Rick Perry? Devout Christian.
Michele Bachmann? Devout Christian.
Rick Santorum? Devout Christian.
Sarah Palin? Devout Christian.
Herman Cain? Devout Christian.
Newt Gingrich? Christian. I guess it depends on what your definition of "devout" is.
Mitt Romney? Devout Mormon. (Some fundamentalists don't think that Mormon's actually are true Christians. Personally, I couldn't care less--but really, who are you going to believe, a bunch of snake handlers, or a good conservative free market businessman who made his millions by buying up companies, stripping off the assets, and then firing everybody in sight? Forget that "cult" stuff, I say Mitt's a True Republican and a Devout Christian.)
I don't know about you, but taken as a group I can't think of a better advertisement for atheism.
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Thursday, August 11, 2011
All politics is local
For a couple of weeks I've been stumped -- what should I write about? The manufactured debt ceiling "crisis"? The Wisconsin recall elections? The crazy people in my home state of Arizona (particularly in Quartzsite -- Google it if you don't know what I'm talking about)? The absolutely crazy people running for the Republican Presidential nomination? The even crazier people who talk about these issues on Fox News every night (believe it or not, even with RupertGate going on in the U.K., they are still with us)?
Nope, instead I'm going to write about something a little more serious -- politics. I can't remember offhand who it was who said "all politics is local" but I'm coming to believe that it's true. Everytime I think of my state senator, Ron Gould (AKA the man who feels that guns are a good idea in both the state senate and on college campuses), I feel a pulsing in my temple, a vein pops out in the side of my neck, and my face gets as red as a pomegranate. So I've decided it's time to try to do something about it.
I was listening to Thom Hartmann the other day and he was discussing how the tea partiers have come to have such an inordinate influence on the Republican party and, by extension, out entire political system recently. He said something that struck me -- the most powerful office in the U.S. is not the Presidency, or a seat in the U.S. Senate or House of Representatives, or even a state governor. Nope, it's the local precinct committeeman. You see, those are the people in every district of every state who ultimately decide who goes on the ballot in primary elections. If you look at what the tea party has done since 2009, you'll see that they've gone in at the local level and made sure that their candidates are always on the primary ballots and then they work like hell to get them elected. That friends, is power.
So I went and volunteered at my local Democratic HQ the other day and told them I wanted to run for precinct committeeman. I found out that it's actually very easy -- in fact, the first step is just to be appointed. Tonight I attended a meeting of our local Democrats and trust me, in my area (Mohave County, Arizona) that is a small meeting. My thoughts in the past were that I couldn't make a difference here -- after all, I wouldn't even put an Obama sticker on my car for fear of vandalism. That is how pervasive the right-wingers are here in Kingman. But I've now come to the realization that if every Democrat or progressive out there in the red states and red counties continues to feel that way, then nothing will ever change. The meeting tonight energized me in a way I haven't felt in a long, long time. Writing on a blog is wonderful as is commenting on political bulletin boards. Making telephone calls and going door-to-door for a national candidate is a great thing as well -- but now I'm going to try to get in at the bottom and really try to make a difference.
After all, all politics is local.
Nope, instead I'm going to write about something a little more serious -- politics. I can't remember offhand who it was who said "all politics is local" but I'm coming to believe that it's true. Everytime I think of my state senator, Ron Gould (AKA the man who feels that guns are a good idea in both the state senate and on college campuses), I feel a pulsing in my temple, a vein pops out in the side of my neck, and my face gets as red as a pomegranate. So I've decided it's time to try to do something about it.
I was listening to Thom Hartmann the other day and he was discussing how the tea partiers have come to have such an inordinate influence on the Republican party and, by extension, out entire political system recently. He said something that struck me -- the most powerful office in the U.S. is not the Presidency, or a seat in the U.S. Senate or House of Representatives, or even a state governor. Nope, it's the local precinct committeeman. You see, those are the people in every district of every state who ultimately decide who goes on the ballot in primary elections. If you look at what the tea party has done since 2009, you'll see that they've gone in at the local level and made sure that their candidates are always on the primary ballots and then they work like hell to get them elected. That friends, is power.
