Fox News Host: How We Can Tell "Bad Guys" If We Can't See Their Skin Color?

Much of Teabagistan gets its news from Fox News, a/k/a Faux News, and if one wants a glimpse of the racist mindset that predominates the Christofascists/Tea Partiers, a Fox News host just provided it.  It's all about skin color.  The New Civil Rights Movement has details.  Note that the anchor is a Liberty University graduate who apparently doesn't realize that one of the murdered French police officers was a Muslim himself.  Here are highlights:

Ever since the horrific terrorist attack on the Paris offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, Fox News has been busy at work trying to blame President Barack Obama for it, and trying to turn it into ratings gold by making it their next Benghazi.

On Fox's "Outnumbered" Wednesday, the cast got into a discussion about how Paris police didn't have enough weapons, which enabled – they claimed – the Islamic extremist terrorists to massacre 12 people.

Enter Fox News anchor Shannon Bream, a former corporate attorney and graduate of Jerry Falwell's Liberty University.

Bream, speaking unscripted, wondered how police would be able to identify "bad guys" if they had ski masks and couldn't "even know what color," what "the tone of their skin was?"

Her commentary – totally unquestioned by the four other Fox News hosts – was in response to co-host Kennedy Montgomery, aka "Kennedy," who had said, "sometimes bad guys don't look like bad guys."

"That's my question about these guys because if we know they were speaking unaccented French and they had, you know, ski masks on, do we even know what color they were?," Bream asked. "What the tone of their skin was," she tried to clarify – as if that were less racist. "I mean what if they didn't look like typical bad guys?"

California Tea Party Spokesman Arrested for Rape

The insanity and hypocrisy of the Christianists and their allies in the Tea Party (some surveys have shown that as much as 80+% of the Tea Part crowd self-identifies as conservative Christian) just seems to never cease. These Kool-Aid drinkers say one thing while doing the exact opposite all too often. Especially when it comes to issues of sexual morality. Take for example, Michael Kobulnicky Pictured at left), the public relations spokesperson for the San Diego Tea Party, was arrested Thursday afternoon on rape/sexual assault charges. In my view, it is no coincidence that a mere four days ago Kobulnicky endorsed a national boycott of Red Bull: "Don't buy Red Bull. Look at what they think about Jesus. There is such an attack against Christianity now and hopefully Christians stand up for what they believe!" Why is it that it's always the self-professed, self-congratulatory "godly Christians" who are the sex perverts? Here are some highlights from MSNBC:

Police arrested a prominent local political activist in connection to a recent Fiesta Island sex assault on Thursday. Michael Kobulnicky, the public relations spokesperson for the San Diego Tea Party, was arrested Thursday afternoon in front of his home, according to Lt. Anastasia Smith with the San Diego Police Department.

Kobulnicky is accused of a Feb. 25 abduction and sexual assault of a 56-year-old woman who was walking home near Linda Vista Road in Fiesta Island. The woman was pulled into a car and assaulted, then left on the island, police said.Surveillance footage of the area near the assault gave police evidence to pursue a suspect. They released a picture of the suspect to the public, and many identified the suspect as Kobulnicky, police said.

Kobulnicky was booked into San Diego Central Jail on numerous felony charges, including kidnapping, sexual assault and sex with a foreign object.

A statement from the San Diego Tea Party said Kabulnicky has been on hiatus since January for personal reasons and has been relieved from his Tea Party duties during legal proceedings.

Sex with a foreign object? That sounds like something Governor Bob "Governor Ultrasound" McDonnell and his Christianist compatriots in the Virginia GOP would readily support. At least so long as the victim of the rape/unlawful penetration was a woman. It's always the conservative and their Christianist allies who condemn others for sexual promiscuity, yet they themselves are the ones who are obsessed with sex and all too often engage in what can only be described as kinky or illegal sexual escapades.

The Price of GOP Extremism: Navy Cuts "Non-Essential" Personnel

The Republican Party and its Tea Party element are obsessed with making huge budget cuts and at the same time have been obstructing measures to turn the economy around in the hope that economic malaise will help they drive Barack Obama from office in November. While the feigned concern for budget deficits is disingenuous at best given the fact that every foolish spending measure brought forth by Chimperator Bush and his unfunded wars were quickly rubber stamped by the then GOP controlled Congress, nowhere along the way is the human toll ever considered by these ideologues. Now locally some in the Navy are finding out that blind allegiance to the GOP and mindlessly mouthing Rush Limbaugh talking points can carry a heavy price. For every budget cut, real people lose their jobs and real families are impacted - something those of the far right who like to wrap themselves in the cloak of religion fail to understand or, mostly likely, even give a damn about. The Virginian Pilot looks at the fate facing some 3,000 U.S. Navy personnel being forced out through no fault of their own. I'm sure the Kool-Aid drinkers will seek to blame Obama rather than take a good look in the mirror. Here are some story highlights:

The day that Amanda Humburg's husband found out he would be involuntarily discharged from the Navy, his command sent him home early to give him time to absorb the shock. He walked through the door of their house in Chesapeake with a blank expression on his face and a pile of papers in his arms that explained what came next - severance pay, six months of health coverage, free advice on how to write the first resume of his life.

Humburg's husband, who chose not to be interviewed for this story, is one of about 3,000 sailors who will lose their jobs in the coming months as part of an unprecedented and drastic effort to thin the Navy's ranks in overcrowded job fields. It marks the first time the service will lay off thousands of sailors who are in the middle of enlistment contracts, including hundreds in Hampton Roads. In the months since the move was announced, it has become widely unpopular and controversial.

Navy officials contend they had no other choice. Faced with record-high retention because of the economy, the service's usual mechanisms for keeping the ranks in balance have not done enough, said Rear Adm. Anthony Kurta, head of manpower plans for the chief of naval personnel. He said the decision to resort to breaking enlistment contracts was not made lightly, and the method the Navy used to determine who would stay and who would go - panels of senior enlisted sailors and officers dubbed an "enlisted retention board" - was the fairest way to do it. For those selected by the board for discharge, the Navy is doing everything in its power to help them find new employment and successfully transition to civilian life, Kurta said.

Still, he acknowledged several facts that affected sailors and their families say are making the layoffs especially hard to swallow: Many of those being forced out have been in the Navy for well over a decade, and many have good service records. In most cases, they were chosen for discharge based simply on their rank and job classification in order to meet set quotas.

While the Navy's ranks are slowly shrinking - the service now keeps 324,000 active-duty personnel, about 50,000 fewer than a decade ago - officials say the enlisted retention board layoffs are not simply about cutting, and they're not directly driven by larger efforts to reduce military spending. Rather, they are about rebalancing the force.

