone Journal, it's written by a bunch of folks and from what I've read, the kind of folks that you'd want to invite you to party with them. Example? Sure!

Discussing a liberal view of democracy... with drinks!

Grindstone does serious stuff too.

In What's So Great About Christianity D'Souza opens with a discussion on why he feels Richard Dawkins, Dan Dennett, Steven Pinker, and E.O. Wilson, all Darwinian scientists, are wrong, but as we will see, D'Souza doesn't offer any scientific evidence for why he thinks their science is flawed. This is something I find amusing coming from a Christian apologist who already nurtures a preconceived bias towards scientific thinking in general, Darwinism in specific. In the second chapter of his book D’Souza quotes Pinker’s account that there may be Darwinian explanations for religious thinking and the very evolution of the idea of God, or at least, according to Pinker, the idea of God may be a byproduct of some pre-existing condition or human need, and may have a naturalistic and organic origin just as language does.[1] At least such a hypothesis as this must be ruled out before we can settle on a hypothesis which is virtually impossible to prove and entirely unlikely to be factual. Conjecture does not a good proof make, although D’Souza ignores such logic and sticks to his guns. Firing away another volley, without having even provided any dependable or convincing evidence, D’Souza immediately goes on to say about Pinker’s theory that, “This is another way of saying there is no Darwinian explanation.”[2]

So be sure to check out Grindstone Journal.

And last there's blueoklahoma and they are "...anything but sad...", what they are is this,

This is a community blog operated since 2006 by people dedicated to promoting and restoring progressive values in Oklahoma. A courageous band of patriots, we fight right-wing tyranny in one of the reddest of red states.

I wonder if their standards are low enough to let me post on there? Anyway these are the first three Oklahoma based progressive blogs of the many that I plan on highlighting here. And as lifelong Okie I want to thank them for their work in fighting ignorance in particular and the dark side in general.

Check 'em out.

Later.

Wealth Distribution for the Rich and Famous: Part II.

2010-01-18T14:24:00.000-06:00

Here's a little right wing mantra that often turns up in emails and on political discussion boards. It's usually attributed to Abraham Lincoln, wrongly, of course.

You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred. You cannot build character and courage by taking away men's initiative and independence. You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves. (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) Assassinated [see also "William Boetcker"]

Lincoln, Abraham

It was actually said by William Boetcker, a conservative preacher who, I guess, was hoping for a little "trickle down" action.

An outspoken political conservative, Rev. Boetcker is perhaps best remembered for his authorship of a pamphlet entitled The Ten Cannots. Originally published in 1916, it is often misattributed to Abraham Lincoln. The error apparently stems from a leaflet printed in 1942 by a conservative political organization called the Committee for Constitutional Government. The leaflet bore the title "Lincoln on Limitations" and contained some genuine Lincoln quotations on one side and the "Ten Cannots" on the other, with the attributions switched. The mistake of crediting Lincoln for having been the source of "The Ten Cannots" has been repeated many times since, most notably by Ronald Reagan in a speech he gave at the 1992 Republican convention in Houston.

Right wingers eat that stuff up and use it to try to frame the arguement that the left is trying to loot the coffers of the benevolent rich from which all good things in life come.

Not only is the right wrong about who said it, it's also wrong in its premise. The fact of the matter is, if we don't rein in the top 1%, the rest of us are going to have squat. The chart at the top of the page is from 2001 when the top 1% controlled 33% of the wealth in this country. Six years of right wing controlled government had raised that to 42%.

Apparently, they want it all.

In the meantime, former Bush Press Secretary Ari Fleischer has a WSJ op-ed arguing that our tax collections are too skewed towards the higher end and that the the middle and the poor don't pay enough. His argument is that it's just plain bad that 50% of the population don't pay income taxes -- that they don't have their skin in the game. That it's fundamentally bad for democracy.

Yeah, the working class don't have any "skin in the game". They only generate this country's economy by putting practically all their income right back into it. Jerk.

As a matter of math, Fleischer is probably right. The idea that we can continue to raise revenue, while shifting more of the burden onto fewer and fewer people is a pipe dream. Think of the grand scale of the government's ambitions, from fighting wars to providing universal healthcare. Are we really to believe that all this can be done via a tax increase on the top 2%? That's obviously hogwash. What's more is that top 2% is getting sharply poorer fast, given the collapse of the financial industry.

The rich can afford their cheerleaders, not to mention the media, in order to get their "poor little billionaire" message out. And if the working class says anything, the "class warfare" meme will be drug out and waved like the bloody shirt.

All of this has just been a segue into an excellent article from My Budget 360 titled How the Average American household making $52,000 a Year is Coping while the Ultra Rich Pull Away. Examining the new Numbers on Income Distribution in the United States.

Here's some relevant passages.

Now that tax season is rolling around average Americans are examining the implications of a difficult 2009 economy. Yet the data on typical families shows that many Americans are falling further and further behind in this current economy. It is sobering to realize that over 14 million American households live on $15,000 or less per year. These statistics usually get lost in the noise of protecting the wealthy class with their generous tax breaks. But when we examine the data even further we realize that even those with solid incomes of $100,000 to $200,000 per year are feeling the tax burden pinch with changes in the alternative minimum tax (AMT). What we can gather from the data is the small elite, the top 1 percent have managed to setup a structure that manages to use the rest of the population to finance their adventure.

The extremely wealthy are the people getting all the perks of the current system; accounting gimmicks, offshore accounts, capital gains tax rates that are favorable, and other items like carryover losses that most Americans never even deal with. The bailouts, the tax breaks, and items that specifically only improve their bottom line.

In fact an income of $100,000 or more a year puts you in the top 15 percent of wealth earners in this country. Looking at 2006 IRS records shows that an income of $108,904 would put you in the top 10 percent while an income of $388,806 would put you in the top 1 percent. And here is the real break. Because tax breaks become more generous for the ultra rich especially when a large number live off of capital gains and only pay 15 percent in taxes on this while working grunts have to pay every imaginable tax on the books.

And this is exactly what we saw in the following five years and are still seeing. Republicans and Democrats alike seem destined to protect this elite group. Hedge fund gains and Wild West gambling on Wall Street allowed the ultra rich to pull away from the average American pack while not even paying their fair share in taxes. This is still going on by the way since the system also allows carryover losses in stocks and wonderful loopholes to game the system.

So we had a major debate for 50,000 tax filers in a nation with over 113,000,000 households? The top 1 percent are betting on you not doing the numbers. They want to keep the game going because it is rigged in their favor. The banking bailouts are largely a transfer of wealth to those who least need it. Until we get this thing under control, the average American is going to feel the pinch of the economy deeper and deeper.

We can't rely on our elected officials to help us out. We have to get together, take back our party and keep our foot firmly on the necks of our politicians to get things straightened out. So get active, get your friends and relatives together and have them do the same thing. Get enough like minded people with you and go to the local Democratic Party meetings and take the damned thing over. Then do the right thing.

The top 1% has everything going for it, even the Tea Baggers. The working class and the poor only have us. Let's not let them down. I guess that should be, "Let's not let us down".

Be sure to read all of the above article.

Later.

Democrats and Health Care Reform: A Tale of No Testicles.

2009-12-16T14:20:00.001-06:00

Moments ago, Democratic Senators told reporters that the caucus yielded to Sen. Joe Lieberman’s (I-CT) demands and dropped the Medicare buy-in provision from the Senate health care bill, leaving only a network of nonprofits to stand in for the public health insurance option. While Senators stressed that a final decision would be made tomorrow, after the Democratic caucus meets with President Obama, most agreed that the fate of the Medicare buy-in was all but certain.

“The general consensus was that we shouldn’t make the perfect the enemy of the good and if we’re going to get all the insurance reforms accomplished and a number of other things [and] dropping the Medicare expansion was necessary, well then that’s what should be done and it appeared that would be necessary to get the 60 votes,” Sen. Evan Bayh (D-IN) told the Hill. “At some point you have to switch from the sentiment, the emotion of the words, to the facts,” said Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV). “And then you’ve got to decide if I didn’t get what I want, in the form that I wanted it, am I willing to cashier 31 million Americans? I want a bill.”

Brilliant! If we can't get the bill that we need, let's just force 31 million Americans to turn their hard earned cash over to the Health Insurance Industry so that we can say that we've done something.

Even Howard Dean who had already given up on the public option couldn't take this.

“This is essentially the collapse of health care reform in the United States Senate. Honestly the best thing to do right now is kill the Senate bill, go back to the House, start the reconciliation process, where you only need 51 votes and it would be a much simpler bill.”

Kinzel added that Dean essentially said that if Democratic leaders cave into Joe Lieberman right now they’ll be left with a bill that’s not worth supporting.

Remember just about a year ago, when we had just gotten a full of fire new president and total control of Congress? Oh, the changes we were going to make. Sure, we knew it wouldn't be easy, that we'd be fighting the Right Wing Propaganda Machine and special intrests all the way, but who'd have thought that it would be Joe Lieberman and a few Corporate Democrats that would make our brave new Democratic government tuck its tail and roll over.

Winston Churchill said it about the Anzio landing and I've been thinking it for months now, "I had hoped that we were hurling a wild cat on to the shore, but all we got was a stranded whale.".

Let's cut our donkey some slack and adopt a bloated, beached whale with his spine and testicles removed until we can come up with a better strategy than "Just cave in".

OK, say the bill passes and Senator Rockefeller gets what he wants. No one is going to be happy with this bill, other than the Health Insurance Industry. The Right is going use this less than half measure on health care reform to show that the Democrats can't govern effectively. Democrats from the President down are opening themselves up to being shown as the party that can be rolled over. This is just a lose/lose situation for the Democrats and the American people. If they get their bill they will look incredibly lame in the process. And they will look incredibly lame in the 2010 elections.

The party of fantasy over facts, money above the people, willful ignorance, Fox News and Sarah Palin has maneuvered the Democrats into engineering their own downfall.

I was really hoping for more than Bush Lite.

There is one effort, more of a "furlorn hope", actually. It's what should have been done in the first place and should be done every time Congress meets until we get it right.

Sen. Bernie Sanders says he is "not naive" and expects to lose, but the Senate on Wednesday will debate for the first time in American history a proposal to create a single-payer, Medicare-for-all health care system, according to statements from the Vermont independent's office.

His amendment would provide health care and dental coverage for every American, save money, and improve health care results, Sanders says. Sanders his attempt to amend the current comprehensive healthcare legislation before the Senate to adopt the single-payer model.

Democratic Sens. Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Roland Burris of Illinois are co-sponsors of the amendment.

It shouldn't be that difficult to do the right thing. Let's let Bernie keep our donkey for us until we can earn it back.

So, what if Howard Dean is right and we kill the bill? Well, for starters, everyday we can get in the media our apologies to those 45,000 people who will die because the Republicans wouldn't let us get them health care. We can explain how our plan is cheaper and more efficient than the current system. We can explain that paying more than anyone else in the world for the 38th ranked health care system in the world is just stupid and that the people who oppose us are too. Every day, beat them over the head with it and then just follow my simple one year plan.

It's about time that the Democrats started acting like they have some priniples and some guts.

Later.

Update: Sometimes it's just plain damned embarrassing to be from Oklahoma.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Wednesday withdrew his single-payer healthcare amendment after Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) initiated a procedural maneuver to shipwreck the measure.

Coburn earlier in the day forced the Senate clerk to read aloud Sanders’s 767-page amendment to the Senate healthcare bill in an effort to halt the healthcare debate.

Sanders, a self-described “democratic socialist,” spoke on the Senate floor to announce the withdrawal of the measure.

"The day will come, although I recognize it’s not today, when the U.S. Congress will have to vote to stand up to … all those who profit every single year off of human sickness,” Sanders said. "That day will come."

The Great Right Hope: Ad Hominem, Non Compos Mentis and Just Plain Old Lying.

2009-12-13T22:48:00.000-06:00

It's a good day. When I get a comment like the one you'll see plus a right wing email that shows what I believe to be what passes for conservative humor, hell, I just got a blog post written for me.

