Well…I’m not sure what is going on in my head today but I’ve had quite a few ideas that I wanted to get down…and that is unusual to say the least, but bear with me…this one might just be worth it…I’m one of the people left in the US that still sees the importance of at least knowing history to make useful connections or see the irony that is frequently contained in it. I say this because I’m old enough to remember the furor over John Kennedy’s faith in the 1960 election; people then were concerned then that Rome and the Pope would call the shots through a Catholic president and the repubs used his Catholicism to try to paint Kennedy as a scary person who would check every decision with the Pope. Then, fast forward to today where we have ole Rick Santorum saying that all of his governance, if elected, would conform to his Catholic faith and the hard right that supports him cheers….ah….irony is lost on the idiots on the right…but it sure makes me laugh at times….
Category Archives: Politics
Rick Santorum is just a liar…
Well…I’m not going to write this one just yet…but, your jaw will drop when I get back from the bike ride, get lunch on, and come back to finish this one….okay, I’m back and I am just astounded on how the media is allowing ole Rick to just spout utter nonsense on the campaign trail without calling him out on it….let’s forget about his insinuation that Obama is like Hitler for the time being and focus on his latest outrage that states that Obama and his health care plan will result in active killing of elderly people who are ill and don’t want to die…and he cites the experience of the Netherlands since they passed a law allow for doctors to help people in the end stages of their lives to die with dignity. Santorum goes on to cite statistics and “facts” that are completely false that were sourced from extremely dubious sources that feed the right wing lie machine like tens of thousands of the elderly there wearing bracelets that say “don’t kill me”. First, there is no connection between the Netherlands and the US and there never has been other than they have better health care there that is a single payer system….and second, every source in the Netherlands that has been contacted to try to find one of these bracelets has come up empty…not one has been found…and not one person has been put do death against his will…not one, Rick….go back to your lobbying and feeding on the misery of others to make your millions…we don’t need to elect a pope that lies to America every time you open your mouth….
Oh….I tried to do this one justice but to get a better take on it, and one of my many sources for this one came from Glenn Kessler in the “Fact Checker” column in the Washington Post…he has all of the stats that Santorum lied about…and it is even worse how Glen describes….geez….
Gas prices are the GOP’s silver bullet?
Well…I’m not sure if this one is going to be the good one that I promised this morning but it bears repeating since the repubs seem to be making gas prices a centerpiece of their attacks on Obama…let’s just remind everyone of one thing when the talk starts to move to the Keystone pipeline and drilling in ANWR…consumption of oil and its products continue to decline while production is at a 6year high…but, what the repubs don’t mention is that we have become a net exporter of refined oil products…what does this mean to you and me? It means that any new capacity coming from the tar sands in Canada will never be used in the US…it will all be exported with the risks of spills and environmental degradation absorbed by the US public while the profits will all go to the repubs best friends, the oil companies. The reason that gas prices are rising have nothing to do with supply and demand…in the new global economy where oil is an investment to be flipped…the commodity traders can manipulate to market to ensure that no matter what happens, they will make obscene profits by using the same fear, gloom and doom tactics that the repubs use to win elections….I hope that day is coming to a close….and it can be hastened by applying transaction fees to every trade and raising the margin dollars required to make those trades…something the oil company purchased repubs will never do…
One last thing…where are the jobs plans from the repub controlled House? They have controlled the House for over a year and nothing from them other than the normal nonsense on social issues…the last I heard, limiting contraception for women hasn’t created one job….
It’s all about what vision you want for America..
Well….it has been almost two years since the repubs did well in the 2010 elections and we now have a very clear view of what this country will be like if they win again in 2012. All we have to do is look to Wisconsin, where the public unions gave back everything they were asked for in cuts to wages and benefits but the repubs had to take more and push their fringe agenda of stripping the unions and the middle class people in them of their right to associate and bargain from a position of equality. Next we can look to Pennsylvania where the legislature just approved the fundamental human right of gays to marry but the tea party governor Chris Christie vetoed the bill and is now, by his own action and governing for only the 20% of the electorate that are tea partiers, trying to change the rules like the repubs always do to get his way. Then we have the debacle in Virginia that I talked about last week that would mandate an invasive and unnecessary procedure for any woman seeking an abortion there. Right here at home in Michigan, we have the Attorney General picking and choosing which laws to enforce or ignore that will drive his personal agenda to eliminate the voter approved use of medical marijuana…..these are just a few examples of what an America run by the right would look like….crony capitalism on steroids where the rights of the people are taken away on the whim of the moralists who think they know best for all of us…geez…
Don’t know where to start with ole Rick…
Well…I have been getting behind in doing these and it is probably because I have been worrying about money so much…but, that’s not your problem and I guess I’ll just have to deal with it…..and I really did want to get one out on ole Rick Santorum since he is just one of the most ridiculous politicians I have ever seen…it’s like a mutation has taken over the right of the repub party and that is what they are left with…a bible spouting judgment freak who has said openly he will bring religion into all aspects of governing…never mind that he continues to advocate “returning” to a strict reading of the constitution that would forbid that type of nonsense…and that there are over 30 percent of the country that either are not his brand of Christian or the 15% of us have no faith at all…what does he propose…that people be forced to agree with religious decisions that are made by the government? Just another incidence where the right screams that Obama is “taking away our freedoms” and then will do so much more to punish those they don’t agree with….just go away, Rick….and make more millions off of the government you seem to hate so much…geez…
Are the republicans stupid or just brain dead?
