Great analogy

"Letting politicians who hate government run the government is like letting Michael Vick run PETA." -- Roy Kunkle (friend)

Republican Party seemingly working hard to kill Ron Paul's chances in Missouri

Love him, hate him or don't even care, it seems the staunch, traditional Republicans--the hard core of the Party--are doing their absolute best to squash any chances Ron Paul might have in Missouri of gaining the presidency this Fall. A couple weeks ago, the Party had to shut down the caucus in St. Charles County in St. Louis because it not only wasn't going the way they wanted but because, it seemed, it was going too much for Ron Paul. Now, today, there's this from a St. Louis paper: Ron Paul supporters dominate GOP caucuses in St. Louis, Jackson County "Ron Paul's chances of winning the White House may be minimal, but his supporters dominated the Republican caucuses in St. Louis and Jackson County on Saturday.

Paul's backers won all 36 delegates here while taking about two-thirds of delegates in Jackson County." I'll never forget that one Republican Presidential debate where Mr. Paul got a whopping 89 seconds off coverage, total, in answering time while the other candidates got, of course, far more time to respond to questions. Don't misunderstand me here, either, as I'm not a Ron Paul supporter. I just find it curious to the point of surprising that Mr. Paul has gotten so little coverage in the press, compared to the other candidates, and that the mainstream Republican Party has so obviously done everything they could in their rather blatant efforts at killing Mr. Paul's chances of being heard, let alone winning the spot at the top of their ticket this November. Sure, he'd be horrible for their chances of winning but they surely threw fairness and openness and at least some of "the people's will" out the window with all this. Links: http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/ron-paul-supporters-dominate-gop-caucuses-in-st-louis-jackson/article_4c7977d4-75e0-11e1-858e-001a4bcf6878.html; http://www.stltoday.com/news/state-and-regional/missouri/mo-gop-caucuses-in-jackson-county-st-louis/article_8e60de1e-f0b4-5d00-ab79-9e1ca9839511.html; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Paul

The Right Wing: Dumbing down the American public

"Many Libertarians and Right-wingers like Santorum believe that the federal government should not be involved in education. Ron Paul has frequently stated that education is not a right.' In reality, 135 nations in the world require compulsory education, ranging from 5 years in Nepal to 13 years in Germany. Germany fully funds all years of education. Chile leads the world in providing for 15 years of free public education (ages 6-21), although all of those years are not compulsory. There is not a single developed nation in the world that does not provide public education to its people." --From the article "India joins list of 135 countries in making education a right." Link: http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article365232.ece

The guys asks some good, legiitimate questions

Don't get me wrong--I'm no Ron Paul supporter, by any means, but all the questions deserve a good, public discussion.

This looks to be just one more "Super Tuesday"

With today's vote for the Republican presidential candidate in Michigan, it looks to be just one more great day for Michiganers and Americans, as a whole, for that matter. Worst case scenario? Mitt Romney wins and wins big. How likely is that? Incredibly unlikely, given his very public stance that he was only too happy to let Detroit and GM and Chrysler and the automobile industry in the US fail and go bankrupt. He's reaping what he sowed. Best case scenario--and what's most likely to happen today? Rick "So What If I Don't Have a Brain" Santorum wins here. After that, it's still all good. So what if the Newtster won or Ron Paul? None have a chance, nationally against their Democratic rival in November. So all in all, today seems like just more of this terrific, mild winter we're having. That is, fantastic. Link: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/27/us-usa-campaign-idUSTRE81N1PG20120227

Recap of tonight's Republican Presidential debate redux

"I'm more conservative than you." "I love Jesus more." "No gay marriage." "Obama stinks." Blah, blah, blah... It's all you need to know.

Quote of the day

"How did American conservatism end up so detached from, indeed at odds with, facts and rationality? For it was not always thus. After all, that health reform Mr. Romney wants us to forget followed a blueprint originally laid out at the Heritage Foundation! My short answer is that the long-running con game of economic conservatives and the wealthy supporters they serve finally went bad. For decades the G.O.P. has won elections by appealing to social and racial divisions, only to turn after each victory to deregulation and tax cuts for the wealthy — a process that reached its epitome when George W. Bush won re-election by posing as America’s defender against gay married terrorists, then announced that he had a mandate to privatize Social Security. Over time, however, this strategy created a base that really believed in all the hokum — and now the party elite has lost control." - Paul Krugman, writing for the New York Times. Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/13/opinion/krugman-severe-conservative-syndrome.html?_r=1

Good news/bad news on the Republican presidential trail

The good news? Rick Perry dropped out of the Republican pursuit for the presidency.