Once again, thanks, goes to the right wingers.

If you haven't guessed already, the picture of the cute little girl on the left, is the right wing email.

Cute little girl with her best "I'm really serious" face backing it up with the universal gesture of disagreement.

I won't even go into why one so young would even know how to flip you off. And it's no wonder that the Right would exploit it to try to make a political point, class act that they are.

But I will go into the text, which so many of your friends and neighbors actually believe to be gospel.

You've spent my lunch money, my allowance,... Now I'm guessing that most right wingers don't really believe that Obama is spending this little girl's lunch money or allowance, although some of them probably really do. I have to assume that the lunch money and allowance refer to the same thing, the deficit. I don't claim to know the innermost workings of the right wing mind, these things may be code words for two different right wing paranoid fantasies. I do know that the Right's not real big on subtlety and nuance, so let's run with the deficit.

In Right Wing Fantasy Land, there was not a federal deficit until Barack Obama was elected and created it in order to turn the United States into a socialist country. BTW, in RWFL socialist is a bad word and it's interchangable with communist and fascist. I blame our education system. Anyway, from a real world standpoint, these tactics are working. It's amazing how many people can't even firmly grasp the obvious.

Bush's tax cuts for the rich, Bush's accounting gimmicks, two wars, one to let Osama Bin Laden get away and one for absolutely no reason, Republican and Corporate Democrat deregulation of the financial industry has nothing to do with it, it's all Obama's.

Leonhardt crunches the numbers to track exactly how the Clinton-era predictions of surpluses gave way to prophecies of massive deficits. His analysis places 90 percent of the blame on the business cycle, Bush's policies, and policies from the Bush years that are scheduled to expire but that Obama hasn't tried to snuff out. That leaves Obama responsible for 10 percent of the projected deficits: 7 percent from the stimulus bill -- and only 3 percent Obama's agenda on health care, education, energy and other areas.

Nevertheless, Obama now has 100 percent of the responsibility for fixing this mess, and what is he doing about it? Leonhardt writes that his talk about cutting health care costs is not yet entirely convincing -- and that it's not enough, anyway.

Yeah, it's all Obama's now, but he didn't create the problems. Here's a handy little deficit chart, but it only goes to 2004. Please take note of the fiscally conservative Reagan years.

inheritance,... Well Sweetie, unless your parents gamble everything away or give it to a religious cult or lose it all to pay medical bills, I'm pretty sure that theres nothing Obama can do to keep you from your inheritance. Are you watching Glenn Beck with your parents?

35 years of future paychecks,... Stay in school, go to college, don't get pregnant, don't vote Republican or for a Corporate Democrat and your future will be fine.

and my retirement. Make sure your government keeps a close eye on the crooks who will be overseeing your 401K and, by all means, don't let them privitize Social Security.

My latest comment was from some Rightie who managed to find their way here from Stumpburners, the local discussion board. I've deleted it from the previous post and have taken out the name of a friend of mine who is currently recuperating in a nursing home. But if you've ever wondered how a state could elect someone like James Inhofe or Tom Coburn, here's your answer.

MReed918 has left a new comment on your post "Health Care Reform, Give The Republicans Their Yea...":

Jim Hull, you are an IDIOT! Or maybe not. Maybe you are nothing more than another "erudite" socialist that seeks to destroy the United States.

Time will tell whether your ilk succeeds. Going to be an interesting couple of years isn't it?

Give **** ******'s ass a big kiss from me while you're there licking the ignorant excrement that emits from her behind.

Or, is it her licking YOUR behind?

Posted by MReed918 to Redneck Liberal at 6:26 PM, December 12, 2009

Check out the politics section at Stumpburners or even better join in.

Ad Hominem, Non Compos Mentis and Lies.

Later.

Health Care Reform, Give The Republicans Their Year And Then Do It Right.

2009-12-01T02:26:00.000-06:00

Republicans, including those who call themselves Democrats, are wanting to put off health care reform in order to concentrate on whatever it is that we are trying to accomplish in Afghanistan. Your guess is as good as mine what that is.

Coincidentally, the troop surge and health care reform cost around the same, 80-100 billion dollars.

I'm all for a MediCare for All type health care system and I believe that the troops in Afghanistan and Iraq should already be on their way home.

However, I could get behind this plan.

Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN) echoed similar sentiments during an appearance on CNN’s “State of the Union” yesterday. He suggested to host John King that health care legislation should be delayed until next year to focus on Afghanistan, saying, “The war is terribly important. … So this may be an audacious suggestion, but I would suggest we put aside the health care debate until next year, the same way we put cap and trade and climate change away and talk now about the essentials, war and money.”

Let's say we spend the next year handing George W. Bush's ego wars over to the U.N. and have the troops home in a year. Let's concentrate on creating jobs during the next year and make that our number one priority. And let's up the taxes on those lucky few who have benefited while the rest of the country fell futher behind.

I know what you're saying, "Why you ignorant redneck, we need health care reform and we need it now!" Yeah, I know. As much as I hate it, we've got to be pragmatic. It looks more and more like the health care reform bill that we're going to get looks less and less like the health care reform bill that we want.

Democrats control 60 seats in the Senate, precisely the number needed to trump a promised Republican filibuster. While Reid spent most of the day jousting with Republicans, his ability to steer the bill to passage will depend on finding ways to finesse controversial provisions within the measure. None is more important than calls for the government to sell insurance in competition with private firms. Liberals favor the plan; moderate and conservative Democrats oppose it. As drafted the bill establishes a so-called government option, although each state can block it.

I don't really like the appellation "moderate and conservative Democrats". Let's be honest here, what the media refers to as "moderate and conservative Democrats" are people posing as Democrats who whore their votes out to the highest bidder. Trust me, Dan Boren is my Congressman so I know a little about these things.

OK, so we spend the next year doing a study of universal health care in all the industrilized countries that have it, that would be all of them btw. We pick and choose all the things that work well and discard the things that don't work so well. You know, like we should have done in the first place. We put it all together in a comprehensive health care reform bill, crunch the numbers, present it as MediCare for All, make sure that our recalcitrant "Blue Dogs" know that they will vote with the Democrats or find somebody else's yard to crap in and let the Right and the special interests whine all they want.

45,000 Americans will die during the next year without health care reform. Probably about the same will die if we get a crap health care reform bill. One thing's for sure, without a strong public option the only winners will be the "for profit" health care industry.

Our health care system is failing. It is expensive, bureaucratic, and denies care to many in need. Americans die younger, get less care, face greater restrictions, are less satisfied, and spend at least $1,500 more per person on health care than Canadians or Western Europeans - nations that have opted for non-profit national health insurance.

In the U.S., canons of commerce are displacing dictates of healing, trampling medicine's most sacred values. Market medicine treats patients as profit centers. The time doctors and nurses are allowed to spend with the sick shrinks under the pressure to increase throughput, as though we were dealing with industrial commodities rather than afflicted human beings in need of compassion and caring. Listening, learning, and caring give way to deal-making, managing, and marketing. The primacy of the patient yields to a perverse accountability - to investors, to bureaucrats, to insurers and to employers. And patients worry that their doctor's judgement and advice are guided by the corporate bottom line.

Here's what Physicians for a National Health Program has to say.

Single-payer national health insurance is a system in which a single public or quasi-public agency organizes health financing, but delivery of care remains largely private.

Currently, the U.S. health care system is outrageously expensive, yet inadequate. Despite spending more than twice as much as the rest of the industrialized nations ($8,160 per capita), the United States performs poorly in comparison on major health indicators such as life expectancy, infant mortality and immunization rates. Moreover, the other advanced nations provide comprehensive coverage to their entire populations, while the U.S. leaves 46.3 million completely uninsured and millions more inadequately covered.

The reason we spend more and get less than the rest of the world is because we have a patchwork system of for-profit payers. Private insurers necessarily waste health dollars on things that have nothing to do with care: overhead, underwriting, billing, sales and marketing departments as well as huge profits and exorbitant executive pay. Doctors and hospitals must maintain costly administrative staffs to deal with the bureaucracy. Combined, this needless administration consumes one-third (31 percent) of Americans’ health dollars.

Single-payer financing is the only way to recapture this wasted money. The potential savings on paperwork, more than $350 billion per year, are enough to provide comprehensive coverage to everyone without paying any more than we already do.

We've got to face facts, the Democrats never framed the issue of health care reform. The Right, the insurance industry and the health care industry did. There's just too much misinformation out there and too many gullible people who believe it. So if we have to give the Republicans their year, fine. As long as we use that year doing the things that need to be done and then finally get the real health care that this country deserves.

I sincerely hope that I'm dead wrong on the health care reform bill and that Congress gives us real reform with a strong public option. I just as sincerely believe that a compromise health reform bill will be worse than no bill at all.

Later.

Family Research Monkey Council, Values Voter Monkey Summit, Monkey Expert Roy Blunt (R-MO), Bill O'Reilly Gets Monkey Courage Award & Prejean Primate.

2009-10-09T20:50:00.000-05:00

And now for something completely different.

I'm going to take a not very well thought out, possibly racist statement by Congressman Roy Blunt (R-MO) and prove the truth of it.

At the Family Research Council Action's 2009 Values Voter Summit Roy Blunt speaking to a like minded audience of the self-righteous decided to tell an amusing anecdote.

Trying to be humorous is always a dangerous thing for a right winger to attempt. I mean, humor is not one of their strong suits.

A lot of folks on the left took Blunt's little story and figured that it must have racist overtones. Possible, but I doubt it. Like humor, nuance is something not really grasped by the Right.

Here's the story of Blunt's story. Thanks, Talk to Action.

Congressman Blunt then went on to tell an anecdote which suggested that life in Washington, for GOP members today, is comparable to the lot of imperial British agents in India who had to contend with monkeys running amok on a golf course that the colonial occupiers had carved out of the verdant Indian jungle. There was a problem, the Missouri Representative explained; monkeys would come out of the jungle, grab golf balls, and throw them about. Amidst swelling laughter from his audience Roy Blunt narrated,

"I could go into great and long detail about how many things they did to try and eliminate the 'monkey problem.' But they never got it done, so finally this golf course and this golf course only, they passed a rule and the rule was - you have to play the ball where the monkey throws it. [audience laughter swells] And that is the rule in Washington all the time."

It seemed like a direct window into the psyche of the revanchist wing of the GOP; politics is a golf game and unruly Democrat "monkeys" have swarmed out of the jungle to disrupt the play. Since it is impractical to "eliminate" the monkeys, accommodations will have to be made. Republicans will now "play the ball where the monkey throws it."

If Congressman Blunt would have expanded on the story he could have made it something rare for a Republican or for the Family Research Council, a factual point. So I'll make ol' Roy's point for him.

Indeed, the monkeys do get in the way of efficient government. Take health care, we want it and the Brits have had it since 1948. You'd think that after all this time with universal health care Great Britain would have it's monkey problem handled.

They don't and look who the monkeys actually are.

The system suffered greatly under the "conservative" governments, to the point that is almost collapsed under its own weight back in the 1970s and 1980s, as these "conservatives" withheld funding, and ordered unrealistic changes in the system under the guise of "efficiency." During the Thatcher years, only about 6% of GDP was expended on health care, and resulted in an extremely high level of dissatisfaction with the system. Since then, subsequent governments have increased funding greatly, bringing spending levels up to 8.4% of GDP, which is just slightly below the 8.9% average of OECDs, and about 1% below the EU average, and you'd be hard pressed to find a poll in which the British express overwhelming dissatisfaction with NHS.

Yes, the monkeys on the golf course are little right wing, conservative monkeys. And they are more than just a nuisance, they are deadly. At least, for the 45,000 Americans who will die this year because they have no health care.

Also at the "Holier Than Thou Summit" Bill O'Reilly was awarded the “Media Courage Award.” It seems that to receive this award requires so much courage that none of the other media were even able to watch the acceptance speech.

