A Solid Endorsement

I have as many problems with Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) as Andrew Sullivan and am not with him on as many issues, but he was right on the Iraq War and the Patriot Act. He's not a liar, he's not a GOP/FOX grifter and he's not an authoritarian. I've said for a long time that he would be the smartest nomination the Republicans could make, a real statement that would crystallize issues.

It's a little scary that Sullivan has written his endorsement so well today, just as he did for Obama four years ago, the first such endorsement I saw and the piece of writing that influenced me to really look at Obama, take him seriously as a candidate. Hopefully, we stay the course for four more years. Obama's the best Republican President since Eisenhower, and I'm hoping since Theodore Roosevelt by the end of his second term.

Here's a few key paragraphs that I agree with:

And I see in Paul none of the resentment that burns in Gingrich or the fakeness that defines Romney or the fascistic strains in Perry's buffoonery. He has yet to show the Obama-derangement of his peers, even though he differs with him. He has now gone through two primary elections without compromising an inch of his character or his philosophy. This kind of rigidity has its flaws, but, in the context of the Newt Romney blur, it is refreshing. He would never take $1.8 million from Freddie Mac. He would never disown Reagan, as Romney once did. He would never speak of lynching Bernanke, as Perry threatened. When he answers a question, you can see that he is genuinely listening to it and responding - rather than searching, Bachmann-like, for the one-liner to rouse the base. He is, in other words, a decent fellow, and that's an adjective I don't use lightly. We need more decency among Republicans.

And on some core issues, he is right. He is right that spending - especially on entitlements and defense - is way out of control. Unlike his peers, he had the balls to say so when Bush and Cheney were wrecking the country's finances, and rendering us close to helpless when the Great Recession came bearing down. Alas, he lacks the kind of skills at compromise, moderation and restraint that once defined conservatism and now seems entirely reserved for liberals. But who else in this field would? Romney would have to prove his base cred for his entire presidency. Gingrich is a radical utopian and supremely nasty fantasist.

I don't believe Romney or Gingrich would cut entitlements as drastically as Paul. But most important, I don't believe that any of the other candidates, except perhaps Huntsman, would cut the military-industrial complex as deeply as it needs to be cut. What Paul understands - and it's why he has so much young support - is that the world has changed. Seeking global hegemony in a world of growing regional powers among developing nations is a fool's game, destined to provoke as much backlash as lash, and financially disastrous as every failed empire in history has shown.

I'm supremely grateful to Rep. Paul that he's not an Obama-hater. He's a gent, which is more than I can say for every other GOP Presidential candidate, other than Gov. Jon Huntsman (who should keep spending as little as possible in his training run in prep for 2016). Romney is establishment trash, with no vision for running a compelling campaign, let alone a Presidency. And Gingrich is anti-establishment trash, all for him, grifter class. His hypocrisy has more integrity than Romney's. It's like Tony Soprano -- this is what he does.

Obama-Paul. A tighter race than either Willard or Newton?

Iowa Crazy

Another GOP Presidential debate, on the eve of the non-binding Iowa Straw Poll (it's not even the Caucus) and the entry of Texas hard-right religious conservative Republican Rick Perry into the nomination race.

This group - Romney, Bachmann, Pawlety, Gingrich, Paul, Santorum, Cain and (premiere debate appearance by) Huntsman - are so out in right field that the non-Fox cable news networks are all just outright calling them crazy. The only thing that holds that party together, all the different constituencies, is Grover Norquist, quite and accomplishment. No new taxes, less taxes, no taxes. One way ticket. To hell. Even when offered the hypothetical of 10:1 cuts:taxes increases, by a show of hands not a one of them, not even someone supposedly "moderate" like John Huntsman, would take the deal. Because the Republican Party completely is i-n-s-a-n-e:



Dangerous people. It's time to state as a fact that the Republican Party as it now stands is hellbent on destroying what's left of the social fabric of America through their very staunchness on social issues and, more importantly, taxes. They are fine with letting the wealthy get it all. And, historically, it is when the selfishness of elites hits critical mass that great states spiral into decline. It doesn't have to be that way...but it is.

This crew is so crazy that the Democrats sent out a mass email tonight telling everyone to watch the debate. It's that terrifying. Not a single one would raise a penny of taxes on or cut tax breaks for the rich. Even though America wants Congress to tax the rich.

In the sane world, Obama has pivoted to jobs, and is asking the nation to call their Congressional Representative to do so as well.