Well…I have bee struggling with the question in the title since yesterday when I saw a segment on Keith’s show that described how repubs in Virgina are attacking a woman’s right to choose by legislating that before she can choose, she must underego an invasive procedure (which I won’t describe here but you can imagine) forced on her by the government. Where are the small government repubs now? When more of than 50% of the electorate are women, you would think that the repubs would put aside their war on women just for their own political survival, never mind that this is just a huge abrogation of womens civil rights and takes us back to the bad old days when men essentially owned women. How would these guys feel if the government told them they had to have an invasive prostate exam to get the rest of their healthcare? You can bet that law would be gone in a minute.
Then…we have the idiot Mitt here in West Michigan yesterday telling a hand picked crowd that he will fight against unions and destroy them if he is elected…I don’t even know what to say about that other than bye, bye, Mitt…it’s the last mistake you’re going to make…especially when over 70% of the people in the US want unions to remain as protection against unbridled business. Geez…
See what I mean about stupid?
Some radical proposals for the economy…
Well…with the latest numbers that have come out on family income over the past couple of weeks showing that poverty and income inequality is skyrocketing in the US, and the connection between this inequality and the lackluster recovery, I think it is time to do something radical. But first let’s place the responsibility for these changes squarely where they belong, on the repub policies over the past thirty years that have resulted in the top 1% doing well and everyone else going backward. I know, I’ve railed about this before just because what I was seeing an feeling felt wrong, but with numbers like these it is time to stop nibbling at the corners and take a huge bite out of the core problems. First, I would propose an immediate change in ceo pay to 1 dollar per year and structural changes that would prevent any ceo from being compensated more than 50 times the average of the people that work for him or her…this would give them the incentive to raise all boats as the saying goes since rising pay of his workers would also raise the ceo’s pay. Second, I would propose worker representation on every corporate board to break the cycle of cronyism and incestous relationships that pervade corporate America and give all stakeholders a voice in their livelihoods….third, I would immediately raise the pay of all of the workers to the difference of the 1 dollar ceo pay proposed and what the average of the pay has been over the past 5 years….putting billions if not trillions of dollars in the hands of people that will spend it and giving a huge boost to our manufacturing and service industries; creating a truly self-sustaining recovery that will be spread across the economic spectrum….
Okay, I know this is really quite radical and will be branded as socialist, communist, and maybe even Martian…but, what we are currently doing is not working due in large part to the desire of the repubs to ensure that Obama doesn’t get a second term….so we need to do something new…
The right is still delusional…
Well…as every day goes by, I have more and more hope that the right will continue is descent into the delusions they have been experiencing since the start of the primary season. The latest in this long list is the idea that, if re-elected, Obama will “wage war” on the Catholic church and somehow cause an institution that has survived for almost 2,000 years to disappear…whether is should or not is not a topic for today but when it and it’s supporters on the right coordinate attacks on Obama for a reasonable rule on contraception saying that as a matter of faith, the Catholic institutions should not have to abide by rules that are already the law of the land in over 30 states, it is the right that is denigrating religion by cynically using it as a ploy for political advantage. So, the right, who wraps itself in the Constitution on a daily basis thinks every law should be subject to a matter of faith; only following those that match their religious beliefs? I defy them to find that kind of nonsense in the Constitution…since the founding of this country, people have been free to practice whatever religion they see fit but never has religion trumped the law of the land…and this comes from the party of laws against Sharia and it’s use in the legal system…but, we all know they would love to have the US become a theocracy…just like the Muslim countries they love to hate…geez…
As a moderate progressive who wants this country to succeed for everyone, I just hope they keep this nonsense up all the way to their convention…by then, they will have shown their true colors to the independents and other moderates that will swing the election and we will send all of these crazies home for another 4 years and maybe get back to making an America for all Americans, not just the wealthy and connected…
More nonsense from Scott Walker..
Well…just a short one about some more nonsense from the governor of the Koch brothers in Wisconsin….with the first settlement of wrongdoing in the mortgage mess, which is supposed to be used to help homeowners that were affected by the practices of the large banks, we see in Wisconsin that Scott Walker has other ideas and is using the money to pay for tax cuts for business that were passed last year. Yep, you heard that right…money that is supposed to go to the people of Wisconsin is going straight back to the businesses that bought the election for Walker…is there any other reason needed to remove this idiot from office? I hope the people of Wisconsin send him back to the Koch brothers in the recall election later this year…
You can tell the republicans are worried…
Well…if you have been following politics at all over the past couple of weeks, you can see that a change is brewing in the tactics of the repub party….the tired old nonsense of the culture war has risen it’s ugly head again but this time, I think they may have miscalculated and it is not going to work except for with their base. We’ve seen that the republicans look worried with their current crop of candidates and their lack of competitiveness in a head to head matchup with Obama…so what do we see again? The GOP rolling out the gay marriage card…the repubs trotting out the faked battle on contraception, and the continued attacks on Planned Parenthood that are designed to appeal to the ignorant haters in their base…but, what they are failing to see in 2012 is that base is the only place these attacks resound…all of the polls show us that America has become more tolerant and accepting and we are tired of the nonsense the repubs are peddling…but, I hope they continue it since these shenanigans have driven the approval of the repub controlled congress down to historically low levels at 10%…only 10% of the people in the US approve of the obstructionist crap the repubs are using to keep the economy from improving…and I hope they pay for it by losing control of the house this fall…they deserve it….geez…