It's hard to imagine the amount of courage that it must take to stand up and fight liberalism, night after night on Fox News where the audience is so well informed that it riots at even the hint of anything that's not "Fair and Balanced".

Bill has been courageous ever since he got out of high school when he showed it by courageously avoiding military service.

Way to go Bill. You deserve this award. You and the Family Research Council are made for each other.

Kinda like another one of their guests, Carrie Prejean, the former Miss California who believes that homosexuality is not natural, yet man-made hooters are.

So I'll leave you with this little slice of Americana. The folks who believe that they are mainstream America. The folks who believe that they are doing God's will by trying to tell the rest of us how to live. The folks who would be more than happy to put you down if you don't listen. The other end of the political spectrum.

Later,

9/12 Teabagging Protesters Motivations and Explanations, Rep. Joe Wilson (Goober-SC), Extreme GOP, Religious Right & Charles Darwin.

2009-09-15T06:22:00.004-05:00

Wow! Look at all those people.

This is supposed to be a shot of the 9/12 protesters last Saturday.

Since turning 60-70,000 people into a million would be a miracle of Biblical proportions a lot of folks on the Right will instinctively believe it.

And like a lot of things that they instinctively believe, it would be wrong.

There's another big problem with the photograph: it doesn't include the National Museum of the American Indian, a building located at the corner of Fourth St. and Independence Ave. that opened on Sept. 14, 2004. (Looking at the photograph, the building should be in the upper right hand corner of the National Mall, next to the Air and Space Museum.) That means the picture was taken before the museum opened exactly five years ago. So clearly the photo doesn't show the "tea party" crowd from the Sept. 12 protest.

Now that America's Ignorancefest 2009 is over, what conclusions can we draw from this spontaneous, grassroots, Fox News/Freedom Works/Health Insurance Industry sponsored and coordinated outpouring of white people's inability to grasp reality?

Well, the most obvious thing that they are wrong about is who they are. They believe that they are independent thinking defenders of the Constitution and the "American Way of Life". You gotta admit that sounds a lot better than corporate lackeys.

What's really happening with these protests is that the genuine rage and not unreasonable economic insecurity of these citizens is being stoked, exploited, distorted and manipulated by movement leaders for entirely different ends. The people who are leading them -- Rush Limbaugh, the Murdoch-owned Fox News, Glenn Beck, business-dominated organizations of the type led by Dick Armey -- are cultural warriors above everything else. They're all in a far different socioeconomic position than the "middle-income Americans" whose anger they're ostensibly representing. Their principal preoccupation is their cultural contempt for various groups (illegal immigrants, the "undeserving" poor, liberals) and their desire to preserve the status quo whereby the prime beneficiaries of government policies remain themselves: the super rich and the interests that control Washington. It's certainly true that many of these protesters are driven by the standard right-wing cultural issues which have long shaped that movement -- social issues, religious fears, cultural and racial divisions, and hatred for "liberals" as Communist-Muslim-Terrorist-lovers. For many, all of that is intensified by the humiliation of being completely thrown out of power, at the hands of the first black President. But much of it is fueled by the pillaging of the corporations and Wall St. interests which own their government.

Ouch!

70,000 dupes getting together to show the world just how little they know about the things that they are protesting against.

Congressman Joe Wilson, (Idiot-SC) is a microcosm of the 70,000 and the Right's approach to the health care debate. I could care less that Wilson shouted, "You lie!" to the President on the floor of Congress. That's just free speech. However, if you are going to do a major breach of decorum then you should at least be correct in your accusations. It's not a hard thing to do, ten seconds on Google would have saved Joe from showing the world just how big of a moron he really is. Now we all know.

The 70,000 Fox News induced protesters are just Joe Wilson gone Viral.

Neal Gabler, Boston Globe covers this phenomenon nicely in his article, The extreme Republican Party.

Let’s not mince words here: We now have an entire political party that is not only dedicated to the mediocre. It is dedicated to the nearly deranged.

Nearly?

Anyway, we kinda know what they are protesting against, which is more than they seem to do. So what are they for?

That's easy, just type into Google, Health Insurance Horror Stories.

"When Steve and Leslie Shaeffer's daughter, Selah, was diagnosed at age 4 with a potentially fatal tumor in her jaw, they figured their health insurance would cover the bulk of her treatment costs." But "shortly after Selah's medical bills hit $20,000, Blue Cross stopped covering them and eventually canceled her coverage retroactively."
So begins a recent report in The Los Angeles Times titled "Sick but Insured? Think Again," which offers a series of similar horror stories, and suggests that these stories represent a growing trend: more and more health insurers are finding ways to yank your insurance when you get sick.

Beats the hell out of me why they would want more of that. But there it is and that's what we'll be getting without the public option in the Health Care Reform Bill.

70,000 people getting together to show their support for health insurance company profits and taking a dump on their fellow citizens. I'll bet Glenn Beck is proud.

To be honest, some of the protesters could care less about the insurance companies, Fox News, you, me or anything else. They are on a mission, they believe that they are doing the Lord's work. Like He would need any help from these cretins, right?

If you're not fortunate enough to live in the Bible Belt and can't really experience this first hand, then I would highly recommend reading the full article, Glenn Beck and The 9/12 Marchers: Subversives From Within. It's about a growing group of people who want to do away with the America that we know and replace it with a country based on some lame preacher's interpretation of the Bible.

Sounds far-fetched? Well, both of my U.S. Senators from Oklahoma belong to that C. Street cult known as "The Family".

The tactics that progressives develop for actually winning against the right have to involve far more than politics. They have to also involve ceaseless vigilance against an enemy that has now -- literally -- raised up an armed, paranoid and deluded alternative nation within our borders and created a fifth column to undermine the United States and our democracy. They need to be called out by the rest of us in no uncertain terms.
Long term the Religious Right subculture has to be understood, then exposed for what it is: an anti-democracy movement built on willful lies with potentially violent underpinnings in the thrall of an apocalyptic cult of revenge on everyone not like "us." It is also the useful tool of corporate lobbyists. Who use these shock troops of the proudly ignorant for non-ideological reasons.

This article was written by Frank Schaeffer, he knows because he was once a big dog in the Religious Right.

The BBC has just made a movie about the life of Charles Darwin. But it looks like it won't be shown here. Any guesses as to why?

"The film has no distributor in America. It has got a deal everywhere else in the world but in the US, and it's because of what the film is about. People have been saying this is the best film they've seen all year, yet nobody in the US has picked it up.
"It is unbelievable to us that this is still a really hot potato in America. There's still a great belief that He made the world in six days. It's quite difficult for we in the UK to imagine religion in America. We live in a country which is no longer so religious. But in the US, outside of New York and LA, religion rules.

In light of a recent survey, it looks like the health care reform protesters will have to stop seeing their doctors. Because they are communists! At least by their own reasoning.

A RWJF survey summarized in the September 14, 2009 edition of the New England Journal of Medicine shows that 62.9 percent of physicians nationwide support proposals to expand health care coverage that include both public and private insurance options—where people under the age of 65 would have the choice of enrolling in a new public health insurance plan (like Medicare) or in private plans.

If you think that things are crazy now, just wait until we tackle the most important issue: Climate Change.

Later

Stand Up for Single Payer/Public Option. Stand With Doctor Howard Dean.

2009-08-18T10:37:00.003-05:00

Click on it and sign the petition.

If you care more for the American people than you do for the health insurance industry's profits, it's the right thing to do.

Thanks.

Right Wing E-Mail, Confusion, Evil Democrat Social Security, Obama's Ten Commandments & Right Wing Humor?.

2009-08-03T12:32:00.000-05:00

I got this in my e-mail, it was titled, "Obama's Health Care Letter".

To the average right winger who is intended to be the recipient it's obvious that Obama wants to kill off all the elderly in this country.

Well, all the elderly white folks.

But if you actually go to the trouble of reading the cartoon, the letter is from the health care industry.

Which would make this cartoon a fairly accurate representation of what is really going on.

But for right wingers, accuracy doesn't enter into the equation. They tend to be more instinctive, rather than rational beings and their instincts are predicated on misperceptions and out and out lies put out by the Right Wing Propaganda Machine. "Gullibility r' Us". Not to mention their racial, sexual and religious hangups.

So once again we'll delve into Right Wing Fantasy Land by checking out the Right Wing Propaganda Machine's lowest tech, but nonetheless effective, method of spreading their version of the gospel.

Hopefully, this will be done over several posts because they pack a lot of crap into a single e-mail.

The first is about Social Security, it fits into their current campaign of Obama and the Democrats are turning this country into a socialist/communist/fascist nation. They use all three terms because most of them don't really know what they mean.

Just in case some of you young whippersnappers (& some older ones too)

Weren't taught or just didn't know this. Be sure and show it to your kids. They need a little history lesson on what's what.

And it doesn't matter whether you are Democrat of Republican.

Facts are facts!!!

Our Social Security

Franklin Roosevelt, a Democrat, introduced the Social Security (FICA) Program.

He promised:

1.) That participation in the program would be completely voluntary.

2.) That the participants would only have to pay 1% of the first $1,400 of their annual incomes into the program,

3.) That the money the participants elected to put into the program would be deductible from their income for tax purposes each year,

4.) That the money the participants put into the independent 'Trust Fund' rather than into the General Operating Fund, and therefore, would only be used to fund the Social Security Retirement Program, and no otherGovernment program, and,

5.) That the annuity payments to the retirees would never be taxed as income.

Since many of us have paid into FICA for years and are now receiving a Social Security check every month -- and then finding that we are getting taxed on 85% of the money we paid to the federal government to 'putaway, you may be interested in the following:

-------------------------------------------------- -----------

Q: Which political party took Social Security from the Independent 'Trust Fund' and put it in to the General Fund so that Congress could spend it? A: It was Lyndon Johnson and the Democratically-controlled House and Senate.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: Which political party eliminated the income tax deduction for Social Security (FICA) withholding? A: The Democratic Party.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: Which political party started taxing Social Security annuities? A: The Democratic Party, with Al Gore casting the 'tie-breaking' deciding vote as President of the Senate, while he was Vice President of the U.S.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Q: Which political party decided to start giving annuity payments to immigrants?AND MY FAVORITE: A: That's right! Jimmy Carter and the Democratic Party. Immigrants moved into this country, and at age 65, they began to receive Social Security payments! The Democratic Party gave these payments to them even though they never paid a dime into it!

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Then, after violating the original contract (FICA), the Democrats turn around and tell you that the Republicans want to take your Social Security away! And the worst part about it is, uninformed citizens believe it!

If enough people receive this, maybe a seed of awareness will be planted and maybe changes will evolve. Maybe not, some Democrats are awfullysure of what isn't so. But it's worth a try.

How many people canYOU send this to?Actions speak louder than bumper stickers.

AND CONGRESS GIVES THEMSELVES 100% RETIREMENTFOR ONLY SERVING ONE TERM!!!'

A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have.'-Thomas Jefferson

Yes, "Facts are facts!!!" and that's about the only fact in this. Fortunately, there are folks who save me a lot of trouble by checking into these facts.

So here's the first paragraph of FactCheck.org's debunking of these "facts".

This elaborate collection of falsehoods is so detailed that we believe it must be an intentional and malicious effort at disinformation. It grafts some new whoppers on top of a list that we debunked in April 2004, in a special report we called "Lies in the E-mail, Part 2." The earlier version, we said, was "full of laughably inaccurate claims," and this one is worse.

Yet there are plenty of folks out there who believe this laughably inaccurate stuff and they vote and they are armed. Plus they see the rest of us as the enemy.

Here's an example.

I certainly want to give credit where it's due.

After observing Obama on the campaign trail and during his first six months in office, we have concluded that our President lives and governs according to his own set of "Ten Commandments." They're certainly NOT the Ten Commandments you learned in Sunday School. In fact, many are the direct opposite! To prove that our conclusions are correct, you will find a link to source documentation for each commandment on the Patriot Update web site.

Source documentation, that's a damned funny way to describe NewsMax.