Really?

President Obama is doing a Tina Fey/Seth Meyer routine on the GOP, as is the majority sane side of the country, those for whom nation is more important than party. Damned if Obama didn't put more on the table than any reasonable man should have had to, and the prissy Republicans turned down what they and their Teafaction had always said they wanted -- to cut the deficit. Only they refuse to return to the Clinton Prosperity levels of income taxation because it mean more of it would come from the rich. As if that's a bad thing.

The wealthy sometimes create jobs. Sometimes here, sometimes overseas, sometimes they just buy more T-bills, which the GOP is holding hostage to default on. Default on money already spent. By them 2000-2008 and the lower revenue levels through 2012.

The twin lies of their economic narrative fall flat now that our nation's President has publicly admitted that the compromise he seeks, the Grand Bargain to cut $4 trillion over the next whatever years, will cause trouble for him with members of his own party. But he's willing to take the heat -- as long as the other side takes theirs go.

"I will not sign a 30-day or a 60-day or a 90-day extension. That is just not an acceptable approach. And if we think it's hard now, imagine how these guys are going to be thinking six months from now in the middle of election season when they are all up. It's not going to get easier, it's going to get harder. So, we might as well do it now. Pull off the band-aid. Eat our peas. Now is the time to do it. If not now, when? We keep on talking about this stuff, and we have these high-minded pronouncements about how we've got to get control of the deficit, how we owe it to our children and our grandchildren. Well, let's step up. Let's do it."

The GOP aren't negotiating. It's beyond hostage-taking. It's their own Dr. Strangelove Doomsday Machine, their impossible logic of having drawn in the most extreme rightwing elements of political America in order to win elections, only to end up fearing for their primaries.

The question is whether they have a jujitsu move to somehow make a deal while screwing the other 80% of America who say Tax the Rich, or at least eliminate their private aircraft deduction. But if they don't, per Jonathan Rauch (subbing for Andrew Sullivan), this is Obama's moment and the Democrats to come:

I'll always remember the moment in 1995 when I realized that Newt Gingrich's Republican Revolutionaries had gone too far. As you recall, they, like the current bunch, were freshly elected hotheads who thought they had a mandate to get tough with Big Government and believed they could hammer a weak Democratic president into submission. One day my father, a conservative independent who until then had shown little sympathy for Bill Clinton, looked up from his paper, having just read about House Republicans' musing that they might default on the national debt if Clinton didn't knuckle under. "These people," he said, "are dangerous."

Republicans ought to remember that nothing would whisk them back to long-term minority status faster than being perceived by the broad middle as unfit to govern. Obama clearly understands as much and is doing everything in his power to broadcast tough reasonableness. He's setting the Republicans up for another Hurricane Katrina moment—but one of their own making.

I think when all the state layoffs hit, particularly in the new GOP governorships, there will be hell to pay. Layoffs is layoffs, and they did it so fast, they'll still be in office for two or four years while the state is hurting.

Somebody game this out for me -- if the GOP don't raise the debt and the economy tanks, maybe the world economy collapses, what could possibly be their strategy for winning in 2012: Obama didn't assent to our demands, so we shot the hostage?

Really?

Michele Nightmare

Matt Taibbi has the brutal truth about serial liar and Oral Roberts University-trained extreme rightwinger, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN). The article is a must-read, with passages like:

Bachmann is a religious zealot whose brain is a raging electrical storm of divine visions and paranoid delusions. She believes that the Chinese are plotting to replace the dollar bill, that light bulbs are killing our dogs and cats, and that God personally chose her to become both an IRS attorney who would spend years hounding taxpayers and a raging anti-tax Tea Party crusader against big government. She kicked off her unofficial presidential campaign in New Hampshire, by mistakenly declaring it the birthplace of the American Revolution. "It's your state that fired the shot that was heard around the world!" she gushed. "You are the state of Lexington and Concord, you started the battle for liberty right here in your backyard."

And:

The theme of socialists scheming to herd children into a factorylike system of predetermined occupations still comes up often in Bachmann's rhetoric. In a recent speech in Iowa, for instance, she talked wistfully of the early Midwest settled by her Norwegian ancestors, a place where "we can choose whatever profession we want, and no one tells us what profession we go in." Bachmann likewise rejected AmeriCorps as an attempt to build "re-education camps for young people, where young people have to go and get trained in a philosophy that the government puts forward," and blasted a schools program started by Bill Clinton for trying to brainwash kids into accepting "government central planning of our economy and our way of life."

