Political Blog—February 2010

February 2—Nashua

Obama gave a speech today in which he stated unemployment must be the primary focus in 2010. He proposed eliminating capital gains taxes on small business investments, plus he suggested taking thirty billion dollars repaid by banks to create a small business lending fund, which sounds great. As he said, it's critical that Congress act to create jobs, but, as he also said, it won't be easy with certain members of Congress (ahem) obstructing every move. He said many in Congress opposed the recovery act but were only too keen to take credit for it when it worked. "They want to have their cake and vote against it too," he said.

Before going too far with that, he said it was a good thing that we had two parties in this country because that meant vigorous debates took place to discard bad ideas and refine good ones so we didn't go too far in one direction. He discussed the Republican caucus he visited last week we all agree on the importance of education, and, he said, "Let's make college affordable for every high school student." Education enables the young to seek good jobs, and he added, let's keep those jobs in this country and "invest in innovation" by putting people to work on green jobs.

Obama proposed cutting over one hundred programs that didn't work and capping discretionary spending. That sounds alarmingly Republican to me, but on the other hand, it also makes sense in the current economic climate. He said it didn't mean we had to do less; we just had to do more with the money we have using the paygo (pay as you go) rule. Finally, common sense and frugality in government spending; now there are a couple of phrases I never thought I'd use in the same sentence.

February 4—Party of Dough

Scott Brown, the pickup truck driving Senator from Massachusetts, took office today. He's a pile of PlayDoh waiting to be molded by the GOP. The GOP treated his victory as though they now had the majority, and I rather feel Brown thinks as much too.

In other news, Congressman Anthony Wiener appeared on The Daily Show and, when Jon Stewart asked him if Lieberman were a dick, Wiener responded, "Yes, Jon." Awesome.

February 9—Southern by the Grace of God Happening to Be Born in Houston

The Senate is growing increasingly annoying; its role of "advise and consent" is becoming "delay and obstruct." It reminds me of an old political argument that ended with one party insisting he was entitled to his opinion and the other party reminding him that he was entitled to his opinion, but he was not entitled to the facts. Obama mentioned the Senate's beaurocracy veiled terms, saying he wanted a discussion, not political theatre.

In other news, justice might not be swift nor severe, but at least it's looking like it will get here eventually. I refer to the international inquiry into the U.S. invasion of Iraq. It's about time. I'm afraid it won't get anywhere, though. Any questions the British put to Dubya are bound to be met with lies and phony confusion in typical drunken cowboy style. The truth probably will come out eventually, but far too late to punish those who deserve it. The mess with Iraq is precisely why our Constitution requires a declaration of war; what we're learning is incredibly disturbing. It started with the Korean War, and every president since has had an undeclared war.

What terrifies me is how close both the government and the right wing extremists are to the beginnings of the Nazi movement in Germany. They were a minority on the fringe, and they slowly gained power, and next thing you knew, people lost rights and then lost their lives. once said "When fascism comes, it will arrive wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross." I saw a picture of Sarah Palin wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross. Remember, Hitler was elected.

Then Megan McCain went after those right wing nuts who want to bring back literacy tests for voters, calling it innate racism, which is precisely what it is. Keith Olbermann compared her to Margaret Chase Smith in the fifties, with her Declaration of Conscience, which of course was an anti-McCarthy tract citing the four horsemen of : fear, ignorance, bigotry, and smear. Regrettably, McCarthy and his horsemen are still with us. Miss McCain's point went after people calling attention to Obama's middle name of Hussein and the desire for literacy tests, and she, as I said, called it what it was: racism. She said it was why young people were turned off by the tea party movement and that revolutions were started by the young, not old people babbling about race baiting.

However.

Then Eugene Robinson got on TV and described the modern-day race baiting as reminiscent of racism in the South during the fifties, as if only the South had Jim Crow laws or the KKK or anything else. Fuck. You. The largest contingent of the Ku Klux Klan was in Chicago, and the Illinois Nazi Party basically owned the legislature there for years. Kiss my Southern ass.

February 10—Bill Nye on Rachel Maddow!

I knew the right wing consisted mostly of morons, but I thought they at least had a grasp on basic scientific facts such as climate change. Instead, of course, they're labeling the recent heavy snows in Washington, D.C. proof that global warming doesn't exist. You fucking idiots; climate change means it gets hotter in warm weather and colder in cold weather.