I. Thou shalt have no God in America , except for me. For we are no longer a Christian nation and, after all, I am the chosen One. (And like God, I do not have a birth certificate.) SOURCE

II. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, unless it is my face carved on Mt. Rushmore . SOURCE

III. Thou shalt not utter my middle name in vain (or in public). Only I can say Barack Hussein Obama. SOURCE

IV. Remember tax day, April 15th, to keep it holy. SOURCE

V. Honour thy father and thy mother until they are too old and sick to care for. They will cost our public-funded health-care system too much money. SOURCE

VI. Thou shalt not kill, unless you have an unwanted, unborn baby. For it would be an abomination to punish your daughter with a baby. SOURCE

VII. Thou shalt not commit adultery if you are conservative or a Republican. Liberals and Democrats are hereby forgiven for all of their infidelity and immorality, but the careers of conservatives will be forever destroyed. SOURCE

VIII. Thou shalt not steal, until you've been elected to public office. Only then is it acceptable to take money from hard-working, successful citizens and give it to those who do not work, illegal immigrants, or those who do not have the motivation to better their own lives. SOURCE

IX. Thou shalt not discriminate against thy neighbor unless they are conservative, Caucasian, or Christian. SOURCE

X. Thou shalt not covet because it is simply unnecessary. I will place such a heavy tax burden on those that have achieved the American Dream that, by the end of my term as President, nobody will have any wealth or material goods left for you to covet. SOURCE

Don't you just pity the white, conservative Christians. They're just so persecuted. Well, they think they are! And they'll look you right in the eye and tell you it's not paranoia if it's really happening to you. If you happen to mention it during a conversation. Which I do. Well hell, I live right here in the big middle of them and I like to have a little fun. And it's a lot of fun to mess with people who actually think that Fox News is "Fair and Balanced". It's my hobby.

I'll leave you with a little of what passes for humor on the right.

Drinking with a Redneck Girl

A Mexican, an Arab, and a redneck girl are in the same bar. When the Mexican finishes his beer, he throws his glass in the air, pulls out his pistol, and shoots the glass to pieces. He says, 'In Mexico , our glasses are so cheap we don't need to drink with the same one twice.'

The Arab, obviously impressed by this, drinks his beer, throws it into the air, pulls out his AK-47, and shoots the glass to pieces... He says, 'In the Arab World, we have so much sand to make glasses that we don't need to drink with the same one twice either...'

The redneck girl, cool as a cucumber, picks up her beer, downs it in one gulp, throws the glass into the air, whips out her 45, and shoots the Mexican and the Arab. Catching her glass, setting it on the bar, and calling for a refill, she says, 'In America we have so many illegal aliens that we don't have to drink with the same ones twice.'

' God Bless America

Naw, they're not racist, xenophobic, homophobic, neurotic or paranoid, right wingers are what made this country great. Don't believe me, just ask one.

Acually I have done quite a bit of drinking with redneck girls in the past. And those stories are no doubt more interesting than the ones I post now.

And since today's my 26th wedding anniversary I'll say no more about it.

Thanks for putting up with me all these years, Boo-Boo.

Later.

Blue Dog Democrat: A Right Wing Nut by Any Other Name is Still..., Health Care Reform, Dan Boren and Maxine Waters.

2009-07-30T06:25:00.000-05:00

OK, just who are the Blue Dog "Democrats"?

Well that's easy, considering that these people are actually proud of their efforts to destroy the Democratic Party and what it stands for.

From their own website,

Blue Dog Leadership Team

Rep. Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (SD), Blue Dog Co-Chair for AdministrationRep. Baron Hill (IN-09), Blue Dog Co-Chair for PolicyRep. Charlie Melancon (LA-03), Blue Dog Co-Chair for CommunicationsRep. Heath Shuler (NC-11), Blue Dog Whip

Blue Dog Members

Altmire, Jason (PA-04) Arcuri, Mike (NY-24)Baca, Joe (CA-43)Barrow, John (GA-12)Berry, Marion (AR-01)Bishop, Sanford (GA-02)Boren, Dan (OK-02)Boswell, Leonard (IA-03) Boyd, Allen (FL-02)Bright, Bobby (AL-02)Cardoza, Dennis (CA-18)Carney, Christopher (PA-10)Chandler, Ben (KY-06)Childers, Travis (MS-01)Cooper, Jim (TN-05)Costa, Jim (CA-20)Cuellar, Henry (TX-28)Dahlkemper, Kathy (PA-03)Davis, Lincoln (TN-04)Donnelly, Joe (IN-02)Ellsworth, Brad (IN-08)Giffords, Gabrielle (AZ-08)Gordon, Bart (TN-06)Griffith, Parker (AL-05) Harman, Jane (CA-36)Herseth Sandlin, Stephanie (SD)Hill, Baron (IN-09)Holden, Tim (PA-17)Kratovil, Jr., Frank (MD-01)McIntyre, Mike (NC-07)Marshall, Jim (GA-03)Matheson, Jim (UT-02)Melancon, Charlie (LA-03)Michaud, Mike (ME-02)Minnick, Walt (ID-01)Mitchell, Harry (AZ-05)Moore, Dennis (KS-03)Murphy, Patrick (PA-08)Nye, Glenn (VA-02) Peterson, Collin (MN-07)Pomeroy, Earl (ND)Ross, Mike (AR-04)Salazar, John (CO-03)Sanchez, Loretta (CA-47)Schiff, Adam (CA-29)Scott, David (GA-13)Shuler, Heath (NC-11)Space, Zack (OH-18)Tanner, John (TN-08)Taylor, Gene (MS-04)Thompson, Mike (CA-01)Wilson, Charles (OH-06)

What purpose do these Blue Dog "Democrats" serve?

According to their website,

The fiscally conservative Democratic Blue Dog Coalition was formed in 1995 with the goal of representing the center of the House of Representatives and appealing to the mainstream values of the American public. The Blue Dogs are dedicated to a core set of beliefs that transcend partisan politics, including a deep commitment to the financial stability and national security of the United States. Currently there are 51 members of the Blue Dog Coalition.

"Center"? Better make that "Way Right". "Mainstream values of the American public", how about "Twisted values of the American Right". "A core set of beliefs that transend partisan politics", apparently their "core set of beliefs" is that the Republicans are right and "transend partisan politics" is just obvious BS. Maybe they can fool the blissfully ignorant with that transending partisan politics line. They should really hire someone who knows something about fantasy writing to do this stuff. And they do have a commitment to the financial stability and national security of this country. That is, if you remove the code words and replace them with what they actually mean. "Financial stability", that means "Status Quo", in other words, keep things like they are now, the rich getting richer and the rest of us getting crapped on. No tax hikes for the wealthy or Big Business, we can cut services instead. "National Security" is code for throwing taxpayer dollars at military contractors while doing virtually nothing for the troops.

There probably are 51 members, but since this is from their website, who can be sure?

The Blue Dogs were called the Bush Dogs by discerning observers. Wonder why?

A tightly-knit group of self-styled moderate and conservative Democrats in the House of Representatives known as the Blue Dog Coalition supported controversial legislation granting the Bush administration expanded powers to spy on Americans.

The Blue Dogs have apparently informed the Democratic leadership in the House that they support the ongoing occupation of Iraq.

The Blue Dogs have provided key votes on controversial bills backed by the Bush administration. In September of 2006, 31 Democratic representatives voted with the Republican majority in the House to pass The Military Commissions Act. The controversial act empowered Bush to designate individuals as "enemy combatants," and deny them certain legal rights.

"The FISA bill is an absolute embarrassment. The idea that Congress would pass legislation, in this day and age, that would allow the government to spy on Americans with out any independent review from the courts or Congress is unbelievable."

You even have to pass an ideological purity test to Join the Blue Dogs.

According to Mahoney, he faced a thorough vetting process before being accepted into the group. "You have to be interviewed and accepted by the group. You have to be able to demonstrate that you're ideologically supportive of being fiscally conservative. You show them speeches and statements you've made in the past," Mahoney told the Charlotte Sun, a local paper from his district.

Wow. I'd be happy to show them some of my statements.

Let's recap, the Blue Dogs claim to be fiscally responsible, yet they backed Bush's trillion dollar war for no reason.

So, what are the Blue Dogs doing for us now? Quite a bit actually, if you're an insurance company. Squat, if your uninsured or underinsured.

The support for Blue Dogs from health care professionals is even more evident. Health pros are among the top 20 industry donors to 38 Blue Dogs since 1989 and are the No. 1 donor for five of them. Health pros have also given the typical Blue Dog $47,550 more than the typical non-Blue Dog Democrat in the House. This month the American Medical Association, which lobbies on behalf of doctors, also came out against a public health insurance plan. The AMA is among the top 20 contributors to 10 Blue Dogs since 1989.

Insurance and pharmaceutical companies fear that a public health option would allow the government to control costs and steal business. And with the Blue Dogs leading the charge against the government-funded plan, the industries might just get their way. Without any support from the GOP, two-thirds of the coalition's members, who mostly represent Southern and Midwestern states, would have to get behind the House legislation, according to Kaiser Health News.

The Blue Dogs by working hand in hand with their ideological soulmates, the GOP and the Mainstream Media, are going to blow the smartest thing that this country has been trying to do in a long time.

But be forewarned, the rot from within the Republican Party doesn’t mean Republicans can’t still win elections. They know how to drive up the “negatives” of their opponents. In a rare display of candor, North Carolina Representative Patrick McHenry said: “Our goal is to bring down the approval numbers for [Speaker] Pelosi and for House Democrats. That will take repetition. This is a marathon, not a sprint.” He boasted about the GOP’s “strategy” going forward: “We will lose on legislation. But we will win the message war every day, and every week, until November 2010.” This Republican “communications” operation is already in full swing with the corporate media playing the usual enabler role.

The Blue Dogs provide an opening for the Republicans to “triangulate” against the progressives inside the Democratic Party. They’re calling for “belt tightening” at a time of severe under-consumption and high employment. Republican leaders in the Senate will try to use the Evan Bayhs and Blanche Lincolns of the Blue Dog faction as a wedge to defeat vital parts of President Barack Obama’s legislative agenda.

Blue Dogs, willing dupes of the Right.

But there are still some real Democrats who have the cojones to stand up and say what needs to be said.

WATERS: Well that may be difficult for Rahm Emanuel, because don't forget -- he recruited most of them. As when he was over in the Congress, in the leadership, Rahm Emanuel recruited more conservative members and based on some of the information I'm getting, they told them that they could vote the way they wanted to vote, that they would not interfere with what was considered their philosophy about some of these things. So, now the chickens have come home to roost.

But many of these Blue Dogs represent districts that have strong pockets of poverty and minorities and they're not representing them with this approach that they're taking. And so I don't know whether or not there will be people running against them. Certainly we're not organized to run anybody against anybody, that's not normally what's done. But there may be people out there listening and observing all of this who may get motivated based on what they're seeing, and throw their hat into the ring.

The folks over a Open Left have been on top of this for a while. You should really check them out, excellent stuff.

Without challenging these members, we will never be able to get progressive legislation through Congress. Or, to put it another way, we think expanded warrantless wiretapping authority is awful for any President to have because we don't want to be spied on. We think the Iraq war is really bad and that troops should be withdrawn. We don't agree with Bush Dog Democrats on the substance of their policy ideas, nor do we think it's a good thing that they are helping George W. Bush govern in an effective working conservative majority.

That was from 2007, they're now fighting the Bush Dogs on health care. The principle's the same.

My personal "Dog" went on MSNBC to lie about health care.

One of the most recalcitrant Democrats in the health care debate said on Wednesday that his skepticism about a public health insurance option was driven by concern for the health of private insurers.

Appearing on MSNBC's "Morning Meeting," Blue Dog Democrat Rep. Dan Boren of Oklahoma said that he generally agreed that a government-run insurance program could effectively lower costs for consumers.

"The problem," he argued, "is in a state like Oklahoma, where we have a lot of private insurers, you have a public option come in and it drives everything else out and the only thing left is the public option and then you have rationed care."