More good news--he endorsed Newt Gingrich in his concession speech, God love him. The bad news? There are still officially four candidates in the hunt. No, wait. That's still good news. The longer they tear each other down, the better. It just gives yet more fodder for the candidate on the "other side." Link: http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/19/perry-to-end-bid-for-presidency/

You can't blame him

Mind you, he was joking and he really isn't and can't be that confident but geez, they did give him an awful lot of "ammunition" with these debates, haven't they? And there are still more to come. Yikes. Enjoy your Sunday, y'all.

Iowa takeaways

Finally, the Iowa caucuses are over, thank goodness. With that and some new developments, it seems there's a lot going on. First things first, the results from last night: 1) Romney technically won, sure--by 8 measley votes. That ain't much, folks. The real winners? That has to go to Rick "I'm a lunatic" Santorum and Ron "I'm really not on the fringe" Paul. How else can you look at it? No one thought Santorum had a chance and to come in so close, in 2nd place? Then, Ron Paul finishes so closely in 3rd? Oh, yeah, those two came out big. What's interesting, too, is that it's been rather correctly pointed out that, with this, it shows 75% of those Iowa Republicans were against the man who is now considered the front-runner. That's not good for Willard. Or Mittens or whatever you want to call him. Also, to add tough insult to this injury, Newt Gingrich said both last night and this morning that he will, in essence, do everything he can to make sure Romney isn't the Republican presidential nominee. Yow. That'll hurt. That'll hurt the Party, for sure. (GOOD). Another winner last night? It had to be President Obama himself. This showed that the Republican Party is tearing itself apart---still. Seriously, President Obama should just use footage of all these candidates from this campaign, all saying horrible things about whoever becomes the Republcan's candidate. It would be easy, there's tons of it (the footage) and it's effective. Shoot, a lot of it is even true. One thing's for sure, it's going to be one crazy political year, made far crazier because corporations and the wealthy can spend all they want on the election, thanks to the Right Wing Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling last year. Yeehaw. Links: http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/daily-ticker/big-takeaway-iowa-75-republicans-don-t-want-152537896.html;_ylt=AsKtTYH1eCE9i5sAUGdem9eiuYdG;_ylu=X3oDMTQ0ZTRsMGZtBG1pdANGUCBUaGUgRGFpbHkgVGlja2VyBHBrZwM3NGY1MTYzNS1lN2E0LTMyNWItODMyMC00ZjkwOTZkOTRmNjAEcG9zAzIEc2VjA01lZGlhU2VjdGlvbkxpc3QEdmVyAzViYWVmMjEwLTM2ZTgtMTFlMS05ZjJmLTg3ODhlODE4NzhmOA--;_ylg=X3oDMTFvdnRqYzJoBGludGwDdXMEbGFuZwNlbi11cwRwc3RhaWQDBHBzdGNhdANob21lBHB0A3NlY3Rpb25zBHRlc3QD;_ylv=3; http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/newt-gingrich-unloads-mitt-romney-ron-paul-hampshire-184017787.html; http://news.yahoo.com/mitt-romney-celebrates-gop-win-2-rivals-flounder-143626145.html; http://news.yahoo.com/michele-bachmann-ends-her-presidential-campaign-not-her-174809476.html

Back to reality--and the 2012 election grind

Yes, unfortunately, the holidays had to come to an end, as if we didn't know it. At least it's still mild and sunny and beautiful here in the heartland, eh? In the meantime, a friend sent this advertisment to me today. I think it a rather revolutionary ad--no pun intended, you'll see: While he's right, of course, about some other nation being here on our soil, etc., it's an old point, however true. That he chose to put this fictitious "occupying country" in Texas makes it far more emotional and even vitriolic, I think, and dilutes his point. Dilutes his point unless, of course, you're from Texas. I think we all just need to calm down. Let's not make sure it's "The end of the world as we know it", you know? It doesn't have to be yet too many people are overwhelmed either by the 2008 financial collapse or weather catastrophes and tragedies or by the fact that the nation has a black president as its leader. Everyone needs to calm down and just chill. In the meantime, welcome to the new year.