So I went and volunteered at my local Democratic HQ the other day and told them I wanted to run for precinct committeeman. I found out that it's actually very easy -- in fact, the first step is just to be appointed. Tonight I attended a meeting of our local Democrats and trust me, in my area (Mohave County, Arizona) that is a small meeting. My thoughts in the past were that I couldn't make a difference here -- after all, I wouldn't even put an Obama sticker on my car for fear of vandalism. That is how pervasive the right-wingers are here in Kingman. But I've now come to the realization that if every Democrat or progressive out there in the red states and red counties continues to feel that way, then nothing will ever change. The meeting tonight energized me in a way I haven't felt in a long, long time. Writing on a blog is wonderful as is commenting on political bulletin boards. Making telephone calls and going door-to-door for a national candidate is a great thing as well -- but now I'm going to try to get in at the bottom and really try to make a difference.
After all, all politics is local.
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Endtimes
Four questions for today's Republican Party:
When you succeed in killing off the middle class, what's next?
Once the middle class is gone, who's going to buy things? Poor people struggle merely to subsist and there will never be enough rich people to support the economy. Your corporate friends are really going to miss the buying power of the 200 million or so people you're reducing to hand to mouth living. China sure isn't going to make up the difference and Europe never has and never will. But by all means keep driving down the average wage and shipping jobs overseas and see what happens.
What are you going to do with all of those angry, newly poor people? When they figure out you've been lying to them for all of these years it will get very ugly, very quickly.
Finally, how high do you think the walls around your gated communities will have to be when the time comes to keep the rest of us out?
When you succeed in killing off the middle class, what's next?
Once the middle class is gone, who's going to buy things? Poor people struggle merely to subsist and there will never be enough rich people to support the economy. Your corporate friends are really going to miss the buying power of the 200 million or so people you're reducing to hand to mouth living. China sure isn't going to make up the difference and Europe never has and never will. But by all means keep driving down the average wage and shipping jobs overseas and see what happens.
What are you going to do with all of those angry, newly poor people? When they figure out you've been lying to them for all of these years it will get very ugly, very quickly.
Finally, how high do you think the walls around your gated communities will have to be when the time comes to keep the rest of us out?
Monday, August 8, 2011
The N.R.A. Man of the Year
You can stop voting, we have a winner! The N.R.A. Man of the Year is from Chandler, Arizona. It had to be Arizona, of course, and it might as well be Chandler, where the official town motto is "We're somewhere south of Tempe, just keep driving."
Our winner won his title by the time honored method. He shot himself. Where? Well, that's where it gets fun! This young Charles Bronson wannabe shot himself in what used to be called, in far gentler times than these, "his private parts." That's right. No doubt imagining himself as an undercover cop, or maybe even a hitman, our hero tucked his piece into the waistband of his pants and Kablooey! You know, I bet that really hurt. Pretty bloody, too. But he was probably able to distract himself from the pain and gore until the ambulance came by reciting the Second Amendment, over and over again, like a mantra.
Since these are not the "gentler times" I mentioned earlier, thanks to the paper we know that he shot his penis and not his testicles. Therefore we can assume that this genius is still able to reproduce. Which means we can count on more potential challengers for the title of "N.R.A. Man of the Year" in the not too distant future.
Not to worry, though. Darwin was right about many things and the herd has a way of thinning itself out.
Our winner won his title by the time honored method. He shot himself. Where? Well, that's where it gets fun! This young Charles Bronson wannabe shot himself in what used to be called, in far gentler times than these, "his private parts." That's right. No doubt imagining himself as an undercover cop, or maybe even a hitman, our hero tucked his piece into the waistband of his pants and Kablooey! You know, I bet that really hurt. Pretty bloody, too. But he was probably able to distract himself from the pain and gore until the ambulance came by reciting the Second Amendment, over and over again, like a mantra.
Since these are not the "gentler times" I mentioned earlier, thanks to the paper we know that he shot his penis and not his testicles. Therefore we can assume that this genius is still able to reproduce. Which means we can count on more potential challengers for the title of "N.R.A. Man of the Year" in the not too distant future.
Not to worry, though. Darwin was right about many things and the herd has a way of thinning itself out.
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Worst Case Scenario
My boy and I went to see the angry monkey movie today and naturally that got me to thinking about our Republican cousins and the 2012 election.