And more ominously:

It has taken just over 10 years for Bachmann to go from small-town PTA maven to serious presidential contender, a testament to both her rare and unerring talent for generating media attention, and to her truly astonishing energy level and narcissistic tenacity. Minnesota politicians who have squared off against Bachmann all speak with a kind of horrified reverence for her martial indomitability, her brilliantly fortifying lack of self-doubt, even the fact that she hasn't appeared to physically age at all in 10 years. "She will not stop," says Cecconi.

She's currently running very close to former Massachusetts Mitt Romney for the Republican Presidential nomination and could steal the Iowa Caucus crown -- the neighbor state of Minnesota and her birthstate. Bachmann is fervently anti-choice and anti-gay, and known for pathological lying to bolster her wingnut arguments (the list is huge).

Like a more focused version of Sarah Palin (and one who I believe is already eclipsing Word Salad Sarah, making her seem obsolete literally this week), she's telegenic as she relentlessly mangles history for her truthiness needs. With her mistaken comparison of herself to serial killer John Wayne Gacy today in Iowa, it was actually unintentionally hilarious:

What I want them to know is just like John Wayne was from Waterloo, Iowa, that's the spirit that I have too. It's really about not being ashamed of America. It's embracing America.

Uh, Michele, the John Wayne from Waterloo, Iowa isn't the John Wayne you're thinking of. It's John Wayne Gacy, one of the most notorious serial killers in American history.

Yes, the serial killer responsible for over thirty sexualized murders and was known for dressing in a clown suit at children's parties.

I'll leave the metaphor to you, valued reader.

Pink Elephants

If arch-Conservative and Tea Party opportunist Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) is somehow the winner of last night's Republican Presidential debate in New Hampshire, that's kind of all you need to know.

The debate was filled with lies and ideology masquerading as "fact" most heinously about our very tame and considered healthcare reform legislation (and I promise to take a positive look at the first GOoPer candidate who calls it by its proper name, the Affordable Care Act, and eschews the manufactured misnomer, "Obamacare"), and just plain surreal candidates positions for 2011:



You want to know what's really going on that these clowns aren't addressing with any real programs, new thinking, anything other than platitudes and service to the wealthy:



Are any of these GOoPers serious about anything other than their own lust for money or power? Because they are not acting like they want to advance civilization, they want to firmly ensconce it in corporate feudalism, enforced with a layer of religious legislation.

And don't talk to me about Romney. He brings up jobs to bash Obama but admits he has no ideas or programs in mind of his own. He's just the CEO with the privatization mantra, that worked so well under Bush. Hey, he'll do Bush and Brownie one better.

Dude's ready to privatize FEMA.

Mitch Daniels: Not Insane

As always, as The Firesign Theater taught us, we should vote for someone who is not insane to be our President. And since you have to be at least slightly insane to want to be President of the United States of America, maybe in a narcissistic vein, it appears that Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, in declaring he would not seek the 2012 Republican Presidential nomination, may actually be sane:

What could have been a complicated decision was in the end very simple: on matters affecting us all, our family constitution gives a veto to the women's caucus, and there is no override provision. Simply put, I find myself caught between two duties. I love my country; I love my family more.

It doesn't get much saner than that. And it'll be interesting to see Conservative reaction -- family values, to be sure, but also not the most masculine, authoritarian, John Wayne statement. Publicly admits to his wife having veto power of his career. Sound evolved to me, may sound whipped to others.

Former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, however, is clearly insane:

"The truth is, our country's in big trouble. We have far too much debt, too much government spending, and too few jobs. We need a president who understands that our problems are deep, and who has the courage to face them. President Obama doesn't -- I do.

"Tomorrow, my first campaign stop will be in Iowa. And that's where I'm going to begin a campaign that tells the American people the truth. I'm Tim Pawlenty, and I'm running for President of the United States."

I look forward to watching Gov. Pawlenty's courage being tested in the campaign.

That crazy nut.

Who Wouldn't Be?

The Colorado GOP Chairman bails.

Corruption Again

Did you know that the controversial anti-immigration law passed in Arizona this year was the product of lobbying by the private prison industry?

Did you know that the BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico was primarily due to Halliburton's use of sub-standard cement?

Did you know that Tea Partiers don't know why they oppose things like Attorney General Eric Holder, they just do as they're told by their Fox News masters?