This is what Boren and the Blue Dogs and the Republicans are backing.

Rescission (also known as "post-claims underwriting") is the process whereby health insurers avoid paying out benefits to treat cancer and other serious illnesses by seeking and often finding chickenshit errors in the policyholder's paperwork that can justify canceling the policy. In one job evaluation, the health insurer WellPoint actually scored a director of group underwriting on a scale of 1 to 5 based on the dollar amount she had managed to deny through rescission. (The director had saved the company nearly $10 million, earning a score of 3. WellPoint's president, Brian A. Sassi, insists this is not routine company practice.) Rescission's victims tend typically to be less-educated people who are more likely to make an error in filling out their insurance forms and lack the means to challenge a rescission in court—a path in which success is, at any rate, not guaranteed, because under state law the practice is perfectly legal if done within the allowable time frame (typically up to two years after a policy is issued).

The health crisis doesn't get more gothic than this. Robin Beaton, a retired nurse in Texas, was rescinded last year by Blue Cross and Blue Shield after she was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer. Blue Cross said this was because she had neglected to state on her forms that she had been treated previously … for acne. Beaton eventually persuaded her congressman, Rep. Joe Barton, to twist Blue Cross' arm, but the delay meant it was five months before she could receive her operation. Otto Raddatz, a restaurant owner in Illinois, was rescinded in 2004 by Fortis Insurance Co. after he was diagnosed with non-Hodgkins lymphoma. Fortis said this was because Raddatz had failed to disclose that a CT scan four years earlier had revealed that he had an aneurism and gall stones. Raddatz replied—and his doctor confirmed—that he had never been told about these conditions (the doctor said they were "very minor" and didn't require treatment), but Fortis nonetheless refused a payout until the state attorney general intervened. The delay in treatment eliminated Raddatz's chances of recovery, and he died.

The bottom line is this, we have to have a single payer (government) option. This is the one thing that Big Biz and their minions are fighting the most. Without it we would have the same thing that we have now. What we have now is paying the highest price in the world for the 37th ranked health care.

What single payer means is the country would expand Medicare i.e. to cover all its citizens. If they wanted it. And who wouldn't.

Or you could look at it as everyone receiving Veterans Administration health care. That's what I have and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

So don't believe the scare tactics and lies that the Right is putting out. It's just a part of their evil plan to regain power and it's not in your own best self interest.

Even the nutcases on the Religious Right are getting into the act.

Perkins explains: "In a world of health care rationing, the elderly, the handicapped and the frail are the most likely to lose their lives because care was delayed or denied. Under the government-run plans in England and Canada, the countries' sick and elderly aren't getting the care they need. As a result, their system isn't improving lives but prematurely taking them. Here in the United States, President Obama's rationing would mean that you and I could be denied basic care while our tax dollars are used to underwrite a mother choosing to end the life of her unborn child."

Scare tactics and lies. I guess some of us are just as stupid as the politicians think we are.

Later.

National Council for a New America Wants You, Roy Blunt, Louis Gomert, American Energy Alliance, Robert J. Samuelson and the Texas State Board of Ed.

2009-05-04T04:37:00.008-05:00

Meet the new Republican party, the new Republican party that now empathizes with those it used to scorn.

The new Republican party is looking forward to taking on new tough challanges. They want to be loved by the GLBT community, they want to be loved by the working class, they want to be loved by someone other than the angry, closed-minded, white folks that have filled their dance cards for the last 100 years.

They are rebranding their image. No longer wanting to be known as the "Party of No", they are now officially the "National Council for a New America" or unofficially "We'll change, we'll do anything if you'll just take us back, just give us one more chance. Please!" council.

Yeah, the GOP knows that it's about as popular as dog vomit right now and they are desperately wanting to convince the American people that their policies really wasn't the reasons that led this nation to near ruin over the 30 years. They want to do this and keep their extreme base happy at the same time. The same extreme base that actually liked those policies and want more of the same.

Prepare to be bamboozled.

Some Republican leaders today launched what they are calling a "conversation with America."

It was the first of several events planned as part of a new movement they're calling The National Council for a New America. The event drew some of the biggest names in the GOP, including former presidential candidate Mitt Romney and former Florida governor Jeb Bush.

Their effort is drawing a lot of attention, the venue was packed.

Audience members packed into a small pizza joint in Arlington to listen and to be heard.

Even with the success of drawing enough semi-openminded supporters and sycophants

...which included reporters, Republican aides and their friends,...

to fill a small pizza place they still have a tiny problem.

But it's a complex task -- going back to roots of fiscal conservatism, without marginalzing a social conservative base -- all the while reaching out to moderates and independents who have left the party in droves.

And just how is all this love working out with that base?

...a group of conservative activists who were protesting in the parking lot complained that they were not allowed through the doors.

“We’re demonstrating against the fact that this organization set up by RINOs [Republicans in Name Only] have taken immigration off the agenda,” said Michael McLaughlin, a member of the American Council for Immigration Reform, a group seeking to stem the flow of immigrants into the country.

The activists grumbled that Republican organizers did not widely advertise the event. Several wearing shirts declaring themselves “Republicans Against Maverick McCain” craned their necks for a glimpse of the senior lawmaker, who did not show up.

Hey, the GOP crawled through the crap on their bellies to court the extremists, they got 'em and now they can't function without them. Cosmic justice? Yeah, if cosmic justice has a sense of humor. I know I'm getting one hell of a kick out of this.

Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO) has kind of an unique take on the situation. It sort of defies logic, but then logic is not really necessary when you have faith in the infallibility of your party's ideology.

“Just because we’re in a situation now where we vote no doesn’t mean we are the ‘party of no’ or have no ideas,” said former House Republican Whip Roy Blunt , who is running for Senate in Missouri and signed the letter. “This adds another way of getting those ideas out there.”

That's right folks, if it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, it ain't no duck. It's actually a clever plan to make sure that the Republican's fresh new ideas, which they're not talking about because they're the same ideas that got us into this mess in the first place, get out to the American people.

They make this so easy.

Outside of the National Council for a New America, it looks pretty much like the SOS.

MIT economist John Reilly has come out and criticized Republicans for distorting his research on clean energy policy. GOP officials have been repeatedly misusing his work to claim that a cap-and-trade system would cost American families $3,100 in extra energy taxes each year. (In fact, the study actually says that any tax burden would be about one-fortieth of what Republicans claim.) Instead of responding to Reilly with facts, Rep. Louis Gohmert (R-TX) is now bashing the economist with ad hominem attacks in CNS News:

You're gonna love this.

Anyone who thinks you can pay $3,100 to the federal government and thinks you can get that money back completely in services — like I said — he may go to M-I-T but he is an N-U-T.

This has been the Right's strategy for the last 30 years. If you repeat something enough it becomes common knowledge thereby the truth. And it has worked great. It doesn't say much for the intellect of the American people though.

In the American people's defense, the Right has some pretty sophisticated help in perpetuating these myths. Take for instance,

The largest U.S. energy companies increased lobbyist spending by 30% in 2008 to influence energy and climate change legislation. Some of those funds are now going towards the creation of the American Energy Alliance, a new off-shoot of Institute for Energy Research.

The American Energy Alliance is headed by an oil industry lobbyist named Thomas J. Pyle. Before joining AEA, Pyle was a policy adviser to former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX). Pyle’s former employer was among the top recipients of oil industry campaign contributions from 1998 to 2004, raking in $498,375 according to the Center for Public Integrity. Pyle then went to work for the oil-giant, Koch Industries.

The American Energy Alliance is airing radio ads in the home districts of moderate Democrats in order to press legislators to vote against the Waxman-Markey clean energy bill.

The ad repeats the debunked $3,100 lie that energy companies and their conservative allies have been pushing for weeks.

And Robert J. Samuelson of The Washington Post is doing his part to help the cause too. According to him, Obama hates the Oil companies to the detriment of all Americans.

Considering the brutal recession, you'd expect the Obama administration to be obsessed with creating jobs. And so it is, say the president and his supporters. The trouble is that there's one glaring exception to their claims: the oil and natural gas industries. The administration is biased against them -- a bias that makes no sense on either economic or energy grounds. Almost everyone loves to hate the world's Exxons, but promoting domestic drilling is simply common sense.

Improved production techniques (example: drilling in deeper waters) have increased America's recoverable oil and natural gas. The resistance to tapping these resources is mostly political. To many environmentalists, expanding fossil fuel production is a cardinal sin. The Obama administration often echoes this reflexive hostility. The resulting policies aim more to satisfy popular prejudice -- through photo ops and sound bites -- than national needs.

I think Samuelson is just a shill for Big Oil.

Here's what other folks had to say about him.

Before we get all warm and fuzzy about real journalists at The Washington Post like Dana Milbank�or whores like Jonathan Weisman who sometimes act like real journalists�it�s important to remember that paper is still firmly captured, ensnared by corporate greed and a nauseating self-righteousness.

Robert J. Samuelson fits that profile perfectly today in his incredibly dishonest and condescending piece The Phony Job Debate. �Electing a president based on job creation makes as much sense as selecting a doctor based on palm reading.�

And from The New Mexico Independent,

His Establishment bias goes way beyond health. No agonizing for Samuelson on the growing income gap between the very rich and everybody else – shades of the 1920s! Nor on the export of American jobs or low investment in public goods (like crumbling bridges). He has inveighed against swollen Wall Street salaries, but on the deregulation now jeopardizing us, he’s been confused, as if the problem was bad people on Wall Street rather than the system. Thus, in April, as the subprime scandal unfolded, Samuelson wrote that greed, shortsightedness and herd behavior compromise modern finance. “But regulation cannot cure this dilemma, because regulators can’t anticipate all the problems and hazards, either.”

That’s wrong, mostly. Regulation did deter but corporate America had it removed.

If you have two functioning brain cells to rub together, you know that regulation worked. We can thank Bill Clinton and some of the other Democrats for caving on that one.

But the more the Right feigns change, the more things stay the same.

"In the first place God made idiots. This was for practice. Then he made school boards."

Mark Twain wrote that in 1897, and Americans still quote it, with feeling. It comes to mind for many observers of a current battle over science education in Texas.

Texas's school board, the State Board of Education (BOE), has been fighting about standards for science textbooks the state buys. Since March, clamorous attention has focused on a proposal to require that texts discuss the "strengths and weaknesses" of evolutionary theory. Everyone knew this was a ploy to get creationist ideas into the classroom. The scientific community was relieved when the BOE finally voted not to include that language – and dismayed when it then voted for amendments that mandate the same thing. The BOE's exuberant chair says he's not afraid to "stand up to the experts."

What's expert opinion worth when compared to a right winger's intuition?

I'll leave you with what passes for humor in Right Wing Fantasy Land. Yeah, another e-mail.

OBAMA TO TAX ASPIRIN.....

I JUST HEARD THAT YOUR PRESIDENT OBAMA IS GOING TO IMPOSE A 40% TAX ON ASPIRIN BECAUSE IT'S WHITE AND IT WORKS.

Sick puppies.

Later.

Congressional Democrats Taking Bids on Their Votes, Estate Tax, Farm Subsidies, Health Care, Bankruptcy Law, Ben Nelson and Richard Lugar.

2009-05-02T12:41:00.007-05:00

This post would have been out a lot earlier, at least 24 hours, if it weren't for my electric going out, the cloud cover zapped my internet connection and my poor old kerosine powered computer wanting to take a break.

In the 2008 elections it was pretty obvious that the country wanted change. We knew that we could expect plenty of opposition from the Republicans. We're getting plenty of that.

What's surprising is the amount of opposition that we are getting from those who are supposedly on our side.

This is from 2006:

With the 2006 midterm elections nearing and the Republicans receiving record-low approval ratings from the American public, companies and business groups are reaching out to opposition leaders in anticipation of a possible Democratic takeover of the House of Representatives, or even a Democratic sweep of Congress for the first time in 14 years.