The Navy explains it this way: Because of the economy, far fewer sailors are leaving the service than in years past. As a result, 31 of the Navy's 85 enlisted fields have become badly overcrowded. For sailors in those job categories, such as aircraft maintenance, that has meant fewer opportunities for promotion, which has swelled the midcareer ranks. While the Navy can compensate to a degree by enlisting fewer new sailors into overmanned fields, it cannot stop altogether; for budgetary reasons and for longer-term force effectiveness, it needs to keep a particular number of sailors in each field and in each pay grade.

The Navy couldn't say exactly how many Hampton Roads-based sailors are being discharged through the enlisted retention board layoffs, but if 1 percent of the service's total force is affected, that amounts to roughly 700 personnel here. It's a number large enough that efforts have sprung up to fight the dismissals, including Facebook pages and a White House petition. At least one sailor is suing over his discharge, according to the publication Navy Times, and even among sailors who haven't been affected, the enlisted retention board has become a source of consternation and anger.

Ward Carroll, the editor of Military.com and a retired naval aviator, said the service's decision to break the enlistment contracts of so many sailors could have wider consequences for recruitment and morale.

I feel badly for those being discharged who have done nothing wrong. The military are now discovering the harsh reality faced by far too many in the private sector. I don't what the solution is, but I do wish that the extremists in the GOP and Tea Party would at least for a moment contemplate that their budget cutting obsession does harm real people and real families.

GOP Neanderthals Scramble for Way to Block Romney

I'm not a fan of Mitt Romney for many reasons, not the least of which is his flip-flopping on issues, including LGBT rights, is enough to give one whiplash. Plus, he has shamelessly pandered to some of the nastiest elements of the Christianist/Tea Party base of today's foul Republican Party. Yet, to many he seems to be the most electable of the mediocre field of candidates fighting to be the GOP presidential nominee. Now, with Romney's better than expected win in New Hampshire, some of the knuckle dragging Kool-Aid drinkers of the GOP base are hysterical that Romney will get the nomination and then fail to back their Christianist version of Sharia law. The Washington Post looks at the scramble by the ultra-far right fear/hate mongering elements of the GOP (which the Post too politely calls "conservatives") to devise a strategy to derail Romney. Here are some highlights:

A near-panic has taken hold among some core conservative activists, who are now scrambling to devise a strategy to deny Mitt Romney the Republican presidential nomination.

Many of these activists see South Carolina’s primary on Jan. 21 as their last best hope of stopping Romney by consolidating in a united front against him. But many acknowledge that they have yet to figure out which of the remaining conservative rivals to rally behind and which should get out.

The tension is exacerbated by the deep divisions between two key GOP wings: tea party groups yearning for a pure small-government conservative, and evangelical Christians who want a loyal social conservative.

In one sign of their desperation, some activists are holding out for what they acknowledge is a spectacular long shot: a late-entering savior who could still qualify for enough state ballots and win enough delegates to force a brokered GOP convention this summer.

The Romney conundrum will be on the agenda Friday when about 150 evangelical leaders huddle at a Texas ranch to debate their next move. Likewise, the subject of consolidating conservative opposition to the former Massachusetts governor is expected to be a major point of discussion among about 500 attendees at a tea party convention set for this weekend in Myrtle Beach, S.C., where the list of speakers includes two Romney rivals seeking the conservative mantle, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum.

One participant in Friday’s evangelical meeting, the Rev. Jim Garlow — pastor of a San Diego megachurch and a leading champion of California’s anti-gay-marriage initiative — said Romney is “untrustworthy” and not “ visceral on the issues that are cardinal to me.”

The fretting from conservatives reflects a persistent question about Romney’s candidacy: whether a wealthy private-equity executive with a history of centrist views in a liberal state can gain the trust of the most energized and active elements of the GOP’s conservative base.

Romney campaign aides and supporters concede that the candidate has not yet made the sale, but they say he will win over conservative voters. They point to the support of a tea party favorite, South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R), who is campaigning nationally for Romney.

[N]ational and South Carolina-based activists said Romney has a difficult task in unifying the party base. Many social conservative leaders are still seething over the party’s experience in 2008, when evangelical Mike Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses but the base didn’t unite, and John McCain locked up the nomination early. “We made a terrible mistake in 2008,” said Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission.

Among the candidates who remain, Romney’s critics can’t agree on who should get the nod. Gingrich backers are pushing for Santorum and Perry to drop out, while Santorum supporters see an obvious solution if Gingrich and Perry clear the way.

With luck, the bloodbath within the GOP will continue and the far right elements will lose the battle. The sooner they are permanently driven from the political realm, the better it will be for America as a nation. Hate, division, the embrace of ignorance and religious extremism will not make America competitive in the world of the 21st century.

Tea Party/Flat Earth Crowd Deny Sea-Level Rise

A local example of the growing glorification of ignorance that is a hallmark of today's Republican Party can be witnessed close by in the form of the batshitery espoused by the Virginia Campaign for Liberty, a tea party affiliate with 7,000 members. These nutcases have their panties in a major wad because they refuse to accept the geological fact that much of the region is sinking. They also deny the existence of global warming.

The consequence is that they are opposing any and all efforts to plan ahead to deal with sea level rises that are happening whether these lunatics want to believe it or not. While these individuals remain in denial, the U. S. Navy is moving to overhaul its piers at the Norfolk Naval Base to deal with the water level rise and private individuals such at the boyfriend and I are looking at means to move our main living areas to higher levels in recognition that flooding seen over the last decade is going to be more common. The Washington Post looks at the attempts by the ignorance lovers of the Tea Party affiliate. Here are some highlights:

A well-organized and vocal group of residents has taken a keen interest in municipal preparations for sea-level rise caused by climate change, often shouting their opposition, sometimes while planners and politicians are talking.

The residents’ opposition has focused on a central point: They don’t think climate change is accelerated by human activity, as most climate scientists conclude. When planners proposed to rezone land for use as a dike against rising water, these residents, or “new activists,” as Lawrence calls them, saw a trick to take their property.

“Environmentalists have always had an agenda to put nature above man,” said Donna Holt, leader of the Virginia Campaign for Liberty, a tea party affiliate with 7,000 members. “If they can find an end to their means, they don’t care how it happens. If they can do it under the guise of global warming and climate change, they will do it.”

Outside of greater New Orleans, Hampton Roads is at the biggest risk from sea-level rise of any area its size in the United States, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The water has risen so much that Naval Station Norfolk is replacing 14 piers at $60 million each to keep ship-repair facilities high and dry.