Bill Nye was on Rachel Maddow tonight, discussing the right denying the existence of climate change. He said that denying science was almost unpatriotic. I don't know about that. It's nuts, yes, but that doesn't make it unpatriotic. Then again, denying science means you ultimately destroy your country and other countries.

Furthering my belief in Republican idiocy, some vinyl-clad ditz was talking to Ron Reagan on TV recently, and they got into a debate over Sarah Palin. The woman wearing the plastic couch said that Palin didn't quit; she answered the call to the lower forty-eight. She told Ron Reagan that his father would have agreed, and Ron Reagan of course begged to differ. Then he pointed out that she'd never met him, and she shot back, "You never met him either." WTF. Last time I checked, Ron Reagan did meet his own father, probably more than once.

February 14—I've been waiting for this.

Today on Meet the Press, Vice President Biden lit into Cheney on his completely crazy rewriting of history. Biden said Cheney was allowed his opinion, but he was not allowed to rewrite history. He said he couldn't guess Cheney's motives, but Cheney was factually and substantively wrong. He added that Cheney may have been misinformed, but he could also be misinforming, that his assertions were not accurate, and that there is a difference between being outspoken and doing so in a way that misrepresents the facts. Biden said Cheney may not be fully informed of what's going on.

Of course Cheney later shot back, trapping himself in a double jock lock, with an admission that he basically supported waterboarding. It'll be interesting to see how this pans out over the next week or so.

February 16—The China Syndrome

Senator Bayh, the Democrat from Indiana, announced he will not seek a third term in the Senate, citing too much partisanship. I hate that we will most likely have one less Democrat in the Senate now, but I cannot blame him. He said the Senate can't get anything done, and he'd be of more use to his state there than in D.C. But couldn't he try to help fix D.C. and help the whole country that way?

Somebody asked Hillary Clinton if the thought of Sarah Palin as president terrified her and if she would consider moving to Canada or Russia if that seventh seal opened. Clinton replied no, but she would visit as often as she could.

Terrifyingly, Obama wants to build a nuclear power plant. Good God I hope he doesn't. I'm old enough to remember Chernobyl, and I don't remember ever being more scared. I hope nothing comes of this.

February 26—Steve King is scarier than Stephen King.

I haven't heard anything more about the planned nuclear power plant; it seems to have disappeared quickly among the Chernobyl Three Mile Island ZOMG backlash.

Governor of Nevada was caught lying about his girlfriend. Yet another Republican sex scandal. Yawn.

Sarah Palin sat down with Glenn Beck in what I suspect was an attempt by Fox to groom her for a presidential campaign. It's ludicrous and terrifying at the same time. Bill O'Reilly said she needs to go to political college—hmm, because she's not prepared to be president? Mais non!

In further ludicrous news, South Dakota has a new law teaching astrology. As if that weren't humiliating and idiotic enough to deserve abundant jeering, I take personal exception since I am dating an astronomer.

One more thing. Congressman Steve King is one scary mother fucker. He said blacks were better off under slave labor than they are today, that if you'd been chained to the reactor at Three Mile Island you'd have received the equivalent dose of an X-ray, that illegal immigrants should be treated like cattle, that children's health care amounted to health care for illegals and their parents . . . and I don't even recall what else. Jesus.

February 28—McCain on Meet the Press

Obviously, John McCain was on Meet the Press today. First, David Gregory asked McCain about John Hayworth's recent statement calling Obama's plans a "socialistic agenda." McCain tried hard not to comment and eventually wiggled out of it by saying he spent enough time taking care of his own misstatements. At least he's honest . . . though then again, I'm not sure how many of those "misstatements" are genuine misstatements; more like "stupid remarks that he didn't think about until it was too late." As proved by his next statement that he had no doubt that the U.S. was a right of center country, and Obama was governing from left of center. It's not that right of center when more people voted for Obama than McCain.

Then the inevitable health care debate arose, and McCain denied any efforts on the Democrats' part. He said health care was written by Democrats for Democrats, and that the Democrats had tried to peel off a few Republicans and call it bipartisanship. What? What about all the stuff that came before that, with all the Republicans shouting no to everything and refusing to participate? And why is it only for Democrats? How? Health care is for everyone. McCain kept using the phrase "unsavory deals" about health care companies. I'm not sure where he was going with that other than attempting to smear the Democrats' efforts to push health care through.

Then David Gregory brought up the awful "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy and asked McCain where he stood on it. McCain said we need to move forward carefully and not change anything too drastically. He said something about conducting a study and examining the results. Where have we heard that before? Typical McCain; typical conservative; never change anything.