The good news for the business as usual folks is that it's working. It looks like a lot of Democrats have no problem whoring for the lobbyists.

The House and Senate approved a $3.5-trillion federal budget outline Wednesday that embraces, in general terms, Obama's top priorities in healthcare, energy and education. But lawmakers have turned a cold shoulder to many of the president's proposals to shift wealth and federal subsidies from the rich to the less affluent.

That's right, too many congressional Democrats are spreading their legs for Big Business and the rich while giving the finger to the working class.

What I find as the most egregious breach of trust by some Democrats is:

Some Democrats even defected from Obama when it came to taxing the wealthiest Americans through the estate tax.

You've heard of the estate tax, the Right calls it the "Death Tax" and says it's the evil government's attempt to tax a person for dying. Like most things the Right claims, this is just pure BS.

The estate tax actually only applies to .025% of us, I guess "of them" would be more accurate. That's .025% of the wealthiest in this country. In fact, 18 of the richest families in the country have been financing the lobbying to do away with the estate tax.

Eighteen families, including the owners of Nordstrom Inc., The Seattle Times Co., Mars Inc., Koch Industries Inc. and Wal-Mart Inc., that stand to save $71.6 billion in taxes are financing lobbying efforts to repeal the estate tax, according to a study by two groups.

Public Citizen and United for a Fair Economy, which want to see estate tax rates increased to as high as 60 percent, said the families perpetrated a fraud on ordinary Americans by saying the levy constitutes an unfair "death tax." Only about 0.25 percent of Americans who die this year will leave an estate large enough to be taxed, the groups said.

That's quite a cause that these Democrats are rallying to.

Some Dems tucked their tails between their shaky legs on farm subsidies too.

The congressional budget did not incorporate Obama's proposal to cut off subsidies to farms with sales exceeding $500,000 a year, a move that bowed to the agriculture lobby and influential rural lawmakers, including the Senate Budget Committee's Conrad.

A lot of my relatives around here were farmers and trust me, the money does not go to family farms. It's not often that I agree with the Heritage Foundation. I guess it's true that if you dig through enough crap you might finally find that pony. It's from 2002, but things haven't changed.

These subsidy programs tax working Americans to award millions to millionaires and provide profitable corporate farms with money that has been used to buy out family farms. The current farm bills1 would provide even greater subsidies for large farmers, costing the average household $4,400 over the next 10 years, while facilitating increased consolidation and buyouts in the agricultural industry.2

It's kinda funny that using taxpayer money to do anything to help the working class is such a bad thing while giving this same money to Big Business and the Rich is a noble cause. But then, they can afford to give some of it back to the same politicians who voted to give it to them.

Here's another example of just how dumb some Democrats are:

Meanwhile, middle-class voters face the prospect of losing Obama's "Making Work Pay" tax credit -- of as much as $400 for individuals and $800 for couples -- after 2010.The budget resolution did not make room for a longer extension of the tax break.

Democrats said they had to impose that limit, at least for now, in deference to the worsening budget outlook.

Who do they think is electing them?

Most of us understand that all civilized countries have universal health care, that it works and it's less expensive than the mess that we call health care in this country. The president wants to partly fund it in this country by lowering the deduction for charitable donations to 28% from 33%. Only the rich get the 33% deduction, the rest of us just get the 28% anyway.

Needless to say, the lobbyists are having a fit over this.

Obama has defended the proposal as a matter of equity: Under current law, tax deductions are worth less to middle-class taxpayers than they are to wealthier people. For example, a middle-class bus driver gets only a 28% write-off for a $100 donation; someone in the upper income brackets gets 33% or more for the same donation.

Nonetheless, Obama's proposal is destined to fail, said Roberton Williams, a fellow at the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. "It sets up two groups to be the fall guys, and that mobilizes two fairly strong lobbies," he said.

Even the good guys in Congress can't compete with the Lobby Whores.

Today, a proposal to change bankruptcy law and allow bankruptcy judges to cram-down mortgage payments for troubled homeowners failed in the Senate by a vote of 45-51. The provision, which was introduced as an amendment by Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), required 60 votes to pass. In recent weeks, support for the measure evaporated in the face of furious lobbying by the banking and mortgage industries. Prior to the vote, Durbin — who this week said that bankers “are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill” — took to the floor to decry the banking industry’s influence in the cram-down debate:

On the same subject:

The U.S. Senate could have stepped up to the plate yesterday and passed an amendment to help bankruptcy judges help homeowners. Instead, twelve Democrats joined all the Republicans in the Senate--including those two supposed 'moderates' from Maine that we hear so much about--to defeat the amendment.

Just so you know that Democrat Lobby Whores are not just a figment of my overactive imagination:

Sen. Ben Nelson said Thursday that he will oppose the creation of a government-run health insurance plan as part of a health care overhaul, contrary to the position held by many of his fellow Democrats.

The company Nelson finds himself in is laid out clearly: business, the insurance industry, and Republicans. Of course, this isn’t surprising, considering his campaign donation history. Open Secrets says Nelson received $608,709 from the insurance industry in 2007-2008, making the insurance industry his biggest donor group, more than lawyers and even lobbyists.

And our newest Democrat doesn't seem to understand what the hell is going on. If you want to call yourself a Democrat then you ought to at least try to act like one.

Specter (Pa.) on Thursday voted against a controversial bill that would have rewritten bankruptcy laws — a bill cherished by Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) — just a day after voting against the Democratic-written budget.

It's funny how anything designed to help the working class is termed controversial. Anyway, Democratic leaders are somewhat less than livid. "Aw shucks, he's just being independent".

Democratic leaders said Specter's "no" votes simply confirm his independence.

I think we need new leaders.

To quote a great American, "We have met the enemy and he is us." Pogo Possum 1971

Later

Congressman John A. Boehner and Congresswoman Virginia Foxx Fleecing the Rubes.

2009-04-30T10:34:00.001-05:00

This is not what I planned on doing today, but when I read it I thought I might be able to have a little fun with it. The first is an interview with Minority Leader John A. Boehner of Ohio by the Washington Times.

The Washington Times, a conservative newspaper was founded by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, the self-proclaimed second coming of Christ and a bigtime GOP backer.

You wouldn't know it by looking at him, but apparently Senator Boehner has a delicate tummy. He tells us about it in the interview.

Boehner says Obama's bills makes him 'want to throw up'

See?

The top House Republican said Tuesday that the liberal bills being pushed by President Obama and congressional Democrats make him "want to throw up" and that Mr. Obama's first 100 days in office have shown he has "no plan for keeping America safe."

Oh, for the good old days when president was ticking off the rest of the world, starting wars for no reason, disregarding terrorist warnings and seeing evil doers behind every bush.

Unfortunately, for Boehner and the Right, paranoia is not conducive to feelings of well being or safety. Catch-22.

Minority Leader John A. Boehner of Ohio said in an interview that decisions such as closing Guantanamo Bay prison and releasing classified memos on CIA interrogation techniques reflect a dangerous, "piecemeal approach" to national security.

"I'm just looking at some of these tactical moves that they've made, and I don't see how they fit into a larger picture," he said in an interview with editors and reporters at The Washington Times. "They have no plan for taking on the terrorists, and they have no plan for keeping America safe. What is the overarching strategy here?"

I have to applaud Congressman Boehner for publicly admitting woefully inadequate cognitive abilities. It takes a big man to admit his shortcomings.

The "overarching strategy" can be found here, Obama's NSC Will Get New Power, btw. Always glad to help out the cognitively challenged.

He attacked Democratic initiatives such as a "hate crimes" bill being considered this week in the House, which would boost the federal government's authority to go after "bias-motivated violence." Conservative critics say the bill amounts to a gag rule for preachers and other religious figures who do not support homosexuality.

The bill "makes me want to throw up," Mr. Boehner said, blasting the idea of going after someone for "what we think they were thinking as opposed to what they did."

OMG! Obama's not only coming after our guns, but he wants our preachers too! And then he wants us put in jail for what we think! OMG! OMG! OMG!

It's just hard for me to believe that a grown man like Boehner could say something like this with a straight face. It's even harder for me to believe the number of people who actually believe this crap.

They ought to be just damned glad that there aren't laws against total stupidity in this country.

As I said before this is crap. Are you listening right wingers? It's just absolute BS. In fact, the language of the bill includes,

"Nothing in this Act, or the amendments made by this Act, shall be construed to prohibit any expressive conduct protected from legal prohibition by, or any activities protected by the free speech or free exercise clauses of, the First Amendment to the Constitution."

So you see, Fox News and the Right Wing Propaganda Machine, or even your hate spouting preachers will not be affected in any way. So you'll have to find something else to talk about at your next tea party.

The 10-term lawmaker criticized Mr. Obama's bid to shut down Guantanamo before figuring out where the high-risk terrorist detainees would be placed.

"We have a fabulous facility in Cuba. It is state of the art," he said. "I have no confidence that any detainees we send back to Yemen are going to be in prison for a very long time, and then they're right back on the battlefield."

Yeah, we should just keep them forever in order to make the Right feel safer. Brilliant!

I have a better idea. Let's move out the detainees and since it's such a "fabulous facility in Cuba" with "great food", we could open it up as a resort for vacationing right wingers. I got this from the right wing blogosphere.

It’s a tropical paradise with great food, comfortable accommodations and culturally sensitive religious services. It’s cleaner and more pleasant than the countries of origin of any of the inmates, and is far too good for them.

Too good for them, but great for tired right wingers who need a little rest far away from Obama and all of those America hating liberals. Hasta la vista!

Mr. Boehner also criticized Mr. Obama's release of Bush administration Justice Department memos approving "enhanced interrogation techniques" such as waterboarding, saying it "handcuffs our intelligence professionals." He also challenged the premise that most of the information had been reported, arguing that an official government account is categorically different than a press report.

"They should have fought this court case all the way to the end instead of rolling over for their friends in the [American Civil Liberties Union]," Mr. Boehner said of the lawsuit that prompted the disclosure.

Boehner says he don't want the memos out because it would "handcuff our intelligence professionals". That's a little odd considering that our intelligence professionals say it doesn't work anyway. Like here and here and here.

So torture yields basically either no intelligence or bad intelligence. It don't work and Boehner's all for it. I have to give them credit, right wingers can go farther with no intelligence or bad intelligence than any other group that I've ever seen.

Congressman Boehner also mentioned another of the Right's greatest fears, the ACLU. Imagine an organization that stands up for a person's civil rights, no matter who or what they are. That's just un-American.

Senator Boehner, champion of red herrings and straw dogs.

Champion of the ignorant beyond belief is North Carolina Congresswoman Virginia Foxx. Take a look at what she said:

Rep. Foxx: "The bill was named after a very unfortunate incident that happened, where a young man was killed, but we know that that young man was killed in the commitment of robbery. It wasn't because he was gay. The bill was named for him, the hate crimes bill was named for him, but it's, it's really a hoax, that that continues to be used as an excuse for passing these bills."[House Floor Speech, 4/29/09]

I mean, even the killers said they did it because he was gay.

I'm glad that these people are finally starting to be seen as the reactionary fringe group that they always have been.

Later.

Right Wing Analysis 101: There Will Be a Test.

2009-04-29T03:00:00.012-05:00

I really don't believe in pounding someone when they're down, however, considering all the trouble they've caused this country and since they are practically writing this post, why not?

Once again we'll delve into the twisted psyche of the Right and see just what kind of fun stuff we can come up with.

To be fair, we have to keep in mind that the Right is experiencing extremely high stress at the moment. They're still shellshocked from the 2008 election, only 21% of the population will admit to being Republican and Sen. Arlen Specter has left the Titanic. Thrown overboard is closer to the truth.

So, let's talk about Specter and the Right's reaction to his joining their nemesis.

“I would rather have 30 Republicans in the Senate who really believe in principles of limited government, free markets, free people, than to have 60 that don’t have a set of beliefs.”— Sen. Jim DeMint, R-SC

“Guess now that Larry Craig is gone & Specter realized there was no teabagging at the teaparty, he had to go Dem for Frank to fondle him.”— RedState.com founder Erick Erickson, on Twitter.