The area has historic geological issues. A meteor landed nearby 35 million years ago, creating the Chesapeake Bay Impact Crater. And a downward-pressing glacial formation was created during the Ice Age. These ancient events are causing the land to sink, accounting for about one-third of the sea-level change, scientists say. This geology is lost in local meetings, where distrust of the local and federal governments is at center stage.

When planners redesignated property as a future flood zone, activists said officials were acting on a hoax. They argued in meetings and on Web sites that local planners are unwitting agents of Agenda 21, a United Nations environmental action plan adopted in 1992 that the activists see as a shadowy global conspiracy to grab land and redistribute wealth in the United States.

Tom DeWeese, president of the conservative American Policy Center, who wrote an essay opposing “smart growth” titled “Fight Agenda 21 or Lose Your Freedom.” The ultra-conservative John Birch Society cautions adherents through its Web site that the “Agenda 21 program may already be in your local community, through your home town or city’s membership in . . . Local Governments for Sustainability.”

Shereen Hughes, a former planning commissioner in James City County, worried that some officials are giving ground to fearmongers. The uprising against smart growth “is ridiculous” and “a conspiracy theory,” she said. But it’s effective. Planners aren’t saying this is wrong, Hughes said, because “most are afraid they won’t have a job if they’re too vocal about this issue.” Tea party members have political allies who “might stand up” against planners who complain, Hughes said.

One of the most serious threats to America is the growing refusal by the far right to accept scientific fact. The rest of the world - especially our economic competitors - are moving forward. Meanwhile the GOP and the Christianist/Tea Party base want to take the country back to the 19th century or earlier. America will fall from within if this threat is not countered.

Tea Party Group Asks Michele Bachmann to Quit GOP Race

I always love it when conservatives turn on one of their own as is happening now with the Tea Party group "American Majority" which has released a statement saying that Michelle Bachmann needs to quit the GOP presidential nomination contest. What kills me the most is that the faults with Bachmann that are cited have always been in plain view - not to mention that the woman is nuts and unqualified to be dog catcher much less president of the United States. Most of us recognized from the start that Bachmann's bid was all about self-promotion and that her only real plank was social issues and religious fanaticism. Better that some have finally opened their eyes and one can only hope that Michele and "Marcia" Bachmann will soon return to relative obscurity. Here are some highlights from CNN:

A tea party group has a surprising and harsh urging for long-time tea party favorite Michele Bachmann: Quit the presidential race. "It's time for Michele Bachmann to go," reads the first line of a statement from American Majority President Ned Ryun. His group operates in seven states, trains thousands of tea party supporters and is "liked" by over 371,000 people on Facebook.

"Bachmann, the leader of the so-called tea party caucus in the House and the most vocal about her affiliation with the Tea Party than any other Presidential candidate, has consistently presented herself as a champion of the movement and its values," Ryun's statement continued. "Bachmann has ridden her tea party credentials from obscurity to a national platform like no other."

American Majority's rebuke of Bachmann marks the first time a well-known tea party group has turned on one of its own in the presidential race – a candidate who so frequently pushes tea party values it's become a key underpinning of her White House bid. The group explained its reasons why it's grown incensed with Bachmann.

"I think it's pretty obvious that Michele Bachmann is about Michele Bachmann," American Majority Executive Director Matt Robbins said.

"Anyone who knows the congresswoman, and knows her record, we appreciate a national figure standing up for the tea party types," Robbins added. . . . . "Let's face it: she's a back-bencher and has been a back bencher congressperson for years," Robbins added. "This is not a serious presidential campaign."

The group explains another reason it believes Bachmann should quit the GOP presidential race.

"Bachmann's resulting plunge in the polls is troubling for the tea party, not because 'one of their own' is losing her footing, but because the longer Bachmann stays in the race, the more likely we will see her shift to the right," Ryun wrote in the statement. "This rightward shift will come as the campaign works to hold on to its more conservative base of support in advance of the release of Bachmann's new book next month."

Ryun continued: "There is nothing wrong with addressing your base during a campaign. However, I suspect that we will hear more from her about social issues and religion to accomplish that goal. As an evangelical who is deeply pro-life, I can say that while many inside the tea party movement are socially conservative, social issues are not what drive the Tea Party."

As for criticism of Bachmann's focus on social issues, Martin said, "When you're running for president, you're appealing to more than just tea party people. And you have to answer questions on other issues as well. So I'm not surprised when any of the candidates are talking about the other issues because those are things that come up in presidential campaigns."

Ouch!! But again, all of Bachmann's many limitations should have been obvious to anyone who wasn't drinking large quantities of Kool-Aid.

Who Is Responsible for Destroying the Republican Brand?

I take some degree of grief at times from readers for my - in my view, justified - pummeling of today's Republican Party for its many moral failings not to mention off the charts hypocrisy. Being critical of the GOP doesn't mean I'm in love with the Democrats, merely that if one has to pick from one of two evils, then the Christianist/Tea Party controlled greed loving GOP is the worse of the two evils. And it's the GOP which has worked to to destroy itself and make it increasingly impossible for rational, thinking, non-religious extremists and non-greed driven individuals to want anything to do with the GOP brand. As I have noted many times, once upon a time I was a Republican in an era when before the Party has degenerated into something foul. The Democrats did not do this to the GOP, the GOP leadership did it by catering to religious extremists, the Tea Party and selling out the middle class. David Frum, one of the shrinking group of rational conservatives looks at this phenomenon on his blog. Here are some highlights:

Aaron Blake and Chris Cillizza describe a new CBS/NYT poll:

The poll also asked which class voters thought the Obama Administration and Republicans in Congress favored. While people were pretty evenly split on whether the administration favors the middle class, the rich or the poor, they were all but unanimous about which class the Republicans favor; 69 percent said Republicans in Congress favor the rich, while just 9 percent said the middle class and 2 percent said the poor.

Voters say the darndest things! The identification of the GOP as mouthpiece for the selfish interests of the wealthy is a stubborn image, difficult to overcome at the best of times. For three years, however, Republican leaders have been doing their utmost to confirm the stereotype – and to quash and quell any attempt to counter that stereotype. Did we really spend months and months arguing that one of the things most wrong with the US tax code is that the poor and unemployed pay too little tax? Yes we did. Head shake. Face slap.

Given the terrible economic fundamentals, this reckless self-branding by Republicans may not in the end be enough to save President Obama from himself. But if he does manage to eke it out, the CBS/NYT result is the beginning of wisdom as to how and why.

