A Fool And His Money...

...is the raison d'etre of the modern Republican Tea Party.

See, like any snake oil salesman or carny barker worth his salt knows, you can tell fools anything.

Anything!

And there's a very good chance that they will believe you, AND give you some money.

Deep Stupid is a beautiful thing.

Ask Wayne LaPierre. Ask Ted Cruz. Ask Mike Huckabee. Ask...

Ask any Republican.

Ask any televangelist.

Some very, very wealthy people have already pissed away over $200 million on failed 2016 Republican presidential candidates.

Rubio, Walker, Fiorina, Perry, Bush, Carson, Paul--a real Murderer's Row of Incompetence.

Think about that. All that dough and nothing to show for it.

And yet, they keep on giving...why?

Well, the one thing all these losers have in common is that they promised not to raise taxes on the donor class.

Come hell or high water our cherished billionaires will not have to pay a penny more. Let the country's infrastructure fall apart, let the water and air be poisoned, let the public schools fail, let the poor starve and the sick die, not one penny more.

In fact, those fabulous "makers" deserve a tax cut, don't ya know.

So of course they keep giving.

After all, what's a few hundred million when there are trillions at stake?

Scotty, We Hardly Knew Ye...

Of course, what we did know was appalling...

So Scott Walker, oh, excuse me, Governor Scott "Polling At Less Than 1%" Walker, darling of oligarchs everywhere, union buster extraordinaire, scourge of those awful bastards who pretend to teach our children, the man who allegedly was able to get out of a jam by buying his own personal set of judges, has decided to drop out of the race to be the Republican presidential nominee in 2016.

Sad sad sad.

What is truly amazing about this is that there were people who looked at Scott Walker and thought, "yeah, he's presidential."

First Rick "The Glasses Make Me Look Smarter--Don't They?" Perry and now Scotty W.

Two weasels down...many more to go.

Pity the poor Koch Brothers. Their hand picked candidate couldn't keep his head above water in a nearly dry pond.

Who will they buy now?

In other news, it turns out "Free Mohammed Bobblehead Day" at Mecca wasn't such a good idea.

Go figure.

Defining Deviancy Down

You're probably thinking, "Boy, there sure are a lot of Republicans who think they're qualified to be President of the United States of America!"

And then, after you stop laughing, you're probably thinking, "But none of them are! Not really. Not one!"

Here's the problem: after 8 years of George W. Bush, the bar was set sooooo low that anyone in the GOP with more than two functioning brain cells thought "Hey, if he was President, I could be President, too! Cool!"

Thank you, Simple W.

And then, because a (gasp) black man was elected, twice, (hahaha), the racist part of those dimly functioning brains thought, "Hey, I'm white! That automatically makes me superior to any non-white person. I should be President! Cool!"

It is a perfect storm of stupid, and hubris, and white privilege all twirling together that gives us people like Trump, Bush, Cruz, Santorum, Rubio, Perry, Graham, Kasich, Christie, and Walker.

Frankly, there is no rational explanation for Carly Fiorina or Bobby Jindal. Other than being purely delusional, that is.

And as for Ben Carson, well, a little too much surgical nitrous oxide is my guess. He's flat tripping.

Live From The Monkey House!

I've never witnessed this, but reliable sources tell me that monkeys and apes in captivity frequently hurl their feces at human spectators.

Now, I don't know how you feel about Charles Darwin and that whole descent of man/origin of the species thing, but I am sure that that behavior is exactly what we can expect from the Republican debates.

And I, for one, can't wait!

PS Don't sit too close to the stage.

Clown Time Is Never Over

Time flies, and before you know it, registered Republicans across this great land of ours will have to make the difficult decision of choosing which disastrous current or former governor to anoint as their party's presidential candidate.

Of course, they could pick from the covey of past and present truly awful U.S. senators running for the job.

Then there's always the business woman who almost ruined a major American corporation.

Or the noted surgeon who has the political intelligence of a salamander.

What about the bigoted blowhard billionaire, who makes the noted surgeon look like Thomas Jefferson?

So little time and so many buffoons to choose from!

Field Guide To The 2016 Republican Presidential Candidates

Marco "Don't Forget To Hydrate!" Rubio

Jeb "I'm The Smart One--No Really!" Bush. (Honestly, in that family, he just might be. But isn't that very much like being the tallest pygmy?)