“RINO Specter is the first to go! He knows that we conservatives are taking back the party and there’s simply no room for him. He’s just showing his true colors and being what he has been all along: a DEMOCRAT!!!!!! Now, if we could only dump Snowe and Collins….”a Free Republic poster

“I think the threat to the country presented by this defection really relates to the issue of whether or not in the United States of America our people want the majority to have whatever it wants, without restraint, without a check or a balance…. This is not a national story, this is a Pennsylvania story.”— Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell

That's right Senator, the majority of the country want the majority party to have whatever it wants. You don't have to worry about checks and balances, that's our job and we'll do it.

Check out the comments at the bottom of the above article to see how the Right's rank and file handle adversity.

The Right's philosophical leader, the venerated Rush Limbaugh doesn't see it as a defection, but rather an ideological cleansing of his party.

"A lot of people say, 'Well, Specter, take [Sen. John] McCain with you. And his daughter [Meghan]. Take McCain and his daughter with you if you're gonna…" he told listeners, dissolving in laughter.

"…..It's ultimately good. You're weeding out people who aren't really Republicans," he said.

I remember when Rush ragged Chelsea Clinton, now Meghan McCain. You know, I really don't think that Rush cares much for girls.

While Rush was trying to keep his party pure, other right wing commentators were busy planting the notion of Swine Flu being introduced into this country by illegal aliens into their fertile yet empty minds. Of course, that's the only possible explanation.

Despite the fact that there is no evidence to support such claims, talk radio hosts Michael Savage and Neal Boortz, radio and Fox TV personality Glenn Beck, and columnist Michelle Malkin are spreading them faster than the contagion.

"Illegal aliens are bringing in a deadly new flue strain. Make no mistake about it," blares Michael Savage.

"I've blogged for years about the spread of contagious diseases from around the world into the US as a result of uncontrolled immigration," writes Michelle Malkin.

"What happens if there's a rash of deaths in Mexico... and if you're a family in Mexico and people are dying and Americans are not, why wouldn't you flood this border?" announces Glenn Beck.

Oh! But wait, there's an even more logical explanation.

"What better way to sneak a virus into this country than to give it to Mexicans....then spread a rumor there there are construction jobs here, and there they come," blathers Boortz.

Savage — "make no mistake about it" — believes that radical Islamic countries planted the virus in Mexico knowing that humans make the "perfect mules for bringing the strain into America."

Don't you just love well thought out and rational discourse?

Bonnie Fuller answers them point by point in her article that I stole these quotes from.

Specter's not the only Republican that the Right may decide that needs to be cleansed.

WASHINGTON – Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., said Tuesday he will support the nomination of an Indiana University law professor to head the Obama administration’s internal law office.

Some Republicans have promised to try to block Johnsen’s confirmation either because of her support for abortion rights or because she criticized the legal justification used by the Bush administration for the torture of detainees.

OMG! The head of the Excutive Branch law office actually following the law? Well, we know that concept is just way too radical for the staid Right. No wonder they think the Left is crazy.

Despite all of the above, we know that the Right stands firm on whatever they consider principles, which, BTW, I believe still have about a day left on the bidding over at e-bay. When a Republican says something it's etched in stone.

While the stimulus was being debated in January, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor called a group of reporters into his office to outline the GOP's objections. As we filed in, we walked past a giant poster ridiculing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) for allegedly pushing for high-speed rail connecting Disneyland and Las Vegas.

On NBC's "Meet the Press," Cantor called that project an example of "waste and pork-barrel spending."

Asked about high-speed rail at a recent local event in Virginia, Cantor was all thumbs up. "If there is one thing that I think all of us here on both sides of the political aisle from all parts of the region agree with, it's that we need to do all we can to promote jobs here in the Richmond area," Cantor said of the high-speed rail.

No wonder the Right's base is confused, I know I am.

Now we will go from the questionably sane members of the Right to a couple that there's no question about.

The image at the top is the Twitter posts from this guy.

An Oklahoma City man who announced on Twitter that he would turn an April 15 tax protest into a bloodbath was hit with a federal charge of making interstate threats last week, in what appears to be first criminal prosecution to stem from posts on the microblogging site.

Daniel Knight Hayden, 52, was arrested by FBI agents who identified him as the Twitter user CitizenQuasar. In a series of tweets beginning April 11, CitizenQuasar vowed to start a “war” against the government on the steps of the Oklahoma City Capitol building, the site of that city’s version of the national “Tea Party” protests promoted by the conservative-leaning Fox News.

Hayden’s MySpace page is a breathtaking gallery of right wing memes about the “New World Order,” gun control as Nazi fascism, and Barack Obama’s covert use of television hypnosis, among many others.

I really don't understand this guy, we have television and the internet in Oklahoma, hell, some houses even have indoor plumbing, so there's really no excuse for this.

But I think this will make him a frontrunner for Sarah Palin's running mate in the 2012 election. Palin/Quasar, it'll sure look good on your bumper.

I tried to see if I recognized anyone on his friends list, but it's kinda hard since we all kinda tend to look alike in Oklahoma.

Unlike Citizen Quasar, this next guy was just kinda bummed out about Obama getting elected. So, he whacked a couple of deputies. He'll have to do better than that to get the Glenn Beck decoder ring.

An offense report filed against Cartwright the day he died outlines an angry husband who threatened his wife, kept guns and knives on hand, was "severely disturbed" that Barack Obama had been elected president, and believed the U.S. government was conspiring against him.

I was going to save this groundbreaking conclusion for the last, but for some reason I'm putting here, probably hoping it will segue into the next item.

The Right has a tenuous grasp of reality. Shocking, huh?

Ohio State University has done a study and found that the folks on the Right actually think Stephen Colbert is serious and is making fun of the Left. Very, very tenuous.

"Our results aren't that conservatives don't get the joke. It's that how you see the joke depends on who you are," says Kristen Landreville, a PhD student in communications at Ohio State University and one of three co-authors. "If you're conservative, you think the joke's on liberals because he's openly making fun of liberals."

And they think the country would be better off with them in charge.

The right may be down, but they're by no means out. They have a cunning plan.

Washington, D.C. (April 28, 2009) – As the White House and Congressional leaders seek to move the country dramatically left, some of America’s most prominent conservative leaders, strategists, academic voting behavior experts and professional pollsters have come together to form Resurgent Republic, an independent, not-for-profit organization that aims to shape the debate over the proper role of government. More giveaways to Big Business and the rich.

Resurgent Republic will promote market-oriented policies, deregulation lower taxes and economic growth, for Big Biz and the rich and strong national security policies. open the doors of the treasury to defense contractors It will help policy makers, think tanks, interest groups and others advocate for policies that are consistent with conservative principles, and oppose policies that stifle job creation, weaken national security and undermine values that have made America a great country. eight more years of Bush or putting lipstick on a pig---no, not Limbaugh in drag

So, let's review:

What have we learned about the Right, it's inhabitants and it's policies?

If you used any form of the words Bat Guano, you get an A.

Have your educational institution contact me to get that put on your transcript, Right Wing Analysis 101.

Later.

What the Right is Thinking, Fantasizing, Muddling, Mulling Over and/or Wanting to Foment.

2009-04-26T05:06:00.009-05:00

First of all, it's pretty obvious that they still believe that they're in the majority, even though they're not.

They also seem to believe that there is a ground swell in this country for a revolution to overthrow our new liberal/socialist/fascist/whatever government that the actual majority voted in.

They actually think that the rest of us are so clueless that we can't understand that the Obama Administration and the Democrat Congress are dismantling the Constitution and bringing in communism as our new form of government. They know this because, by God they love this country and care enough to take interest in what's going on. They stay informed, they listen to talk radio, they watch Fox News, they click on WorldNetDaily and Newsmax and they're all saying the same things, so it must be true.

Oh yeah, and they're going to take our guns away from us. Just like Hitler did.

But hang on a minute, where were all these Constitution lovers during the last eight years. How many of them really realize that there's a lot more to the Constitution than the 2nd Amendment?

Imagine the furor if Barack Obama had said these words:

"I don't give a goddamn," Bush retorted. "I'm the President and the Commander-in-Chief. Do it my way."

"Mr. President," one aide in the meeting said. "There is a valid case that the provisions in this law undermine the Constitution."

"Stop throwing the Constitution in my face," Bush screamed back. "It's just a goddamned piece of paper!"

I really don't remember their outrage when this happened. They didn't complain when George W. Bush called our Constitution a "Goddamned piece of paper" and they didn't complain when Bush ignored the Constitution and broke the law in doing so.

We may not have realized it at the time, but in the period from late 2001-January 19, 2009, this country was a dictatorship. The constitutional rights we learned about in high school civics were suspended. That was thanks to secret memos crafted deep inside the Justice Department that effectively trashed the Constitution. What we know now is likely the least of it.

Of course, to a card carrying member of the Silent "Majority", none of this stuff actually happened. It was just hype perpetrated by the liberal media. Really.

Let's take a look at what motivates these people.

Here's what a joke looks like in the extreme Right. I think it epitomizes the Right's "Audacity of Hope".

What does President Lincoln, President Kennedy, and Presedent Obama have in common?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Nothing Yet .

I get this neat stuff in my e-mail. It's kinda scary. There's lots of folks out there who really believe this stuff. They are afraid of their government, they are paranoid and they are armed.

Here's a really neat one, it has a biblical theme and it pretty much covers the whole Right Wing Fantasy Land misinformation campaign. You can see it all here.

It's titled "The Promised One". Obama, of course is the Promised One. Here's the happy ending.

> >> And the people said, "Wait a minute. That is unfair!!"

> >> And the world said, "Neither are these other idiotic

> >> programs you have embraced. Lo, you have become a Socialist state and a

> >> second-rate power. Now you shall play by our rules!"

> >> And the people cried out,"Alas, alas!! What have we done?"

> >> But yea verily, it was too late... The people set upon The

> >> One and spat upon him and stoned him, and his name was dung. And the

> >> once mighty nation was no more; and the once proud people were without

> >> sustenance or shelter or hope. And the Change The One had given them was

> >> as like unto a poison that had destroyed them and like a whirlwind that

> >> consumed all that they had built. And the people beat their chests in

> >> despair and cried out in anguish, "Give us back our nation and our pride

> >> and our hope!!" But it was too late, and their homeland was no more.

> >> .......................

> >> You may think this is a fairy tale, but it's not. It's

> >> happening RIGHT NOW!> >>> >>

After reading this, if your not wetting your knickers, you must not be a "real American". Mine's dry too.

You must be thinking, "Why would anyone rather believe untruths and be miserable when it's just as easy to believe the truth?" We all know that knowing the truth doesn't make you happy but at least the things that we're concerned about merit that concern. I mean, we're not going to get off our butts, go buy tea and go protest a 3% tax increase on the richest 5% of the country.

When I first read the next vitriolic screed I thought it was written by one of the "Silent Majority" members who had let the right wing propaganda take her off the deep end and needed to vent their rage before they spontaneously combusted.

It was surprising to find out that the woman who wrote this is quite accomplished. I figure that she is just another of the Right's hired guns that they use to manipulate the rubes.

It's about the Obama's trip to the G20 Summit and her indignation over the Obama's performance during that trip

You can read it all here, but here's some bits and pieces.

Yo, first couple!

Yeah, that's really the title.

OK, Barack and Michelle - it's my turn now.

As long as you seem to be on the road of informality, throwing tradition, etiquette, proper diplomacy, protocol and common sense out the window and replacing it with 21st century casual, I'm taking the liberty, as an American citizen, to give you a message from my heart: stop it!

For two people of your political and diplomatic level, your breezy disregard for proper behavior is embarrassing.

Don't you just love how the Right feels that they are experts on all matters and therefore they should be the arbitrator on all matters, because the rest of us are just too stupid to understand grown up things. Like this.