More to look forward to when the GOP takes the House.

Fascist State Ahead?

Here's an essential read by Sara Robinson on where the Tea Party may be taking us, "Fascist America: Is This Election The Next Turn?" A taste:

Paxton defined fascism as:

...a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.

Paxton laid out the five basic lifecycle stages of successful fascist movements. In the first stage, a mature industrial state facing some kind of crisis breeds a new, rural movement that's based on nationalist renewal...

...In the second stage, the movement takes root, turns into a real political party, and seizes a seat at the table. Success at this stage, Paxton writes, "depends on certain relatively precise conditions: the weakness of a liberal state, whose inadequacies condemn the nation to disorder, decline, or humiliation; and political deadlock because the Right, the heir to power but unable to continue to wield it alone, refuses to accept a growing Left as a legitimate governing partner..."

...In the face of this deadlock, the corporate elites forge an alliance with rural nationalists, creating an unholy marriage that, if it continues, will soon breed a fascist state. And, of course, this is precisely what's happening now between the Koch Brothers, the oil companies, Americans for Prosperity, and the Tea Party.

Robinson goes on to lay out possible outcomes. Meanwhile, Harold Meyerson does the best job I've yet seen explaining why the Tea Partiers are exactly 180% wrong on the cause of our current problems and how to "get back" to the 1950's America they seem to idolize:

In the worldview of the American right -- and the polling shows conclusively that that's who the Tea Party is -- the nation, misled by President Obama, has gone down the path to socialism. In fact, far from venturing down that road, we've been stuck on the road to hyper-capitalism for three decades now. The Tea Partyers are right to be wary of income redistribution, but if they had even the slightest openness to empiricism, they'd see that the redistribution of the past 30 years has all been upward -- radically upward. From 1950 through 1980, the share of all income in America going to the bottom 90 percent of Americans -- effectively, all but the rich -- increased from 64 percent to 65 percent, according to an analysis of tax data by economists Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez. Because the nation's economy was growing handsomely, that means that the average income of Americans in the bottom 90 percent was growing, too -- from $17,719 in 1950 to $30,941 in 1980 -- a 75 percent increase in income in constant 2008 dollars.

Since 1980, it's been a very different story. The economy has continued to grow handsomely, but for the bottom 90 percent of Americans, it's been a time of stagnation and loss. Since 1980, the share of all income in America going to the bottom 90 percent has declined from 65 percent to 52 percent. In actual dollars, the average income of Americans in the bottom 90 percent flat-lined -- going from the $30,941 of 1980 to $31,244 in 2008.

In short, the economic life and prospects for Americans since the Reagan Revolution have grown dim, while the lives of the rich -- the super-rich in particular -- have never been brighter. The share of income accruing to America's wealthiest 1 percent rose from 9 percent in 1974 to a tidy 23.5 percent in 2007.

Try telling the Tea Party ideologues that it was the New Deal that created the mid-century prosperity they crave, while it was Reaganomics that took it away. But we've all known people in our lives who were passionately committed to the wrong information.

Too bad when that ardor means they may win control of our U.S. Congress.

Nutjob

You can keep your Christine O'Donnell, your Sharon Angle. The biggest nutjob rigthwing woman is Victoria Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas:

In a voice mail message left at 7:31 a.m. on Oct. 9, a Saturday, Virginia Thomas asked her husband’s former aide-turned-adversary to make amends. Ms. Hill played the recording, from her voice mail at Brandeis University, for The New York Times.

“Good morning Anita Hill, it’s Ginni Thomas,” it said. “I just wanted to reach across the airwaves and the years and ask you to consider something. I would love you to consider an apology sometime and some full explanation of why you did what you did with my husband.”

Ms. Thomas went on: “So give it some thought. And certainly pray about this and hope that one day you will help us understand why you did what you did. O.K., have a good day.”

In Jewish parlance, we call this chutzpah. If not meshugenah. Where does Virginia Thomas get the gall to dig up Professor Hill's office number and leave her such a disrespectful message at 7:30am?

For the record, Ms. Hill said she's stands by her Senate hearing testimony regarding Thomas' inappropriate sexual remarks and pornographic movie references when she worked for him.

Virginia Thomas is a classic contemporary wingnut looking for her share of publicity:

Mrs. Thomas is a founder of a new nonprofit group, Liberty Central, which opposes what she has characterized as the leftist "tyranny" of the Obama administration and congressional Democrats.