Mike "Hey, I Got To Jam With Ted Nugent!" Huckabee

Chris "What Do You Mean Lard Isn't A Food Group?" Christie

Sarah "I'm Still Here And I'm Still Babbling Incoherently" Palin

Scott "Ruining A State Is Just The Beginning" Walker

Ted "Living Proof The Ivy League Isn't All It's Cracked Up To Be" Cruz

Rick "The Glasses Make Me Look Smarter, Right?" Perry

Rand "Fill In The Blank" Paul ("I mean, really, I'll say whatever you want me to say. Just tell me what you want me to say.") AKA Rand "I Honestly Can't Open My Mouth Without Saying Something Stupid--God Knows I've Tried" Paul

Ben "Being A Surgeon Requires Less Intelligence Than You'd Think" Carson

Donald "If I Were A Human Being I'd Be Appalled By Me" Trump

Willard Mitt "Wouldn't It Be Easier If I Just Bought The Presidency?" Romney (Willard says he's not going to run and, by God, I believe him! Just like I believed him when he said he cared about poor people...)

Of course, there's always room in the Klown Kar for one more...

Somewhere On The Road To Serfdom

The good people of Wisconsin have decided that they would rather be serfs, ruled by a weaselly, beady-eyed, bought and paid for Corporate Whore like Scott Walker and his blood sucking minions...

Good for them!

I say let's run those "union thugs" out of town!
To Hell with the minimum wage and benefits!
To Hell with the 40 hour week!
To Hell with pensions!
Bring back child labor!

To Hell with Healthcare!
To Hell with Public Education!
To Hell with clean air and water!
To Hell with the safety net!
Privatize Everything!

To Hell with progress!
The Enlightenment was a tragic mistake!
Keep women in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant!
Taxes are Socialism!
Freedom Isn't Free!

All Hail The Corporation!

The GOP war on the middle class and the poor

The GOP took over the House of Representatives and several statehouses and Governorships in 2010 by running on the platform of reducing the deficit and creating jobs. Thus far, I haven't seen a single thing -- not one solitary single bill -- to indicate that they weren't lying through their teeth.

The first place where this was really noticeable was in Wisconsin. Gov. Walker ran on a "get the state out of the red" platform. Not once in his campaign did he ever mention dismantling the public unions for all intents and purposes. So what has he done in a mere 11 weeks in office? Destroyed the public sector unions -- except, of course, those that supported him in the election. Not a single bill to create jobs for Wisconsinites -- instead he and the Repulican legislature have passed bills that according to the experts will result in the loss of thousands of jobs as well as killing job expansion.

In Maine, the anti-labor forces led by Governor Paul LePage have reached new heights of silliness. The Governor, who claims the state is another one facing severe budget deficits, is actually spending money to remove a mural depicting the history of labor in Maine. Where is this mural located? The Capitol building? The governor's mansion? No, it's at the Department of Labor! You know, the department assigned to ensure the rights of workers in the state. The reason it is being removed, at taxpayer expense, is that it is actually not pro-business enough. You read that correctly. It actually celebrates labor without giving enough credit to business -- you know, the people who actually fought against labor expansion, minimum wage, the 40-hour work week, etc. Spending taxpayer money on this is something Gov. LePage actually deems important -- all while trying to weaken unions and increase the work week, even on 16 and 17 year old kids!

Florida, led by newly-elected Governor Rick Scott -- he of the fraud problems (he was forced to resign as CEO of Columbia/HCA in 1997 after the company was found guilty of fraud and Medicare violations, including 14 felonies) -- has introduced its own bills aimed at weakening labor unions. First is a bill similar to one under consideration in Maine that will ban the government from automatically collecting union dues. The purpose of this is to make people leave the unions, under the assumption that while unions will still fight for the rights of workers, the people can reap the benefits without having to actually support the unions financially. The second bill will force the unions to tell the members every year what they must do to decertify their union -- in other words, the unions will be forced to tell the members how to destroy their unions. This one is a classic. Scott yesterday signed a bill implementing merit pay for teachers while eliminating tenure for new hires and he is pushing a bill that will privatize public hospitals.