To begin with, we should never underestimate the ability of the American people to do the wrong thing. Exhibit #1: the 2004 Presidential election. I'm sure that some of you believe, as I do, that the 2004 vote in Ohio was rigged. But the point is that the election shouldn't have been close enough for "electronic funny business" in one Midwestern state to have made any difference. After 4 years of Simple W--the Appointee in Chief--and the Dark Lord Cheney, including their Keystone Kops act on September 11th, the resulting bait and switch war in Iraq and, to top it off, replacing a large surplus with a huge deficit, how could more than 60 million people still vote for the Republican ticket? Are they that stupid? Sadly, the answer is "yes".
So let's say up is really down and black is really white and in 2012 the good citizens of the USA elect some lunatic Republican to the highest office in the land. (Next to Grover Norquist's, that is. Oh, that's right, he's never been elected to anything. He's a lobbyist. Strange, isn't it?)
And let's throw in the Senate for good measure. So that means the White House, both houses of Congress, and perhaps most importantly, the Supreme Court, would all be in Republican hands.
Doesn't really matter which Republican either. Sure Bachmann (or Palin or Cain or Perry) might be the craziest of the lot, but when you get right down to it, is there really that much difference between any of them and Romney (or Pawlenty, or Gingrich or, hell, any angry monkey)?
Can you imagine a country run by these people with absolutely no checks and balances?
And you think you're fucked now?! Baby, you don't know what fucked is...
To begin with, we should never underestimate the ability of the American people to do the wrong thing. Exhibit #1: the 2004 Presidential election. I'm sure that some of you believe, as I do, that the 2004 vote in Ohio was rigged. But the point is that the election shouldn't have been close enough for "electronic funny business" in one Midwestern state to have made any difference. After 4 years of Simple W--the Appointee in Chief--and the Dark Lord Cheney, including their Keystone Kops act on September 11th, the resulting bait and switch war in Iraq and, to top it off, replacing a large surplus with a huge deficit, how could more than 60 million people still vote for the Republican ticket? Are they that stupid? Sadly, the answer is "yes".
So let's say up is really down and black is really white and in 2012 the good citizens of the USA elect some lunatic Republican to the highest office in the land. (Next to Grover Norquist's, that is. Oh, that's right, he's never been elected to anything. He's a lobbyist. Strange, isn't it?)
And let's throw in the Senate for good measure. So that means the White House, both houses of Congress, and perhaps most importantly, the Supreme Court, would all be in Republican hands.
Doesn't really matter which Republican either. Sure Bachmann (or Palin or Cain or Perry) might be the craziest of the lot, but when you get right down to it, is there really that much difference between any of them and Romney (or Pawlenty, or Gingrich or, hell, any angry monkey)?
Can you imagine a country run by these people with absolutely no checks and balances?
And you think you're fucked now?! Baby, you don't know what fucked is...
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Gutless
Being essentially an understanding, compassionate, bleeding heart liberal, (I consider these to be virtues, by the way), I'd like to think that President Obama had no choice but to go along with the latest Republican attack on the well being of the American people.
The Israelis may have the luxury of saying that they don't negotiate with terrorists, but when the terrorists are duly elected members of the United States' Congress it is a slightly different matter. And when the credit and honor of the nation is at stake in addition to the economic well being of much of the world, well...
It is true that nothing good can get through the House of Representatives at this point. The Tea Party Jacobins have scared whatever little sense there was out of the other Republicans. So maybe this is the best deal he could get. I don't know.
I do know that Mr. Obama is a cautious man who likes to calculate and re-calculate and run through every possible hypothetical. And it may indeed be the case that invoking the 14th Amendment, and telling Boehner and Cantor and McConnell and the rest of the scum to go to hell, might have ended up with the Supreme Court--which at this point is about as corrupt an institution as I can imagine--having to decide the matter. So what?
Let Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Kennedy, and Alito--the Supreme Corporatists--explain to their "owners" why they let the US default. I for one don't think they have the balls to do it. I mean, what would their country club buddies say?
But now we'll never know.
One thing is for certain: if you believe in the hereafter, then at some point Barack Obama will have to answer to Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Harry Truman, JFK, MLK, RFK, LBJ, Gene McCarthy, and Teddy Kennedy for what he's helped the Republicans do to the citizens of this country.
The Israelis may have the luxury of saying that they don't negotiate with terrorists, but when the terrorists are duly elected members of the United States' Congress it is a slightly different matter. And when the credit and honor of the nation is at stake in addition to the economic well being of much of the world, well...