Vatican Calls for Global Economic Authority and Condemns " Idolatry of the Market"

I will be the first to admit that I rarely agree with anything emanating from the bitter old queens in dresses at the Vatican who all too often turn Christ's Gospel message upside down in their quest for power, control, and most importantly money. But I guess once in a while even such people get something right. Hence the Vatican's condemnation of the cult of free market controls which often morphs into a struggle of the survival of the fittest (or most greedy) with the vast majority suffering in poverty and varying levels of neglect as the amoral and greedy waltz away with most of the profits and resources. The interesting thing to watch will be to see how this new Vatican announcement plays with the Christian Right adherents of the prosperity Gospel and the Tea Party crowd who would throw most citizens to the wolves as they hoard money and possessions for themselves. Candidly, nothing would please me more than to see a rift develop between conservative Catholics and the greedy hate merchants of the Christian Right and GOP. Reuters looks at this in some ways surprising development. Here are some highlights:

The Vatican called on Monday for the establishment of a “global public authority” and a “central world bank” to rule over financial institutions that have become outdated and often ineffective in dealing fairly with crises. The document from the Vatican’s Justice and Peace department should please the “Occupy Wall Street” demonstrators and similar movements around the world who have protested against the economic downturn.

“Towards Reforming the International Financial and Monetary Systems in the Context of a Global Public Authority,” was at times very specific, calling, for example, for taxation measures on financial transactions. “The economic and financial crisis which the world is going through calls everyone, individuals and peoples, to examine in depth the principles and the cultural and moral values at the basis of social coexistence,” it said.

It condemned what it called “the idolatry of the market” as well as a “neo-liberal thinking” that it said looked exclusively at technical solutions to economic problems. “In fact, the crisis has revealed behaviours like selfishness, collective greed and hoarding of goods on a great scale,” it said, adding that world economics needed an “ethic of solidarity” among rich and poor nations.

“If no solutions are found to the various forms of injustice, the negative effects that will follow on the social, political and economic level will be destined to create a climate of growing hostility and even violence, and ultimately undermine the very foundations of democratic institutions, even the ones considered most solid,” it said.

It called for the establishment of “a supranational authority” with worldwide scope and “universal jurisdiction” to guide economic policies and decisions.

Asked at a news conference if the document could become a manifesto for the movement of the “indignant ones”, who have criticised global economic policies, Cardinal Peter Turkson, head of the Vatican’s Justice and Peace department, said: “The people on Wall Street need to sit down and go through a process of discernment and see whether their role managing the finances of the world is actually serving the interests of humanity and the common good. “We are calling for all these bodies and organisations to sit down and do a little bit of re-thinking.”

OWS vs. the Tea Party

Dan Nexon came up with the chart above - click on it to enlarge the image - that compares the strengths and weaknesses of the Tea Party versus the Occupy Wall Street phenomenon. The good news is that the core constituency of the Tea Party is old white people, a group that is literally dying off, albeit perhaps not fast enough to save the country from damage flowing from their lunacy, and which represents a declining percentage of the public. I don't agree with everything that the OWS crowd wants, but they at least seem to be looking to the future while the Tea Party is all about the past, maintaining religious based bigotry, and rejecting modern scientific knowledge. They want to return to an America that in part never really existed and they want to maintain white supremacy.

Will Mitt Romney Kill The Tea Party?

The free for all in the GOP presidential primary contest continues and even while Herman Cain is peaking in the polls, the premise is that he will be a flash in the pan as his ignorance about foreign policy and likely unworkable proposals become more widely know. Meanwhile, Rick Perry has not recovered from a combination of self-inflicted injuries and the fickleness of the loons that now comprise the Republican Part base. Thus, the issue becomes whether Mitt Romney - assuming he becomes the GOP nominee - will have the effect of driving a wooden stake through the cold and bitter heart of the Tea Party. Even as the Tea Party maligns the Occupy Wall Street movement, the Republican Party establishment seems Hell bent on blocking the nomination from going to the type of nutcase and ignoramus that seems to be favored by the Tea Party. A column in Huffington Post looks at the struggle within the GOP. Here are some highlights:

Herman Cain's rise in the polls this week doesn't change the fact that Mitt Romney is still the most likely Republican nominee for president, but it does underscore the biggest remaining question mark about him: If he wins the primary, will that kill the Tea Party?

FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe raised the prospect of a third party candidate if the former Massachusetts governor is the nominee, telling The New York Times this week that at the very least, a Romney candidacy would discourage conservative activism in the 2012 election.

But there were a surprising number who said they would work for the Republican nominee no matter who it is, even if it is Romney.

"Most people do not like Romney," said Dave Zupan, a Tea Party leader from the Cleveland suburbs. But, Zupan told The Huffington Post, "our goal is to beat Obama and flip the Senate. So if [Romney]'s the candidate, we're going to beat Obama with him and we're going to flip the Senate." "The Tea Party's going to show up for whoever's the candidate.

Zupan said that giving control of the Senate over to Republicans would be a way to hem Romney in, helping ensure he fulfills promises to conservatives such as repealing Obama's health law. The Romney campaign believes that unlike the 2008 election, when Democratic voters were spurred by passion for their candidate, Republicans will be motivated in 2012 not by personality but by their view of current circumstances.

Romney's brain trust is betting that conservatives like Puig will make up for what their candidate lacks in personal dynamism and conservative orthodoxy. "If Mitt Romney becomes the nominee, the entire party will rally behind him as the strongest leader on the paramount issue of our time -- putting America back to work," top Romney adviser Eric Fehrnstrom told HuffPost. "He will then go on to defeat President Obama and begin the task of turning around a very troubled economy."

I suspect that Romney as the GOP is Barack Obama's worse case senario because as hard as Obama tries, it will be difficult to paint Romney as a scary figure - unless, of course, he pulls a John McCain and nominates a VP nominee like Sarah Palin. One would think that Romney would have learned from McCain's self-defeating VP choice.

Tea Party Ignorance

Click image to enlarge.

The ignorance and stupidity of the Tea Party crowd is truly breath taking at times as illustrated by the photo above which has been notated to indicate the many things that government - funded through taxes, of course - does for society. While the Tea Party rails against taxes, nowhere do they ever explain how they think infrastructure and utilities are going to come from if taxes are eliminated or reduced to nothing. Candidly, instead of the signs they are brandishing, they ought to be carrying signs that read "I'm a freaking Moron" or "I'm severely mentally challenged."

What If the Tea Party Wins?