She was a keynote speaker earlier this month in Richmond, Va., at a state convention billed as the largest tea party event ever.

God help us. But if her intention was to get in the cable news discussion, it seems to have backfired:

Ginni Thomas canceled her appearance on NPR’s and WBUR’s On Point — scheduled a week in advance — at the last minute. The interview would have lasted 20 minutes and aired nationally. Thomas’ publicist said she had a “scheduling conflict.”

“I’m horribly, horribly sorry,” the publicist said in an e-mail.

The producers “worked tirelessly” to book Thomas for a conversation about her very public involvement in the Tea Party, said John Wihbey, a producer.

Leave it to Andy Borowitz to offer on The New Yorker site, "Three Things to Do When Clarence Thomas' Wife Calls You":

1. Start apologizing the moment you hear her voice. Remember, like a bear at a campsite, Virginia Thomas does not want to eat you, she’s only after your food, and in this case, your apology is the only thing protecting you from Mrs. Thomas mauling you to death. If apologizing does not work, clap your hands loudly into the receiver in the hopes of scaring her away.
   
   
2. When she says, “This is Virginia Thomas,” reply, “No, this is Virginia Thomas. Who’s calling? Wait a minute—is that you, Anita Hill?” When she denies being Anita Hill (and she will), say, “There you go again, with your infernal lies. This is like Clarence’s confirmation hearings all over again. You disgust me, Anita Hill.” With any luck, accusing her of being Anita Hill will disorient her long enough for you to summon help.
   
   
3. Get in the habit of answering your phone, “Long Dong Silver residence."

And if you feel like I do, sign here for Clarence to apologize to Anita.

Thank Glenn

Byron Williams, a 45-year-old ex-felon, exploded onto the national stage in the early morning hours of July 18.

According to a police investigation, Williams opened fire on California Highway Patrol officers who had stopped him on an Oakland freeway for driving erratically. For 12 frantic minutes, Williams traded shots with the police, employing three firearms and a small arsenal of ammunition, including armor-piercing rounds fired from a .308-caliber rifle.

...

In an affidavit, an Oakland police investigator reported that during an interview at the hospital, Williams "stated that his intention was to start a revolution by traveling to San Francisco and killing people of importance at the Tides Foundation and the ACLU."

What or who could possibly drive a man to such evil?

"I would have never started watching Fox News if it wasn't for the fact that Beck was on there. And it was the things that he did, it was the things he exposed that blew my mind." - Byron Williams

Yep - Beck targeted the Tides Foundation on his show.

Co-conspirator?

Burn Her?

There's an old saying in politics that when you smear an opponent with a lie, they have to waste time and oxygen defending against it, pulling themselves off message.

But how about when a politician (or an endlessly aspiring one) does it to herself? Like Delaware Republican Senate nominee Christine O'Donnell who, years ago on Bill Maher's Politically Incorrect, talked about dabbling in witchcraft even more years ago. And how she (and her campaign) perceives so much real danger that maybe she'll lose her core (nutbag) supporters that she opens her campaign ad by denying that she's a witch:



I'm wondering if the ad might have the opposite effect and, instead of neutralizing the witch-fear, actually stoke it. After all, it's all too pat how she denies her witchhood, then switches the subject to make it seem that she's "just like you." Hell, I'm not a witch!

And I don't have secret information that I can't reveal about China taking over the U.S., either.

Down at the Saloon

Wild west time in four states where the NRA has enough GOoPers in the legislature to make it legal to bring your (permitted) handgun into any bar or restaurant. One must be reminded:

“Guns and alcohol don’t mix; that’s the bottom line,” said Michael Drescher, a spokesman for Governor Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, a Democrat, who vetoed the bill but was overridden by the legislature.

So far there's been one patron who shot himself in the foot while drinking. Can't wait for the shootouts!

Something in the Tea

What are they lacing that tea with? And why are the 'bagger candidates trying to hide their own views?

Maybe to try and actually get elected?

Chris Matthews calls out Alabama Congressional 'bagger candidate Rick Barber, picking up on his lying "metaphor" defense of his inflammatory insurrectionist ad:

But Matthews also grilled Barber on the language used in his campaign ad, during which he references taxation "without representation" and a George Washington character says "gather your armies."

When Matthews asked who Barber intended to gather his armies against, the candidate claimed it was a metaphor for "political armies."