It is true that nothing good can get through the House of Representatives at this point. The Tea Party Jacobins have scared whatever little sense there was out of the other Republicans. So maybe this is the best deal he could get. I don't know.
I do know that Mr. Obama is a cautious man who likes to calculate and re-calculate and run through every possible hypothetical. And it may indeed be the case that invoking the 14th Amendment, and telling Boehner and Cantor and McConnell and the rest of the scum to go to hell, might have ended up with the Supreme Court--which at this point is about as corrupt an institution as I can imagine--having to decide the matter. So what?
Let Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Kennedy, and Alito--the Supreme Corporatists--explain to their "owners" why they let the US default. I for one don't think they have the balls to do it. I mean, what would their country club buddies say?
But now we'll never know.
One thing is for certain: if you believe in the hereafter, then at some point Barack Obama will have to answer to Teddy Roosevelt, FDR, Harry Truman, JFK, MLK, RFK, LBJ, Gene McCarthy, and Teddy Kennedy for what he's helped the Republicans do to the citizens of this country.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
All Haircut, No Cattle
Rick Perry, the governor of Texas, who briefly floated the idea of secession, until someone pointed out to him that without Federal money Texas would resemble one of the poorer states of Mexico, is now flirting with the idea of running for president in 2012.
You may recall that our last experience with having a Texas governor as President of the United States wasn't a particularly happy one. Unless you were a billionaire or a war profiteer, that is. But try to forget that for just a moment, and let's give Mr. P a chance to tell us what he believes in.
He believes that the Federal stimulus was a "$4 trillion rat hole". He's got his numbers wrong, of course. (He is a Republican after all.) And there are a few million people in the auto industry and related fields that might disagree about the usefulness of the stimulus. Here's a fun fact: Rick Perry's own state used Federal money to balance its budget and avoid a financial disaster. But don't bother the "guvnah" with facts, y'all. As any faithful Fox News listener will tell you, using facts is just a cheap liberal trick.
Perry also believes in states' rights. Big surprise there. However, like all truly patriotic, God fearing Republicans, if a state's citizens should decide that they favor gay marriage, or reproductive rights for women, or medical marijuana, then Ricky would favor federal legislation to thwart that state's will. Because Mr. Jesus doesn't want those things and Mr. Jesus trumps everything.
Yes, you guessed it, Rick Perry is a conduit of God, another Christian warrior determined to lead us down the path of righteousness. As he perceives it.
Haven't you heard, America should be a theocracy! That's what the Founders intended. Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison--they all spent their time praying--not thinking.
You might think that having one card carrying Crazy Jesus Club member running would be enough for any political party, but not the Republicans. They may have given up on that "Big Tent" crap, but it's still a wide trough. So Michele Bachmann and all the rest, say hello to Rick Perry!
You may recall that our last experience with having a Texas governor as President of the United States wasn't a particularly happy one. Unless you were a billionaire or a war profiteer, that is. But try to forget that for just a moment, and let's give Mr. P a chance to tell us what he believes in.
He believes that the Federal stimulus was a "$4 trillion rat hole". He's got his numbers wrong, of course. (He is a Republican after all.) And there are a few million people in the auto industry and related fields that might disagree about the usefulness of the stimulus. Here's a fun fact: Rick Perry's own state used Federal money to balance its budget and avoid a financial disaster. But don't bother the "guvnah" with facts, y'all. As any faithful Fox News listener will tell you, using facts is just a cheap liberal trick.
Perry also believes in states' rights. Big surprise there. However, like all truly patriotic, God fearing Republicans, if a state's citizens should decide that they favor gay marriage, or reproductive rights for women, or medical marijuana, then Ricky would favor federal legislation to thwart that state's will. Because Mr. Jesus doesn't want those things and Mr. Jesus trumps everything.
Yes, you guessed it, Rick Perry is a conduit of God, another Christian warrior determined to lead us down the path of righteousness. As he perceives it.
Haven't you heard, America should be a theocracy! That's what the Founders intended. Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison--they all spent their time praying--not thinking.
You might think that having one card carrying Crazy Jesus Club member running would be enough for any political party, but not the Republicans. They may have given up on that "Big Tent" crap, but it's still a wide trough. So Michele Bachmann and all the rest, say hello to Rick Perry!
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