The Center for American Progress has a new white paper (you can read it here) that looks at the consequences of the Tea Party prevailing in its effort to rewrite the United States Constitution and/or read it so narrowly that many much needed federal programs would be labeled "unconstitutional" and cease to exist. While the extremist in the Tea Party largely identify themselves as conservative Christian, their underlying agenda is driven by greed and a desire to throw everyone but themselves under the bus. That they view themselves as Christian is beyond farcical. Some will say the white paper is alarmist and falsely crying wolf, but see what the Christianist/Tea Party crowd is doing in Virginia, I would argue that it is not. Here are highlights from an Center for American Progress overview of the white paper:

In the Tea Party’s America, families must mortgage their home to pay for their mother’s end-of-life care. Higher education is a luxury reserved almost exclusively to the very rich. Rotten meat ships to supermarkets nationwide without a national agency to inspect it. Fathers compete with their adolescent children for sub-minimum wage jobs. And our national leaders are utterly powerless to do a thing.

At least, that’s what would happen if the Tea Party succeeds in its effort to reimagine the Constitution as an antigovernment manifesto.

It is difficult to count how many essential laws would simply cease to exist if the Tea Party won its battle to reshape our founding document, but a short list includes:
■Social Security and Medicare
■Medicaid, children's health insurance, and other health care programs
■All federal education programs
■All federal antipoverty programs
■Federal disaster relief
■Federal food safety inspections and other food safety programs
■Child labor laws, the minimum wage, overtime, and other labor protections
■Federal civil rights laws

The Tea Party imagines a constitution focused entirely upon the Tenth Amendment, which provides that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people”—which is why their narrow vision of the nation’s power is often referred to as “tentherism.”

The Constitution gives Congress the power “to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,” thus empowering the federal government to levy taxes and leverage these revenues for programs such as Social Security and Medicare. A disturbingly large number of elected officials, however, insist that these words don’t actually mean what they say.

In a speech to the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council, Texas Gov. Rick Perry listed a broad swath of programs that “contradict the principles of limited, constitutional government that our founders established to protect us.” Gov. Perry’s list includes Medicare and “a bankrupt social security system" . . .

[T]enther proposals to simply let the states take over Social Security and Medicare are nothing more than a backdoor way to eliminate these programs altogether. If the Tea Party gets its way, and our nation’s social safety net for seniors is declared unconstitutional, millions of seniors will lose their only income and their only means to pay for health care.

Education is also on the Tea Party’s chopping block. . . . The truth, however, is that the federal government has never told states how to educate their children—and it could not do so if it tried. . . . . So, the state of Texas is perfectly free to turn down federal grants if they do not like the conditions attached to them.

Sen. [Mike] Lee [(R-UT)] would go even further in cutting off assistance for low-income Americans. In an interview with a Utah radio host, Lee claimed that the framers intended all antipoverty programs to be dealt with exclusively at the state level. This would not only eliminate programs like income assistance and food stamps, it could threaten unemployment insurance, federal job training, and other programs intended to provide a bridge out of poverty.

You get the drift. Greed, false piety, a total lack of compassion, and a hatred of those deemed "other" are the hallmarks of the Tea Party.

A Christianist Manifesto’s Call to Arms

I have written a number of times about Christian dominionism and, more frighteningly, its appeals and connections to some of the darlings of the GOP presidential candidate slate, namely Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry. From following the "Christian Right" - which is any thing but right - for over a decade, I continue to believe that too few people appreciate just how successful the dominionists have been in infiltrating more mainstream evangelical groups, some of which have no idea that they are being moved like puppets by the far more extreme dominionists. The far right continues to be working in over drive to minimize the level of influence now enjoyed within the GOP by those who a decade ago would have been viewed as radioactive and certifiably insane. These extremists DO control the GOP to a large extent and, therefore, it is crucial that the larger public understand the clear and present danger the Christianists and dominionist pose to the country. A piece in The New Yorker looks at the true subversive aspect of the Christian dominionists who while wrapping themselves in a flag and clutching a Bible would happily overthrow the U.S. government and replace it with a frightening theocracy. Here are some highlights:of

appreciate Ross Douthat’s partial praise of my recent piece about Michele Bachmann, especially since I led him into debate with a tweet. But when Douthat writes about Francis Schaeffer, an important influence on the Presidential candidate, he misses the mark.

Schaeffer didn’t like the formal melding of church and state, but his exhortation to readers was that Christianity, properly applied, “brings forth not only certain personal results, but also governmental and legal results.” Schaeffer’s big point was that, for too long, American Christians had divided the world into spiritual and material spheres, and that they had applied Christianity only to the former.

He saw an apocalyptic, zero-sum struggle between the Christian world view and what he called the “humanist” world view. In “A Christian Manifesto,” Schaeffer writes: “What we must understand is that the two world views really do bring forth with inevitable certainty not only personal differences, but total differences in regard to society, government, and law. There is no way to mix these two total world views. They are separate entities that cannot be synthesized.”

And our view of final reality—whether it is material-energy, shaped by impersonal chance, or the living God and Creator—will determine our position on every crucial issue we face today. It will determine our views on the value and dignity of people, the base for the kind of life the individual and society lives, the direction law will take, and whether there will be freedom or some form of authoritarian dominance.”

And later in “A Christian Manifesto,” he writes: “It is not too strong to say that we are at war, and there are no neutral parties in the struggle. One either confesses that God is the final authority, or one confesses that Caesar is Lord.”

If Christians were to lose this “war” over world views, the consequences would be catastrophic. Schaeffer wrote that the humanist world view—leave aside the matter that almost no one self-identifies as a “humanist”— was on the cusp of defeating Christianity in America.

Either Christians defeated the humanists and reinstated “God’s written Law” as the “base” in America or we would lose our democracy. He genuinely believed that freedom could not flourish unless biblical law formed the foundation of society.

But Schaeffer believed Christians needed to follow a path of escalating actions, and he left no doubt where those actions led if they were not successful. Indeed, much of “A Christian Manifesto” is concerned with the question of “what to do about it if the window does shut?”

Schaeffer agrees that we have reached the point by which Rutherford argued revolution was justified, he later makes it clear: “It is time we consciously realize that when any office commands what is contrary to God’s Law it abrogates its authority. And our loyalty to the God who gave this law then requires that we make the appropriate response in that situation to such a tyrannical usurping of power. I would emphasize at this point that Samuel Rutherford was not wrong, he was right; it was not only right in the seventeenth century in Scotland where he was right; it was not only in 1776 where he was right: he is right in our century.”

to read “A Christian Manifesto” as only a call for non-violent civil disobedience is to willfully ignore a central argument of the book: that at a certain point—the “bottom line”—the government loses its moral authority, and its overthrow by any means is justified.