"He's wearing a military uniform and says 'gather your armies' and you're saying that's a metaphor?" Matthews asked.

"Chris, do you know what a metaphor is? Do you know what hyperbole is?" Barber shot back.

"Are you a metaphor for a guy running for office?" Matthews asked. "Or are you a real candidate?"

Also speaking metaphorically is Rand Paul, 'bagger candidate for Senate in Kentucky:

"In the latter days of Rome, the economy was crumbling, the emperor ... would placate the mob with bread and circus - food and entertainment to placate them since the economy was in shambles and dwindling around them," Paul told several hundred people gathered for the rally in a Bullitt County park.

"Now in our country, as our economy is in shambles, they give us Cash for Clunkers and a stimulus check and they tell us to go to the mall and spend your money and everything will be OK ... That's not how you become prosperous as an individual or a country," he told the crowd of supporters.

...

Following the 14-minute speech, he brushed past a gaggle of television and print reporters and climbed into a sport-utility vehicle without answering questions - except to acknowledge that despite his call for term limits, he would not voluntarily impose one on himself.

His campaign manager, Jesse Benton, said he had to get back to Bowling Green for a family birthday party.

Benton said Paul uses the fall of Rome as an analogy to explain the country's current economic situation.

"Rand is deeply concerned about the debt and unsustainable overspending in our country," Benton said in a statement. "He uses Rome as a metaphor to show that great nations can fall if they are not vigilant in protecting their traditions. He believes that millions of Kentuckians share that same concern."

So helping out the auto industry in a time of crisis...is like letting lose Christians in an arena to fight lions?

Then there's Sharon Angle, who beat that chicken lady to run against Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid as the 'bagger candidate in Nevada. Angle, often the lone dissenting vote in otherwise unanimous votes in the state assembly, has publicly called for the elimination of both the federal Department of Education and Department of Energy, the complete privatization or elimination of Social Security, and any offshore drilling regulations. In an attempt to keep her from sounding like a total moron, while making her a stealth 'baggercandidate, her website has been scrubbed and either outright contradictions of her opinions or...metaphors?...added instead:

Asked about the website alterations, the National Republican Senatorial Committee said that it was a normal upgrade for any candidate transitioning into a general election.

"Many campaigns revamp and re-launch enhanced websites over the course of an election season," said NRSC spokesman Brian Walsh. "Sharron Angle's positions have not changed though and she remains committed to reversing the economically disastrous policies of Harry Reid while offering Nevada the fiscally responsible leadership they deserve."

But even if the revisions offered to Angle's record don't represent position changes (though with respect to offshore drilling, a clear change was made), they do reflect a decidedly tone-downed candidate. No longer does her bio list the endorsement from the "birther" organization, "Declaration Alliance PAC." Gone, likewise, is her call for "free market alternatives" to Social Security as that system is "transitioned out." In its place is a short section that calls for the country to "keep the promise" of Social Security and redeem the IOUs.

There are other obvious changes that, under normal circumstances, would seem like drastic attempts to dilute a legislative platform. Angle no longer refers to a cap and trade proposal as "unscientific hysteria over the man-caused global warming hoax" that stepped "over the constitutional boundaries of the federal government and is merely another way to tax the people."

As for her reference to the United Nations as an institution "captured by the far left and has become ineffective and costly," that's gone too.

Her new website does not, like the old one, call for abolishing the "67,000-pages of IRS code," or for making the "death tax cuts permanent." Nor does it mention her proposal to require that a "supermajority two-thirds requirement" be instituted for passing tax increases.

It's even scarier that they're covering it up...imagine if she gets in.

Interestingly enough, a Republican who I never before considered "moderate" but who has been heckled by 'baggers, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has come out with some truth likely to get him in further hot water:

In a previous conversation, Graham told me: "The problem with the Tea Party, I think it's just unsustainable because they can never come up with a coherent vision for governing the country. It will die out." Now he said, in a tone of casual lament: "We don't have a lot of Reagan-type leaders in our party. Remember Ronald Reagan Democrats? I want a Republican that can attract Democrats." Chortling, he added, "Ronald Reagan would have a hard time getting elected as a Republican today."

Next thing you know, those tea hunters will have bagged him as prey.

Stupid TV

It's not just Faux News but they lead the pack. I'd say America is stupid, but it's not really the people, per the calls in this video compilation, it's the pundolts:

Mission accomplished.