Believe it or not, it gets worse than this. Perhaps the champion of them all is Governor John Kasich of Ohio, the former Fox News right-wing pundit. In Ohio, a bill has passed the Senate and looks to pass the House that will restrict the rights of over 350,000 public sector union members there. At least Kasich is more consistent than Walker -- he doesn't care which unions supported him, he is all in favor of ruining them all. Including the police and firefighter unions! Now some may say that Kasich is really just doing his best to cut the deficit, but those who make that argument then must deal with the fact that Kasich just gave his new chief of staff a healthy pay increase over the previous Governor's chief of staff of about 40% to $175,000. His reason for this is that you must pay and pay well to attract people from the private sector into the public sector. You see, Kasich says basically that union members are overpaid, lazy slobs and don't deserve what they're making, but in some cases (as long as it suits him) they actually need to make more!

I haven't even gone into Michigan, Arizona, South Carolina, Colorado and a few other states yet. This is just the tip of the iceberg. The only good things I'm really seeing about all this is that 1) it is definitely opening the eyes of the voters (the governor and legislature approval ratings are dropping precipitously in all these states); and 2) the Democratic base is beginning to be galvanized, after meekly sitting on the sidelines in 2010. Let's hope so. Someone has to do something to stop these con men before the middle class is completely destroyed.

Shared sacrifices

Why does it seem that the Republican's idea of a "shared sacrifice" is for the middle class to give up more and more in benefits, services, etc. while the wealthy folks and the corporations sacrifice by getting huge tax cuts? Why does Scott Walker believe that the "shared sacrifice" in Wisconsin is for the public sector unions to give up their collective bargaining rights in addition to the concessions they've already made in order to solve a budget "crisis" that he helped to create with his tax cuts for the wealthy and the corporations?

Oh yeah....it's because they're all bought and paid for by corporate America. As for the bottom 98%, good freakin' luck....you know, get to work and all that. Pull yourselves up by your own bootstraps. I guess you better pull yourself up, because you sure as hell aren't going to get a job if you don't already have one, and if you're a union member don't count on keeping that job too long unless you're willing to give up everything your union has gained over the past 80 or so years...

A couple of late night thoughts

It's late and I just feel like getting a couple of things out there into the ether. On Thursday I'm planning to write more about Wisconsin, Scott Walker, John Kasich and Ronald Reagan, but tonight I just want to make a couple of points.

First, bravo to the Obama administration and the Department of Justice for the announcement that they will no longer defend the DOMA in appellate court. I can't help but think this is the beginning of the end for DOMA, an act that along with Don't Ask Don't Tell has always seemed to me to be both unconstitutional and repellent in its discrimination against roughly 10% of the American public. The right has already begun its assault on this decision, with that harridan Monica Crowley leading the way on Fox calling Obama "Mubarak Obama" and stating that this is a dictatorial decision by the administration. This only leads me to believe that Crowley needs to get a dictionary and try to find out what the word "dictatorial" actually means, because it's pretty apparent that she doesn't understand it right now.

Next, the Presidential election of 2012. Which Republican is actually going to try to run? One would think by their rhetoric that the Republicans would be lining up to face a socialist dictator who by their account is the most unpopular President in history, but the early frontrunners already seem to be dropping out. John Thune, that handsome dude from South Dakota? Nope. Mike Pence, that erstwhile defender of liberty from Indiana? Says he ain't gonna try. Let's see -- who else is out there. Oh yeah. Chris Christie, Anne Coulter's dream of a boy toy. Will he run? According to him he will commit suicide before running, just to convince people that he's not running. Who does that leave now? Mitt Romney, the plastic master of change (he can change his opinion in an instant depending on which way the political wind is blowing) who got slaughtered just two years ago? Mike Huckabee, the evolution denier who tries to come across as somewhat moderate -- a stance that disappears upon any close appraisal of his policies and words? Newt Gingrich? Give me a break.

Nope, none of those could possibly beat Obama and I believe they all know it. Who does that leave? Please, please, by all that's holy, let the last two candidates I can think of please run. That's right, ex-Governor half-term, Sarah Palin, and crazy lady who seems to have frostbite of the brain, Michele Bachmann. If she were to actually run and be forced to face actual reporters at some point and not just the droids at Fox, Palin's approval rating by November 2012 would probably hover at somewhere around 15%. And is there really even anything to say about someone who believes that Glenn Beck can solve the nation's financial crisis? Enough said....although if anyone in the country would be happier than me for Presidential runs by these two idiots, it could only be Jon Stewart and the writing staff at Saturday Night Live.

I'll be back later with my thoughts on Walker and labor, particularly regarding the influence Ronald Reagan has had on them. For now, good night.