This Joke Is Getting Old

The GOP circus rolled into town the other night and all it left was a big, stinking, pile of elephant dung...

As expected, the circus brought the usual collection of freaks, fools, and phonies. Also, as expected, the crowd ate it up.

It's an old show biz axiom: Give 'em what they want and the audience will come out.

In this case "they" must want a party that openly hates women, minorities, young people, old people, poor people, working people, sick people, in short anyone who isn't rich, white and the right kind Christian.

A party that would do away with every Federal agency and every regulation that protects us from the avarice of corporations, in the apparent belief that Caveat Emptor should be the 11th commandment.

A party that would allow our air, water, and soil to be despoiled in the name of profit.

A party that would do away with every advance that working people have made in the last century. Minimum wage? Gone. Child labor laws? Gone. Unions? Gone. OSHA? Gone.

A party that doesn't trust women to have control over their own bodies.

A party that loves the fetus more than the child. Once you're born you're on your own--so pick your parents wisely.

A party that would entrust Social Security to the very people that looted our Treasury.

A party that thinks if you can't afford health insurance, and you get sick, you should do us all a favor and just die.

A party that is itching to go to war with Iran--because it would rather do Israel's bidding than our own.

I could go on and on...but this joke is getting old.

Iowa? Really?

You have to keep one thing in mind as you watch the ubiquitous coverage of those salt of the earth Iowans shuffling off to the grange to cast their God given votes for the Republican Tea Party worthy of their choice.

The poor dirt farmers of the Hawkeye State have suffered through years, it seems, of first Paul, then Bachmann, then Perry, then Cain, then Gingrich, then Paul again, then Santorum, and always the multiple faces, Past Present and Future, of Willard Mitt Romney, each doing their own ethical limbo.

They watched in awe as each one bent lower and lower backwards in decrying the meddling big government forced on us all by everybody's favorite Kenyan anti-Colonial Socialist, Barack Hussein Obama.

Solemn, heartfelt promises were made, and if they were all kept, in some imaginary Republican Never Never Land, there would be no goddamned government telling us what to do! No EPA, no FDA, no IRS, no Departments of Education, Commerce, or Energy, no FEMA, and especially NO, absolutely NO Obamacare!

Every attack on the pernicious nature of the federal government was rewarded with grunts of approval, fervent "yeahs!", and sometimes even applause from the good burghers.

Oh, it's been nothing but fun, watching the candidates twist and turn, leap frogging each other in a race to the bottom of the barrel. But now it's time to get down to the real nut crackin'. Time for a little old fashioned small "d" democracy in action! Time to choose your favorite Horseman of the Apocalypse!

However, before we get to that, here's the one thing you have to keep in mind: these proudly self-sufficient Iowa Republicans get to share well over a billion dollars a year in federal farming subsidies--and have for many, many years.

They hate the big, nasty federal government...except when it's helping them.

Of course, Iowa is only the first step. Win or lose, it's on to New Hampshire, where the tough, independent, "just leave us alone" Republicans of the Granite State no doubt also hate the big, nasty federal government--until they need it. Then down to South Carolina, y'all, where they're still fighting the Civil War.

It may seem like this party has been going on for far too long, but trust me, the fun is just beginning...

Shocked, Shocked! (Redux)

For the last week or so we've been inundated with various pundits announcing that they are shocked--shocked! to discover that Pizza Man Herman Cain's 9-9-9 plan would in fact lower taxes on millionaires while raising taxes on the middle and lower classes. Really? They're surprised by this? Really?

Lest we forget, Cain is a Republican. He is also a millionaire. As are Willard Mitt "Do As I Say And Not As I Do" Romney and Rick "Try To Forget All Of The Crazy Things I Say And Gaze Instead At My Beautiful Head Of Hair" Perry. So is Sarah "Material Girl" Palin, who isn't running because she feels that she can best serve the America people by collecting enormous speaking fees from starstruck saps.

Michelle "Yes, I Am This Stupid" Bachmann? Millionaire. Ron "FEMA Is A Bad Idea" Paul? Millionaire. Newt "Lover Boy" Gingrich? Millionaire. Even Rick "For The Love Of God Please Don't Google Santorum" Santorum is a millionaire.

So of course they want to lower taxes on millionaires. They're all millionaires. "Duh!", as the kids say.

I mean really, what would be the point of being President if you couldn't feather your own nest? Leave austerity to the little people. It suits them.

Republicans never govern very well, their "hearts" aren't really in it. Besides, since their cornerstone belief is that "government is the problem" you can't expect them to do a good job for the rest of us. It goes against their very nature.