That's right. One of the founders and advocates for dominionism advocate for revolution against the government if Christianists principles were driven from controlling civil government. In most circles, this is called treason. Yet the Christianist continue to be treated with kid gloves and are allowed to say and advocate for things that would land the rest of us in prison. It's far past time that this special treatment and privilege end.

The Paralyzed Federal Reserve - Bad News For All of Us

In the New York Times Paul Krugman looks at the paralyzed Federal Reserve which needs to engage in stimulus actions, yet sits watching as the economy teeters back toward recession. Krugman places blame on Fed Chair Ben Bernanke who seems afraid of his shadow - not to mention the batshit insanity of Rick Perry. It's an attitude of "to Hell with the country" as the needs of the nation are placed behind personal ambition and fear of criticism from crazy people. It's disconcerting that so many in public office - especially in the Republican Party - no longer put the nation even remotely first. It's all about the party and pandering to the worse anti-Constitution elements of the public . Here are some highlights:

As I write this, investors around the world are anxiously awaiting Ben Bernanke’s speech at the annual Fed gathering at Jackson Hole, Wyo. They want to know whether Mr. Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, will unveil new policies that might lift the U.S. economy out of what is looking more and more like a quasi-permanent state of depressed demand and high unemployment.

But I’ll be shocked if Mr. Bernanke proposes anything significant — that is, anything likely to make any serious dent in unemployment or offer any serious boost to growth. Why don’t I expect much from Mr. Bernanke? In two words: Rick Perry.

I’m using Mr. Perry — who has famously threatened Mr. Bernanke with dire personal consequences if he pursues expansionary monetary policy before the 2012 election — as a symbol of the political intimidation that is killing our last remaining hope for economic recovery.

Obviously, the U.S. economy remains deeply depressed, and under normal conditions we would expect the Fed to pump it up by cutting interest rates. But the interest rates the Fed normally targets — basically rates on short-term U.S. government debt — are already near zero. So what can the Fed do?

[I]n 2000 an economist named Ben Bernanke offered a number of proposals . . . . . These could include: purchases of long-term government debt (to push interest rates, and hence private borrowing costs, down); an announcement that short-term interest rates would stay near zero for an extended period, to further reduce long-term rates; an announcement that the bank was seeking moderate inflation, “setting a target in the 3-4% range for inflation, to be maintained for a number of years,” which would encourage borrowing and discourage people from hoarding cash; . . .

Was Mr. Bernanke on the right track? I think so — as well I should, since his paper was partly based on my own earlier work. So why isn’t the Fed pursuing the agenda its own chairman once recommended for Japan? . . . . The larger answer, however, is outside political pressure. Last year, the Fed actually did institute a policy of buying long-term debt, generally known as “quantitative easing” (don’t ask). But it faced a political backlash out of all proportion to its modest effect on the economy, culminating in Mr. Perry’s declaration that any further monetary easing before the 2012 election would be “almost treasonous,” and that if Mr. Bernanke went ahead and did it, “we would treat him pretty ugly down in Texas.”

With prominent Republicans like Representative Paul Ryan already denouncing policies that allegedly “debase the dollar,” a political firestorm would be guaranteed. . . . . So now you see why I don’t expect any substantive policy announcements at Jackson Hole. Back in 2000, Mr. Bernanke accused the Bank of Japan of suffering from “self-induced paralysis”; well, now the Fed is suffering from externally induced paralysis. In effect, it has been politically intimidated into standing by while the economy stagnates. And that’s a very, very bad thing.

With the Fed also intimidated into inaction, it’s hard to see any end to the ongoing economic disaster.

Video Shows White Teens Killing Black Man

Hate is alive and well - especially in Mississippi - where a video caught a group of white teens targeting and black man then running him over with a car and killing him. It's yet another example of what the politics of hate and division of the far right bear as their ultimate foul fruits. The messaging of the far right seems increasingly out to dehumanize others because of their race, gender, sexual orientation, and religion - all of which makes it easier for some to feel totally free to physically harm those whom have been dehumanized. It's precisely what the Nazi regime did to the Jews in the 1930's. What's shocking in this sad case is that the murder was caught on video. Here are highlights from CNN on the disturbing story:

On a recent Sunday morning just before dawn, two carloads of white teenagers drove to Jackson, Mississippi, on what the county district attorney says was a mission of hate: to find and hurt a black person.

In a parking lot on the western side of town they found their victim. James Craig Anderson, a 49-year-old auto plant worker, was standing in a parking lot, near his car. The teens allegedly beat Anderson repeatedly, yelled racial epithets, including "White Power!" according to witnesses.

Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith says a group of the teens then climbed into their large Ford F250 green pickup truck, floored the gas, and drove the truck right over Anderson, killing him instantly.

Mississippi officials say it was a racially motivated murder. What the gang of teens did not know was that a surveillance camera was focused on the parking lot that night, and many of the events, including the actual murder of Anderson, were captured live on videotape.

The group of teens that night was led by 18-year-old Deryl Dedmon, Jr., of Brandon, Mississippi, according to police and officials. "This was a crime of hate. Dedmon murdered this man because he was black," said Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith. "The evidence will show that."

Dedmon led and instigated the attack from early in the evening, he took part in the beating of Anderson, and Dedmon was also the actual driver of the Ford 250 truck that would serve as the murder weapon, according to officials.

As the teens were partying and drinking miles away from Jackson that night, in largely white Rankin County, Dedmon told friends they should leave, saying "let's go fuck with some niggers," according to law enforcement officials.

Dedmon pummeled Anderson repeatedly as he crumpled to the street, according to officials, though this is not visible in the videotape. Finally, after the beating some of the teens left and some got into the green truck.

At this moment on the video, Anderson becomes visible, as he staggered into view and walked towards the headlights of the truck. The truck suddenly surges ahead, running over Anderson, then continuing at high speed away from the scene.

Shortly after he allegedly drove the truck over Anderson, Dedmon allegedly boasted and laughed about the killing, according to testimony given by some of the teens to detectives. "I ran that nigger over," Dedmon allegedly said in a phone conversation to the teens in the other car.

It's frightening stuff and it's the result in part, I suspect, of the constant message put out by the Tea Party and Christianists that America - read whites - are under siege and losing control of the country. Sadly, I suspect that we'll see more murders like this. And not just of blacks.