We've been treated to you repeatedly criticizing and apologizing for our country on foreign soil in front of world leaders. Then, to make it worse, you bowed to the Saudi king, a full, from-the-waist, bow!

What was that about? Bowing signifies subservience! You can make book that the Saudis and all the Middle East understands that. Barack, the president of the United States of America is not subservient to anyone.

That bow was inappropriate and demeaning to your office and to all Americans. You should be ashamed, at the very least, embarrassed.

You can kinda see my problem with taking these people's selective indignation too seriously.

This was going to be it, but I received a new "joke" today. I just thought I'd share it with you.

Obama walks into a bar with a parrot on his shoulder. The bartender says, Hey, where did you get that? The parrot says, Kenya ...they're all over the place!

When you stop rolling around on the floor check out this video and think about if the Right is who you want leading this country into the future.

Did you know?

I don't think the Right could even come close to grasping the implications.

Later.

Standing With Mississippi.

2009-04-25T03:49:00.003-05:00

Heather Young sent me the following information about the Mississippi Center for Justice and their Standing With Mississippi campaign to force Mississippi's corrupt (my word) Republican Governor Haley Barbour to take federal money to help Mississippi's working class and stop acting like a posturing dumbass (again, my words).

OK, Heather I've signed the petition and here's my endorsement.

For those of you who don't know who Haley Barbour is, lucky you. Haley's a big time, Southern, good old boy, anything that helps the rich and screws the poor must be a good thing, Republican party philosopher/propaganda expert. He was even chairman of the Republican National Committee from '94-'97.

Here's a little more background on Barbour courtesy of Think Progress.

Family members and lobbyists profited from Katrina tragedy: "Among the beneficiaries are Barbour's own family and friends, who have earned hundreds of thousands of dollars from hurricane-related business. A nephew, one of two who are lobbyists, saw his fees more than double in the year after his uncle appointed him to a special reconstruction panel."

Owned controlling interest in 2002 New Hampshire phone jamming company: For nearly two hours on election day 2002, subcontractors for the telemarketing firm GOP Marketplace tied-up Democratic and union phone banks with repeated hang up calls. Multiple GOP officials eventually either pled guilty to or were convicted of criminally violating federal communications law. Barbour's investment group, Helm Partners, was not only a major investor in GOP Marketplace, but it also held a controlling interest in the firm.

As a lobbyist, he represented firm indicted in Tom DeLay's money laundering scandal: As a lobbyist for Barbour Griffith & Rogers, Barbour represented The Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care Inc., "a corporate coalition of 14 of the country's largest for-profit nursing home companies." The Alliance wrote a check for $100,000 "ended up illegally funding Republican candidates for the Texas statehouse" in 2002. The check was eventually used as evidence in the case that led to indictments for money laundering against former Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX).

A former tobacco lobbyist, he killed Mississippi's successful anti-smoking program: From 1998 to 2002, Barbour's lobbying firm "was paid a total of $3.8 million by the tobacco companies." As governor of Mississippi, he led an effort to defund and ultimately kill the state's anti-smoking program, considered to be "the nation's most successful anti-smoking programs."

Directed large amounts of reconstruction funds to wealthy homeowners: Barbour and Mississippi's two Republican Senators steered an "unprecedented" $23.5 billion in federal reconstruction aid, but by waiving a HUD requirement that "70 percent of the funds are supposed to be allocated to low- and moderate-income people." Barbour "badly skewed" the funds towards "wealthy homeowners," with only 25 percent reaching "the poorer segments of the population."

What a guy.

Here's the plug from Standing with Mississippi.

Petition to Governor Barbour: Accept Stimulus MoneyMississippi

Center for Justice launches national online petition in favor of stimulus

Mississippi Center for Justice launched an online campaign, “Standing With Mississippi,” designed to inform Mississippians—and other friends around the country—about Governor Haley Barbour’s intended rejection of nearly $60 million in Unemployment Insurance benefits provided to Mississippi as part of the Federal stimulus package.

“Standing With Mississippi” encourages people to voice their support for providing every available dollar to Mississippians who have lost their employment through no fault of their own.

As the poorest state in the nation, Mississippi can least afford to put partisan politics ahead of people’s basic needs. Mississippi desperately needs its rightful share of the stimulus package. The money that Governor Barbour is rejecting will help 39,600 hardworking families weather this recession.

Supporters are encouraged to sign the petition and learn more at: http://www.StandingWithMississippi.org

The petition comes at a time when Governor Barbour has called a public meeting for April 16 to discuss the stimulus money. Mississippi Center for Justice believes hardworking Mississippians deserve every available resource to support their basic needs of food and shelter during such a difficult economic time.

There's a lot of good folks in Mississippi, sign the petition and help them out. Thanks.

Later.

I'm working on some right wing propaganda to show just how unbalanced the Right actually is, so stay tuned.

Just how stupid do you have to be to be a Republican? Global Currency, Michele Bachmann, Glenn Beck, Mary Fallin and GOP SOS Budget.

2009-04-01T20:54:00.005-05:00

I don't know? Is it just a tenuous grasp of reality or is is just plain stupidity? Paranoia? Persecution complex? Superiority complex? Having Jesus talking in their heads 24 hours a day? The Right Wing Propaganda Machine? Analytically challenged? Greedy? No, that one's a gimme.

I mean just what is it that makes Republicans/Conservatives the way they are?

I sure as hell don't know. But I do know that there's plenty of evidence that something's wrong with them.

Just one example is Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN). She appeared on Glenn Beck's Paranoid r' Us show to brag about the great job that she's doing in stopping America's rush into the One World Currency crisis that is currently sweeping Right Wing Fantasy Land.

Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) appeared on Glenn Beck's TV show yesterday, to talk up her proposed constitutional amendment to stop the Obama administration from replacing the dollar with a global currency:

Bachmann boasted that she's picked up 30 cosponsors so far, to which Beck replied: "I can't believe that you've only got 30 cosponsors. I mean -- how is it you could walk around going, "I just -- this is just, hey, save the dollar.' And only 30 people are willing to say, 'Eh that sounds like a good thing, let's give that a shot.'"

OK, we have two supposedly educated adults here talking about something that's not even real. And to top it off, Bachmann has convinced 30 other supposedly educated adults to put their names on a public document to stop something that there's no such thing as.

What's even more amazing is that these indredibly, gullible freaks of nature have their own following of even more incredibly, gullible freaks who think that the rest of us who don't believe the crazy crap are stupid. And this is how the GOP and their base make fantasy policy.

The 30 genii that cosponsered Bachmann's "I'm so damned dumb that I don't know what's real" constitutional amendment proposal are: Whacked out nut jobs, I mean, are:

Todd Akin (R-MO), Spencer Bachus (R-AL), Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD), Judy Biggert (R-IL), Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Paul Broun (R-GA), Henry Brown (R-SC), Dan Burton (R-IN), Michael Conaway (R-TX), John Culberson (R-TX), Mary Fallin (R-OK), John Fleming (R-LA), Virginia Foxx (R-NC), Phil Gingrey (R-GA), Louie Gohmert (R-TX), Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), Darrell Issa (R-CA), Walter Jones (R-NC), Steve King (R-IA), Mark Kirk (R-IL), Doug Lamborn (R-CO), Tom McClintock (R-CA), Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI), Ron Paul (R-TX), Joseph Pitts (R-PA), Bill Posey (R-FL), Tom Price (R-GA), David Roe (R-TN), John Shadegg (R-AZ), Glenn Thompson (R-PA), Zach Wamp (R-TN)

Now think about it. Wanting to amend the Constitution to prevent something that's not real from happening.

Oh yeah, Oklahoma's own Mary Fallin is a typical family values Republican. In 1998, in typical Oklahoma politics fashion Mary's state trooper bodyguard resigned after admitting to "unprofessional conduct”, but it had nothing to do with making the animal with two backs. Wink, wink, nod, nod. There was nothing more than a little hand holding and kissing, you know, like friends do. I never realized that the Republicans were such a friendly bunch.

Meanwhile Oklahoma's holier than thou Republican Governor Frank A. Keating who at the time was railing against Bill Clinton's "unprofessional conduct", said nothing. There's nothing quite like living in a Red State.

Back in the real world, the GOP trotted out their tired old sow and put some new lipstick on it and called it their budget plan today.

Later

Brit Hume and Joe the Plumber at the Media Research Center Confessional and Evan Bayh is Senator Strangelove.

2009-03-21T04:49:00.005-05:00

OK, it's official. It's straight from the horse's ass, er, mouth.

Last night the euphemistically named Media Research Center gave Brit Hume of Fox News its “William F. Buckley Jr. Award for Media Excellence.”

Media Research Center is one of the right wing propaganda outfits that make sure that the peasants don't clue in on the fact that most of what they believe runs totally opposite to their own self interests. You know, "All things which are good come from the wealthy and large corporations." Yes, there are a lot of folks who believe just that.

Media Research Center was founded by Buckley's nephew Brent Bozell. Bozell makes out really well by confirming that the right wing garbage that the less attentive of us take for truth is, indeed, truth. You know, Iraq brought down the World Trade Center and Barack Obama is a covert Muslim terrorist and the anti-Christ. After all, he is a multi-tasker.

Brit said a lot if interesting things that night. One of the more humorous things was:

HUME: What are we getting?…We’re getting bloggers and websites and all sorts of individual entrepreneurs, and we have a vaster menu of choices today than we’ve ever had. But I think that we also have the danger that everything will be presented from one political viewpoint or the other, and that the media that confront us are going to be more partisan than ever — which means that the Media Research Center will have a mission for many years to come, and a good thing that is.

Brit's worried that the media will be more partisan than ever. Brit works for Fox News. Are you starting to see the irony? Thank God for His creation of Fox News to protect us from the truth.

Then Brit really let the cat out of the bag. Apparently Fox News research needs to go no farther than Media Research Center. In fact they don't even need to go that far, because Media Research Center comes to them.

HUME: I want to say a word, however, of thanks, to [MRC president] Brent [Bozell] and to the team at the Media Research Center and all the contributors who make that work there possible. […] also for the tremendous amount of material that the Media Research Center provided me for so many years when I was anchoring Special Report. I don’t know what we would have done without them. It was a daily, sort of a buffet of material to work from, and we — we — we certainly made tremendous use of it.

A buffet of bullshit and people keep coming back for more. Fox News, we repeat Media Research Center crap and you decide. It's just incredible the amount of people who have decided that they prefer bullshit.

It was a night of confessions. One man conservative think tank and emerging conservative leader Samuel Wurzelbacher, AKA Joe the Plumber, admitted to the crowd that rich white guys make him horny.

"God, all this love and everything in the room -- I'm horny," declared Joe.

Whether this will displace Jeff Gannon as the conservative's favorite male prostitute, only time will tell. My money's on Joe.

Joe went on to say:

"Unfortunately, we have a chairman up there who wants to redefine conservatism; he wants to make it hip hop, put it in a new package and sell it," Wurzelbacher said. "You can't sell principles; either you have them or you don't."

Poor Joe, he actually thinks that what conservatives have are principles.

Media Research Center's Anything But The Truth festival was a great success and a good time was had by all. The most often heard comment was "Hee, hee, hee, Joe said "horny"."

Meanwhile, in the real world, some Democrats after seeing how much fun the Republicans were having with their circular firing squad, decided that they wanted one too.

Senator Evan Bayh (D-IN) proclaimed today on MSNBC's Morning Joe the beginning of a new group of conservative Democrats that could work to block Obama's budget priorities.

Bayh and his colleagues have joined with Republicans to insist that the president gain a super-majority of 60 votes to pass any of his major reforms. Others warned the president not to use existing budget rules that require only a simple majority of 51 votes to pass either his clean energy or his health care reforms. Now, if the Moderate Dems Working Group votes alongside Republicans against Senate Democrats, they will be able to block Obama's major reforms, which need at least 60 votes to pass.

It looks like things are getting back to normal. The Republicans are taking the express to Right Wing Fantasy Land and some Democrats standing in line for their tickets.

Enjoy the weekend.

Later.