But give them credit for one thing: they sure know how to look out for their own kind.

Death Wish, Too

It should have come as no surprise that at the Ronald Reagan Death Cult Whoopdeedo and Square Dance the other night, Rick "Social Security is a Ponzi Scheme" Perry was applauded for the number of executions he's overseen as governor.

Or the total lack of concern that at least one of those executed was innocent.

Or that a few days later one of Ron Paul's flock shouted out that people without health insurance should just "die".

You see, The Republican Tea Party is the party of hatred and death, and day by day its dark heart is exposed more and more.

Oh, they march around in their stupid little tricorner hats, misquoting the Founding Fathers, waving their tiny guns, and pretending to be patriots deeply concerned about the Constitution, but deep down they're just a bunch of hate filled, mostly racist, fools.

And dupes, as well. They may have cowered and paralyzed half of the Congress, but their noise and bluster only benefits the corporate status quo--the status quo that has left this nation in the sad state it is today.

They scream about welfare and entitlements and yet 44% of Tea Party members are on Medicare, or have a family member who is and 48% of Tea Party members are on Social Security, or have a family member who is. And yet these idiots applaud talk of "Ponzi" schemes and "vouchers."

They weep and moan about the rights of the unborn and then turn their backs on the living. And then they go to church on Sunday and congratulate themselves for being good Christians. Oh boy, the shear hypocrisy of it all takes my breath away!

Listen, the facts are that the only people who won't end up needing both Social Security and Medicare are either very rich or plan on dying young. Which one are you?

What Year Is It?

Ron Paul, who is from Texas, which, when you get right down to it, accounts for most of what he says, doesn't think much of FEMA. In fact, he'd prefer us to do things the way they did them in "1900". Folks helpin' folks on a local level--without the dadgum gubmint interfering. (At this point, feel free to spit some tobacco "juice" and hitch up your pants.)

So, when the hurricane, or tornado, or earthquake flattens your town, don't come crying to Ron Paul. Just bend over, grab your bootstraps, and pull. If that doesn't work, tough. You don't need no Federal aid--you just need to pull harder!

You see, this is what we're up against. There are people, not as many as Fox News wants you to think, but definitely enough to screw things up for the rest of us, who want to turn back the clock 100 years or more, to what they imagine, in their tiny little brains, was a "better" America.

Admit it, things were so much better before child labor laws, when you could work those little suckers until they dropped. When women could not vote, black people dare not vote, and homosexuals didn't even exist, except in European novels. Before all those pesky, intrusive Federal regulations that keep our food and water and air (reasonably) clean. Before the 40 hour week and OSHA, before unemployment insurance, before universal elementary education and Social Security and Medicare and all those other "socialist" ideas that have destroyed the Eden that once was.

You know, being nostalgic for the "golden age" that people like Ron Paul hold so dear is like being nostalgic for a cholera epidemic.

Poor Relations

Coming from a Republican politician, other than calling someone a 'liberal', there is no epithet more damning than 'elitist'. Elitists go to Ivy League universities and are usually progressive in their thinking. Elitists are often 'intellectuals' (another bad word!). Elitists don't understand the 'real people', and certainly don't share their 'values'. In fact, elitists treat 'real people' with condescension. Elitists are what is wrong with America. They are the root of all the evils that have befallen us.

With this in mind, I wonder how today's Republicans can reconcile their professed feelings about elitists with what we know about the Founding Fathers?

Thomas Jefferson? Elitist. John Adams? Elitist. George Washington? Elitist. Madison, Mason, Hancock, and even the illegitimate Hamilton? Elitists all. Old Ben Franklin, who was the epitome of a self-made man and contemptuous of aristocrats, still feared the chaos of a mob and believed in a natural aristocracy based on merit. Elitist.

This may come as a shock to some of you, but our nation was founded by a relatively small group of elite men. None of them were saints. Many were tainted by a deep seated devotion and belief in the institution of slavery. But flaws and all, do you really think any of them would have anything but contempt for Palin, Bachmann, Paul, Ryan, Romney, and the rest of those grifters, liars, cranks, and clowns? How far would Sister Sarah's 'you betcha's' get her in a political discussion with Madison? What would happen if either of the Paul's tried to run their Ayn Rand crap by Ben Franklin? And Hamilton would dispose of the 'free marketeers' with a contemptuous laugh. In general, when dummies start talking to extremely smart people, even though it can be very entertaining for awhile, it never ends well for the dummy.

(To be fair, Jefferson might give Newt Gingrich a job as an overseer, depending on how well he could handle a bullwhip. But that doesn't mean that Newty would be welcome at the master's dinner table.)