Yahoo! and Yahoo! News have become solidly Right Wing

In the last few months, there have repeatedly been times when I've seen a headline on Yahoo! News that strikes me as patently biased, Right- Wing "reporting". Today is another such day as this is the headline I saw: Ron Paul Is a Dangerous Tin Man Who Has No Heart (link at bottom) Sure, it's commentary and it's even from one of their "contributors" but could they be any more biased? This isn't even reporting. This is just ugly, very-slanted opinion. Later, up poppedd these two headlines, too: . First this one: Ex-Aide: Ron Paul Foreign Policy is 'Sheer Lunacy' And then this one: Fmr staffer: Ron Paul planned ‘No’ vote for Afghanistan invasion, staff threatened mutiny It seems clear Yahoo! really doesn't want Ron Paul even remotely considered as a candidate. Don't get me wrong here, either--I'm no big Ron Paul fan or supporter. I just think there should be responsible reporting and journalism in the country for the benefit of the voting populace. This is just ugliness, opinion, again, and possibly even vitriol. It serves no good purpose. Link: http://news.yahoo.com/ron-paul-dangerous-tin-man-no-heart-053200808.html

Ron Paul's latest ad, knocking Newt

In case anyone out there thinks Newt Gingrich is an "outsider" when it comes to Washington, the Federal Government and politics.

Rings true to me

You say you want a revolution?

A friend has a link today on Facebook, showing some grass roots organizations that are doing just that, organizing, but for a June 14th, Flag Day protest in lower Manhattan, among many, many other things, apparently, nationwide, to protest what they see as the state of our union here in the States.  Following is just a little bit of their information:

“We are a decentralized non-violent resistance movement, which seeks to restore the rule of law and fight back against the organized criminal class.

One-tenth of one percent of the population has consolidated wealth in unprecedented fashion and launched an all-out economic war against 99.9% of the population.

We are not affiliated with either wing of the two-party oligarchy. We seek an end to the corrupted two-party system by ending the campaign finance and lobbying racket.

Above all, we aim to break up the global banking cartel centered at the Federal Reserve, International Monetary Fund, Bank of International Settlement and World Bank.

We demand that the primary dealers within the Federal Reserve banking system be broken up and held accountable for rigging markets and destroying the global economy, effective immediately.

As a first sign of good faith, we demand Ben Bernanke step down as Federal Reserve chairman.

Until our demands are met and a rule of law is restored, we will engage in a relentless campaign of non-violent, peaceful, civil disobedience.”

This bring up a few thoughts, at least:

First, it's pretty fascinating that it may be out "Tea-Partying" the Tea Party.  Whereas the original Tea Party of recent creation was to rebel against what they saw happening, if what the site below tells and shows is true, this apparently has a great deal of broad-based support, across many organizations and has many followers and fellow creators in the country.  From the sounds and looks of it, many people are involved and in lots of different ways and with many different purposes.

Second, it's terrific to see that this group--or person, anyway, at least--understands what I've proposed for a long time--along with Molly Ivins, for several years, before she died--and that is, that we need true, stringent, tough and verifiable campaign finance reform.

Saying again, if we don't get corporate and wealth people's money out of our government, little will go the way of the working man and woman, the "little guy", and the middle-class will continue to shrink.

Third, the odd part of this, however, to me, is where they call for the dismantling of the Federal Reserve.  

I've always been extremely "iffy" on that one.

Sure, Representative Ron Paul has called for this for some time and I think that's where it gets the biggest push but I've never been one who particularly saw the evil or wickedness of the Fed.  I just don't get it.  If anything, I've always thought the Fed really does help keep us a bit more "between the lines" of booms and busts.  I see nothing nefarious there.

Anyway, with all this, it looks like fascinating developments.  It will be interesting to see where these groups go with all this disenchantment.

I've said for a long time that we need to take our government back---again, from the corporations and wealthy of the country.

I just hope this is all very orderly, frankly, and that we don't descend into chaos and/or anarchy.