The Truth of the Moment

I've been predicting this for months, ever since the healthcare reform bill passed, that any poll numbers pointing to outsized GOP gains in the November election would erode by that time. Once the lefties had time to get over their wounds on the reform not being as lefty as they'd have liked, once the actual candidates became better known, once it became clear that the President and Dems had delivered on most of their promises, once Obama started campaigning, once America began seeing the Tea Partiers irrevocably subverting the Republican Party.

Dana Milbank has the goods, and the best piece I've ever seen from him -- worth reading in full, but here's a taste:

Future historians tracing the crackup of the Republican Party may well look to May 8, 2010, as an inflection point.

That was the day, as is now well known, that Sen. Robert Bennett, who took the conservative position 84 percent of the time over his career, was deemed not conservative enough by fellow Utah Republicans and booted out of the primary.

Less well known, but equally ominous, is what happened that same day, 2,500 miles east in Maine. There, the state Republican Party chucked its platform -- a sensible New England mix of free-market economics and conservation -- and adopted a manifesto of insanity: abolishing the Federal Reserve, calling global warming a "myth," sealing the border, and, as a final plank, fighting "efforts to create a one world government.

...

In the Alabama gubernatorial race, a conservative attack ad charged that a Republican gubernatorial candidate "recently said the Bible is only partially true." The outraged candidate reaffirmed his "belief that this world and everything in it is a masterpiece created by the hands of God."

In Utah, just a couple of days after Bennett's fall, conservative Rep. Jason Chaffetz talked about trying to topple none other than Sen. Orrin Hatch (89 percent lifetime conservative rating) in 2012.

In Arizona, Sen. John McCain, who once said a fence is the "least effective" way to secure the border, continued his fight against a conservative primary challenge by releasing an ad demanding, "Complete the danged fence."

Democrats are having purity putsches, too, in Arkansas, Pennsylvania and Colorado. But these are mild compared with the sort of uprising Republicans are experiencing in places such as Maine, tranquil land of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow...

This is the fruit of the Ronald Reagan deal with the Far Right religious bloc and the California Birchers. The conspiracy theorists on the Left are in abeyance, the Democratic Party led by the calmest President since Eisenhower (and his daughter endorsed Obama), but on the Right they are in the process of completely hijacking the Republican Party. There's no common-sensors from New England coming to save the day; they just lost their very own convention.

It's like Dick Armey, who's FreedomWorks is behind much of the teabaggin' organizing, has his own political party. But the grassroots side of it is the biggest incursion of terrified, angry and self-righteous reactionary force into contemporary politics since the reaction to the Civil Rights Movement, the Dick Nixon Southern Strategy. If this works, if these Beck-blinded psychos get control of the House, Senate or, God-forbid, White House, you can rewind America thirty-odd years.

With this in mind, I say it's time for the Dems to toss out some of their old and put some of our own worthy anti-incumbents in place. Joe Sestak should defeat Arlen Specter in the Pennsylvania Senate Primary. Arkansas Dem voters should replace Sen. Blanche Lincoln with candidate Bill Halter. In an anti-incumbency election, fresh blood where weakest.

Then see which way America goes.

Bonus video: Sneak preview of the winning campaign theme:

What the Cluck?

Nutjob Sue Lowden, the GOoPer in Nevada who thinks -- or maybe thought, until this week -- that she's going to replace Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, made the notorious chicken barter for medical services comment that has now morphed into meme.

And website -- convert your chickens to appendectomies here.

Not so incidentally, it turns out that Lowden is an anti-union employer with a history of cutting health insurance benefits:

When Sue Lowden headed the Santa Fe hotel-casino, management forced a group of workers to shift to part-time status and sign away their health care coverage, said a judge who ruled the company violated fair labor practices. He ordered the Santa Fe to pay two dozen employees almost $188,000 in back wages and benefits and to reinstate three workers who lost their jobs, records show.

The 1990s case, which involved a bitter war between the unions that tried to organize Santa Fe workers and casino executives Sue and Paul Lowden who fought the effort, is at the heart of the latest attack on the Republican U.S. Senate candidate by incumbent Sen. Harry Reid's campaign.

The Lowdens lost the case in court but sold the joint so workers all had to reapply for their jobs anyway. Then they continued their anti-worker ways:

The Reid campaign has dug into financial reports of the Lowden family gaming company, Archon Corp., to undercut her business experience. Annual reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission show Paul Lowden, as Archon chief executive officer, was paid $200,000 in bonuses in 2004 and again last year when the Archon-run Pioneer Hotel & Gambling Hall in Laughlin dropped 106 employees and stopped matching employee contributions to their 401k accounts.