Totally Missing from the Debt Ceiling Deal: Jobs and the Unemployed

What is perhaps the most dismaying aspect of the GOP manufactured debt ceiling crisis is that years into the worse economy since the Great Depression of the 1930's, nothing of significance has been done to address the loss of jobs and the unemployed. And when the spending cuts kick in under the soon to be approved debt ceiling deal, the fall out will likely be more job losses and the addition of more individuals to the ranks of the unemployed or under employed. Shockingly, the GOP and the Tea Party who all to often wear their alleged religiosity o their sleeves care nothing for those falling into the ranks of the unemployed. In the minds of these "godly Christians" the unemployed and their families apparently mean nothing whatsoever. In my own law practice, the number one thing I am seeing in terms of the cause of why homeowners are falling behind in their mortgages is job loss or reduced work hours that devastates their family cash flow. And people wonder why housing isn't recovering? A piece in the Washington Post looks at this forgotten segment of the population - real, living, breathing people. Here are highlights:
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The debt-ceiling deal, as we know, contains no stimulus. Nothing on jobs. No relief for the out-of-work. And that’s a real worry because, at the end of this year, existing emergency unemployment benefits — the ones that were extended as part of the 2010 tax-cut deal — are set to expire. Yet there are still millions of Americans who can’t find work. So what happens to the unemployed at that point? . . . . anyone who loses their job after July 1 this year will get the 20 to 26 weeks, no more.
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The macroeconomic effects of failing to extend could be significant. Chad Stone, an economist at CBPP, walked me through a back-of-the envelope calculation. Currently, about 3.8 million people receive those additional, federally funded benefits scheduled to expire. The average benefit is about $1,300 a month. That comes to roughly $60 billion a year in spending. Now, UI benefits are one of the most effective forms of stimulus out there — people without jobs tend to spend most or all of the money, rather than pocket it. Moody’s chief economist Mark Zandi estimates that every dollar spent on unemployment benefits boosts GDP by about $1.60.
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Add it all up, and letting unemployment benefits dwindle could provide a hit to the economy of about 0.5 percent of GDP. That’s a sizeable dent, especially when we’re barely seeing any economic growth as it is.
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Conservatives might be inclined to say, fine, that will force people to look for work. They might even cite Harvard economist Robert Barro’s suggestion in the Wall Street Journal that the jobless rate would be 3 percent lower if unemployment hadn’t been extended to 99 weeks. But there’s reason to think Barro’s wrong. Conti points out that there are now at least five unemployed people for every one job opening — the main roadblock here hardly seems to be lazy, unmotivated laid-off workers living high on fat UI benefits. Second, two recent studies by the San Francisco Fed and Goldman Sachs suggest that extended unemployment benefits contribute just 0.4 percent to the jobless rate. Cutting off aid would produce a small gain in exchange for a lot of extra hardship.
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Meanwhile, apart from stimulus, unemployment benefits can also benefit the long-term health economy in another way, as Harvard’s Raj Chetty has argued. In a bleak job market, when unemployment benefits expire quickly, out-of-work folks tend to seize the first opportunity that comes along — even if it’s a job for which they’re not particularly suited. We end up with the specter of engineers, desperate to make ends meet, settling for low-wage food-service jobs. Giving people extra time to search can lead to more optimal outcomes.

Did the "Hobbits" Win the Debt Ceiling Fight?

While the extremists and Kool-Aid drinkers in the GOP controlled House of Representatives may still be a stumbling block and a final vote is still needed, purportedly the White House and Democratic and Republican leaders of both houses of Congress claim that a deal has been reached. Is it a good deal? My bets are that long term it will prove to be harmful. However, without some kind of deal, tomorrow could see the country immediately go off a financial cliff. Scanning the headlines many think Obama gave away the store - no surprise there to me. If Obama had been negotiation in World War II, we'd all likely be speaking German today. The only real winners seem to be the forces of "No" whom John McCain recently referred to as Hobbits on the Senate floor. It is of huge concern that going forward these hobbits will have learned that by being intransigent, they can get their way. Here are highlights from a triumphal op-ed piece in the Washington Post that looks at the supposed deal from a pro-Tea Party view:
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The reported debt-limit deal appears to be a victory for the Tea Party. It includes around $1 trillion in spending cuts and creates a special committee of Congress to recommend cuts of $1.2 trillion more. If Congress does not approve those additional cuts by year’s end, automatic spending cuts go into effect. The package sets an important new precedent that debt-limit increases must be “paid for” with commensurate cuts in spending.
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The devil is in the details, of course. There are troubling reports that the agreement may disproportionately cut defense spending. Conservatives should ensure that the final deal, which is still being hammered out at the time of this writing, does not gut defense. They should scour the legislation to make certain it lives up to its billing. If it does, the Tea Party has won.
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According to Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell, the proposed deal has no tax increases. The Tea Party took tax hikes off the table and held the line — another major victory.
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The Tea Party is also winning the battle of ideas. Last week, Obama campaign strategist David Axelrod crowed that the debt-limit battle was shaping up as a “definitional fight” in which voters would see Obama as defending the reasonable center against Republicans who are “pandering to the extremes.” Well, if Axelrod is so confident that Obama is winning this “definitional fight,” why was the White House so adamant about ducking a second round next year?
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Instead of winning over independents with his calls for a “balanced” approach, the president’s support among independents has collapsed. A Pew poll released last week found that a majority of independents now disapprove of Obama’s job performance for the first time in his presidency. Two months ago, Obama held an 11-point lead over a generic Republican. Today, that lead has vanished. Whatever the president’s strategy was, it failed.
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Now comes that hard part: accepting an incomplete victory. Some Tea Party Republicans will be unhappy with the deal because it does not include a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. . . . . That the Tea Party accomplished all this in just six months — at a time when the GOP controls one-half of one-third of the federal government — is remarkable. The “hobbits” won.
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Time will tell whether or not this "victory" sends the nation back into recession. As for the elderly who in my view stupidly believe the GOP batshitery, they may yet rue the fruits of their own gullibility.