I also wish all the people who are so upset now would have opened their eyes from 2000 to 2008, when George W. Bush was giving away the farm, so to speak, to the wealthy and so few people said anything about it.

These are interesting times.

I just hope they don't get "too interesting".

Links:  http://ampedstatus.org/prepare-for-revolution-the-empire-state-rebellion-begins-on-june-14th/; http://ampedstatus.org/network/groups/a99; 

Action Planning Site: http://www.fss34.com/opesr.html

Social Network Group: http://ampedstatus.org/network/groups/a99/

For further information read: Prepare For Revolution: The Empire State Rebellion Begins on June 14th

Shutting down government, Republican redux

Republicans seem to be lining up to threaten to not raise the debt ceiling for the government, which would shut down--again--that same government.

This is no way to work together for the betterment of the country, for sure.

They did this once before, back in 1995-96, the Republicans and it blew up in their faces.  They were then blamed for the government not working, and rightfully so.  They did it, the people didn't like it so they should get the blame for it.

Now they seem to be headed the same way again.

Several freshmen Republicans have already come out against raising the debt ceiling:

A handful of incoming Republican lawmakers — including Sen.-elect Mike Lee (R-UT) and Reps.-elect Jeff Denhem (R-CA) and Tim Scott (R-SC) — have said that they will not vote to increase the debt ceiling, even though the U.S. government will reach its borrowing limit early next year. “I’m going to vote against raising the national debt ceiling. We simply can’t continue to mortgage the future or our unborn children and grandchildren,” Lee said.

Plenty of Republican freshman besides these three also ran on opposition to a debt ceiling increase, and according to Rep.-elect Bill Johnson (R-OH), many of them have agreed to stick to their guns when the vote comes:

Rep.-elect Bill Johnson of Ohio said those who ran on such messages didn’t intend to reverse themselves now. “Most of us agreed that to increase the limit would be a betrayal of what we told voters we would do,” he said.

Then they were followed by Rep.-elect Alan Nunnelee (R-MS), Rep.-elect Tim Walberg (R-MI), Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA), Rep. Steve King (R-IA), Sen.-elect Mike Lee (R-UT), Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) and finally, Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX). 

And while there are some similarities between this "showdown" and the last one, in the mid-1990's, this time shutting down the government by not raising the debt ceiling could be far more negative and financially devastating to both the country and the world markets:

As the Center for American Progress’ David Min pointed out, failure to raise the debt ceiling could be disastrous:

The financial markets are on edge today, with U.S. Treasury bonds being the safe haven for most investment capital. Refusing to raise the debt ceiling would recklessly disrupt the sale and purchase of new Treasury bonds, and could potentially cause a run on outstanding Treasurys as well, as investors sought other investments. This could have catastrophic consequences for our economy as well as the economic stability of the rest of the world.

Such a move will also increase long-term deficits and debt, while cutting off Social Security and Medicare benefits for millions of seniors. But if Johnson is to be believed, many incoming Republican freshman will put that second to their Tea Party ideology.
 
For once, I'm hoping these empty, shallow clowns don't go through with their hair-brained, ignorant idea. 
 
Seeing them fall is terrific. 
 
I don't want them taking us all with them.

Links:  http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2010/10/big_freeze.html
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/11/22/freshmen-betrayal/
http://thinkprogress.org/2010/11/16/gohmert-shutdown/

Finally, Washington is catching up with us

From The Huffington Post, Rep. Barney Frank and Rep. Ron Paul, just now: Why We Must Reduce Military Spending As members of opposing political parties, we disagree on a number of important issues. But we must not allow honest disagreement over some issues to interfere with our ability to work together when we do agree. By far the single most important of these is our current initiative to include substantial reductions in the projected level of American military spending as part of future deficit reduction efforts. For decades, the subject of military expenditures has been glaringly absent from public debate. Yet the Pentagon budget for 2010 is $693 billion -- more than all other discretionary spending programs combined. Even subtracting the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, military spending still amounts to over 42% of total spending. It is irrefutably clear to us that if we do not make substantial cuts in the projected levels of Pentagon spending, we will do substantial damage to our economy and dramatically reduce our quality of life. Welcome to the party, boys. Now, make it happen.