Sue Lowden, who is executive vice president, secretary and treasurer of Archon, responded by saying she did not sit on the compensation committee that made those decisions.

Yep, another Republican politico masquerading as for the people, when all they're really for is themselves and their cronies.

Has she met Meg yet?

News Alert

Cable newsman does his job!

COOPER: You told our producer you voted for this because you get a lot of calls from constituents with questions based on things they have read on the Internet.

I mean, isn't it your job as a leader to actually lead, not to throw up your hands and say, well, who knows what's real or not on the Internet, to actually say, well, actually, you know, Hawaii has released this information, and it's factually correct?

ASH: Well, as I said, I haven't personally investigated that. But I -- I think that, if -- if...

COOPER: But, I mean, there's plenty of things you believe that you have not personally investigated.

ASH: That's true.

COOPER: Why, this, are you holding onto?

ASH: Well, what we're requiring here is for a -- a presidential candidate to demonstrate he is qualified.

And I don't think having any presidential candidate -- candidate show that he's qualified by demonstrating the requirements of the requirements, that there's any problem with that.

COOPER: You told my producer you thought the president spent a million dollars fighting the release of his birth certificate, and then that raised concerns for you.

(CROSSTALK)

ASH: That's what I have heard. As I said, it...

COOPER: Right. But that's not -- you know that's actually not true?

ASH: I -- I don't know that that's not true. As I said, I haven't studied it. You get a lot of information on the Internet. As you know, much of it is inaccurate.

It goes on -- brilliant stuff. Stupid Cecil Ash of Arizona. There's no talking to Ash or people like him -- Cooper tries, but facts don't count, just manufactured radical rightwing controversies designed to dehumanize and de-legitimize a winner they don't like, and the perverted political pandering that follows.

Shame on the stupid/racist/reactionary birthers, but greater shame on any morally corrupt enablers in the Republican Party -- like those making up the majority in the Arizona state legislature.

From either angle: pure evil.

Chickens for Cancer

Not to be too facetious but Nevada GOP Senate candidate Sue Lowden is suggesting that we repeal health care reform and go back to barter for medical treatment:

"And I would have suggested, and I think that bartering is really good. Those doctors who you pay cash, you can barter, and that would get prices down in a hurry. And I would say go out, go ahead out and pay cash for whatever your medical needs are, and go ahead and barter with your doctor."

Is this a woman who's lived without health insurance and had any kind of serious medical issues in her adult life? Does she really think that there's enough barter out there to pay for, say, breast cancer treatment?

She also suggests socking away $20,000 in a health savings account. Again, does she have any sense of what catastrophic medical treatment costs?

What's crazy is that she doubles down today on a local news show:



My favorite line: "I'm telling you this works." Sure, back in the 1860's.

Look, my father was an OB-GYN, and we had some pretty incredible artwork and craft items around the house from some barter deals he did with patients who were cash-strapped artists back in the 1960's and 1970's, maybe even into the 1980's. It was a very small percentage of his business, and he was actually instrumental in forming a regional doctors-owned HMO that went in direct competition with the big corporate outsider HMO. So I get that there's always room for other types of transactions between individuals.

A chicken, we'd have no need for. Well, maybe if it came plucked.

Scary thought: this removed-from-reality woman could end up replacing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

And that would be a bum deal.

Still More Hate

How angry (and dangerous) are the conservatives? Well, you've got a doctor in Florida who has hung a sign on his door saying that if you voted for Obama, don't bother returning as one of his patients. F'real. Then you've got a conservative group threatening thirty governors to leave office within three days or be removed. Ominous.

Best of all, you have Erick Erickson, radical rightwing editor of the litmus-test conservative RedState blog, who was inexplicably hired by CNN to provide "balance" (to who, Mother Theresa?), and threatened shotgun violence against U.S. Census workers on his radio show yesterday:

I’m not filling out this form. I dare them to try and come throw me in jail. I
dare them to. Pull out my wife’s shotgun and see how that little ACS twerp likes
being scared at the door. They’re not going on my property. They can’t do that.
They don’t have the legal right, and yet they’re trying.

Nice way to break telegraph breaking the law, Erick. Anyone care to wager now long before CNN puts him on waivers?