The Tea Fragger Party

Kathleen Parker - on of a dwindling number of sane conservatives - has a column in the Washington Post under the title I used on this post that looks at the destruction of the Republican Party (and the nation) by those who would claim to save it. Looking at the GOP today compared to the party that I once spent many years working within my continued reaction is WTF happened. Although I know what happened. It can be described by a few words. One word is "Christianists" and the others are "Tea Party." Under those twin banners, rationality and logic have been jettisoned and ignorance and extremism have become the order of the day. My always dignified and intellectual maternal grandfather would be utterly aghast at the level of batshitery that passes for intelligent thought and debate within the GOP. If the grown ups don't retake the GOP soon, the best hope for the country is that the party dies a quick death. Here are some highlights from Parker's all too on target column:

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Fragging: “To intentionally kill or wound (one’s superior officer, etc.), esp. with a hand grenade.” Take names. Remember them. The behavior of certain Republicans who call themselves Tea Party conservatives makes them the most destructive posse of misguided “patriots” we’ve seen in recent memory.
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If the nation defaults on its financial obligations, the blame belongs to the Tea Party Republicans who fragged their own leader, John Boehner. They had victory in their hands and couldn’t bring themselves to support his debt-ceiling plan, which, if not perfect, was more than anyone could have imagined just a few months ago.
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These people wouldn’t recognize a hot fudge sundae if the cherry started talking to them. The tick-tock of the debt-ceiling debate is too long for this space, but the bottom line is that the Tea Party got too full of itself with help from certain characters whose names you’ll want to remember when things go south. They include, among others, media personalities who need no further recognition; a handful of media-created “leaders,” including Tea Party Nation founder Judson Phillips and Tea Party Patriots co-founders Jenny Beth Martin and Mark Meckler (both Phillips and Martin declared bankruptcy, yet they’re advising Tea Party Republicans on debt?); . . . and elected leaders such as Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan, head of the Republican Study Committee, and South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint, who grandstand and make political assertions and promises that are sheer fantasy.
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South Carolina’s contingent was so troubled that members repaired to the chapel Thursday to pray and emerged promising to vote no. Why? Not because Jesus told them to but because they’re scared to death that DeMint will “primary” them — find someone in their own party to challenge them. Where did they get an idea like that? Look no further than Sarah Palin’s Facebook page, . . . .
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Unfortunately for the country, which is poised to lose its place as the world’s most-trusted treasury and suffer economic repercussions we can ill afford, the stakes in this political game are too high to be in the hands of Tea Partyers who mistakenly think they have a mandate.
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Hubris is no one’s friend, and irony is a nag. The Tea Partyers who wanted to oust Barack Obama have greatly enhanced his chances for reelection by undermining their own leader and damaging the country in the process. The debt ceiling may have been raised and the crisis averted by the time this column appears, but that event should not erase the memory of what transpired. The Tea Party was a movement that changed the conversation in Washington, but it has steeped too long and has become toxic.

John McCain Slams Conservatives for Lying

I once admired John McCain before he went of the deep end, prostituted himself to the Christianists, and picked the delusional Sarah Palin as his VP running mate. However, the other day we had a glimpse of the old John McCain when he took Republicans to task on the U.S. Senate floor and called them liars, said they were living in a fantasy land, and called them hobbits (insulting hobbits with the last remark). Would that more conservatives had the courage to call it like it is - and don't even get me started on the mainstream media which continues to parrot GOP lies rather than analyze the facts and expose the lies and untruths that now make up the main GOP talking points. One of the biggest calamities this country has suffered is the loss of a mainstream media that will report the facts as opposed to simply replay the demagoguery of the far right. There are some highlights from the Washington Post on McCain's denunciation of the current GOP lies:
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So the debt limit debate has come to this: John McCain, who you may recall was the GOP’s 2008 standard bearer, is now openly accusing conservatives of actively misleading America with their completely unrealistic demands, which he labeled “deceiving” and “bizarro.”
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There are Republicans in both the House and Senate who are still pushing for another vote on the balanced budget amendment, even though “cut cap and balance,” which contains such an amendment, has already failed in the Senate. . . . . To such conservatives, McCain offered a simple answer: You’re in fantasy-land, and you’re doing your constituents a disservice by perpetuating the falsehood that such a thing can ever happen.
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Tellingly, McCain cited today’s Wall Street Journal editoral excoriating conservative opponents of the Boehner plan as out of touch with reality for thinking they can do better. McCain’s angry tirade on the Senate floor today perfectly captures the rising frustration, anger and panic of more responsible Republicans and GOP establishment figures as they come to terms with the true depths of the delusion that is now afflicting some on the right — and the danger it is now posing to our economy and country.

Show Down Between GOP Realists and the GOP Insane

Like many Americans, the stunts and insanity of the GOP over the course of the week so far has cost me thousands of dollars in declines in my investments - something I take very personally and will be sharing with Scott Rigell and Eric Cantor - along with my mantra of vote for anyone other than a Republican. One can only hope that there are a few realists in the GOP who can grasp the potential horrific financial consequences of a U.S. default on its debt. Obviously, that description excludes Michele Bachmann and the Kool-Aid drinking GOP freshmen put into office by the ignorance embracing, fact denying Tea Party. Why the know nothing crowd in the Tea Party cannot grasp that those of them with 401(k)'s and investments will be paying a huge price in lost equity, not to mention paying more as interest rates jump upwards is beyond disconcerting. The Washington Post looks at this battle between the near insane in the GOP and the very few grown ups left within the party. Here are highlights:
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The run-up to the vote expected Thursday on House Speaker John A. Boehner’s proposal to provide a short-term increase in the national debt limit is quickly turning into a time of clarity for the chamber’s Republicans. If GOP leaders are unable to muster enough support to get the plan out of the House, the only measure left would be a Democratic proposal by Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), and voting with Reid is not a concession many House Republicans are willing to make.
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“There’s only three choices,” said Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-Ohio), a close Boehner ally. “One is to vote for Senator Reid’s plan. One is to default. And one choice is the Boehner bill. It should be pretty self-evident what the best choice is to someone who’s a Republican.”
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Increasingly, the vote on Boehner’s proposal is shaping up not as a test of wills between moderates and conservatives, but as a faceoff between political purists who scorn the bill and realists who prefer it to the alternative.
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But it is not an easy sale for a party that won back control of the House last year on promises to vote without regard to political consequences.
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House leaders expressed cautious optimism Wednesday that they were convincing members that the plan advanced by Boehner (R-Ohio) is the best that Republicans can hope to get. It would avert a government default, take a bite out of the deficit and require Congress to adopt $1.8 trillion in additional cuts before the debt ceiling could be raised again next year.
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Freshman Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.), whose district in Staten Island and Brooklyn is home to many Wall Street professionals, said he decided Wednesday that he will vote for the bill after he was convinced that its failure would hand Democrats control of the debate.
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The House proposal was panned at a small rally held at the Capitol by the Tea Party Express and the American Grassroots Coalition. The GOP that rode tea party energy and activism is hoping that some of it members can look past that relationship. “Some people are new here and this is part of the learning curve,” LaTourette said. “At times you have to say ‘no’ to people you represent who are yelling at you, if you’ve reached the conclusion that it’s in the best interests of the country.”
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Let's hope that the GOP for once puts the good of the country ahead of prostituting itself to extremists who are untethered from objective reality (which sadly, is most of the GOP base).