Go GREEN---recycle Congress.
That’s the latest quip floating around on Facebook. But, really thinking about it, this might well be good advice. Since our present Congress has repeatedly demonstrated that they are incapable of performing their duties, maybe it is time to replace them. Were this a business, and we had hired a crew to perform some tasks, and they proved incompetent or venal or just plain stupid, we would fire them and go look for replacements.
Of course there is a down side to this. What might we get as replacements? When we were discussing local elections, my old Daddy gave me some sound advice. He said “Boy, always vote for the incumbent. He has already stolen all he’s going to get. A replacement would have to start fresh, and it would cost more in the long run.” What we might get as replacements could be a major disappointment.
I am constantly amazed at some of the statements coming from the dingbats. Now they are attributing “mystical powers” to President Obama. Just recently I heard another reference to “Obama’s Afghanistan War.” I was around at the time, and I’m sure that war started in 2002, long before he was elected. I have also seen references to “Obama’s TARP Program” you know, the one that was started during the last year of the Bush Administration. Any President with the powers to do things like that even before he is elected is one we probably should keep. Those sorts of powers might come in handy.
Just today I heard the ultimate in Dingbat mendacity. This came from the Romney campaign, which I thought would have had more class. They took an excerpt from a speech by President Obama in 2008, where he was quoting a statement by an aide to Senator McCain. They very conveniently omitted that part of the speech where President Obama stated he was quoting the aide, to make it appear that this was a factual statement by the president. Now that is the epitome of low-class dirty politics. The idiots should have known the media would check this out and expose their perfidy. They don’t care! There are lots of people out there who will believe this sort of lie. Heaven help us if the Dingbats get in power!
Science is not a Liberal conspiracy.
I stand corrected. I feared that this political season would prove to be bereft of humor. That would be a dismal prospect, for there certainly is no worthwhile humor on commercial TV. But, I am pleased to report, that the dingbat candidates have introduced a marvelous brand of humor into the campaigns. I guess we can call this brand of humor “listen to what I say but don’t believe a word of it because I’m going to contradict it in the next sentence.” You have to listen fast and loose, because any truth in any statement is fleeting.
During the Las Vegas debates, how many times did we hear this sequence: “The government is too big, too intrusive, too complicated, and must be cut back, reduced or eliminated?” Then the next sentence was: “The government should be doing more about this problem, or spending more on that problem.” Make up your mind dingbats!
It is amusing how the same people who rant about how government is so intrusive are perfectly willing to have the government dictate how we think or what we believe. If the dingbats have their way, your ideas about same-sex marriage or abortion will be rigidly controlled. They would pass laws telling you what you can believe. That is a croc! As my old grand-daddy said, “ain’t nobody gonna tell me what I can think.”
One of the other really humorous items concerns taxes. Now, this is not normally a funny subject. Nobody likes to talk or even think about taxes. But a couple of the dingbats have introduced some humor into this discussion. They didn’t intend to introduce humor into this rather serious subject, but it happened. Now, it is well known to anyone who has followed all the debates, discussions, forums, interviews or any other means used to introduce personal beliefs, that the dingbats are not great supporters of education. They also seem to demonstrate a deficiency about simple arithmetic. I’m not talking rocket science here, or even math, just simple number manipulation. They have proposed the infamous 9-9-9 plan, or a “flat rate tax plan,” Both are regressive, more onerous on the lower income groups, but their proponents just can’t seem to grasp this.. Here is a simple example: family A has a gross income of $30,000 per year; family B has one of $100,000. Both families buy $100 worth of groceries. The tax for each is $9.00. But for family A, that is .0003% of their annual income. For family B, that is .00009% of their income. What is so difficult to understand about this? Any flat rate tax hurts the lower income classes more.
“Two-Gun” Perry firmly believes that the only solution to all our problems is to support (turn loose) the “awl bidness” as they say in Texas. “Drill, Baby, Drill” is his motto. Of course if we follow his advice, in 4-5 years we might have some improvement, at least in Texas, but also a hell of a lot more pollution. But then, that’s the price one must pay for success.
Also, the head lady dingbat has chimed in with a solution to all the health care problems. According to her, we don’t need any form of government sponsored health care. The hospitals and various charitable organizations have enough money on hand that they can take care of all the indigent people. Now that would be hilarious if it wasn’t so pathetic. Do these people think, or is this merely propaganda learned but not understood?
I suppose if you listened to FOX News all day, then you too could memorize and then repeat outrageous statements, incorrect facts or just plain lies.
I almost feel sorry for the Republican dingbats. They have some serious problems, and apparently no idea how to solve them. Some of their problems are self-inflicted, but others just because history has caught up with them.
One of their problems is rather comical. They are having just one hell of a time trying to remember all the things they used to be against but now favor, and vice versa. Maybe someone should build them a good cheat sheet. Of course that assumes they can read.
The Congressional dingbats have another problem. They can’t decide where their allegiance lies. Is it to America, to the district that elected them, or to Grover Norquist. This could evolve into a real problem if their electorate begins to get a little nervous. Another election for the House is always just around the corner.
Now the dingbats have a new problem. Religion has reared its ugly head into the primary campaigns. I, for one, welcome this. I was getting a bit bored with the campaign since Sarah is out and Michelle has disappeared off the radar. I depended on those two for some comic relief. But now we will be entertained by some fanatical “religious” persons saying some rather stupid things in a most pious manner. Some of these I define as self-proclaimed born-again, holier than thou, I’m right and you’re wrong sanctimonious windbags.
The fun here has already started. Poor Rick Perry, who has not scored well in the debates, had to find a spokesman. Who else could he find than a Southern Baptist preacher from Dallas? If you understand Texas politics, you know this is natural. But, in the process of attacking Milt Romney and his Mormon Religion, they have accidently or not attacked all other Protestants. Listen carefully to what this preacher says. By his definition of what constitutes a “Christian” he excludes most all the other protestant churches. This may become interesting.
It is also interesting to watch how the dingbats can ignore the problem of unemployment. I have yet to hear of any proposal for job creation from that side of the aisle. They just can’t seem to realize that job must be created. Action is required! All I am hearing is the same disproven platitudes that if we just eliminate all business regulations and reduce all taxes then everything will be fine. The best economists calculate that this action would show some results by 2015. It is Reagenomics all over again. Big business prosperity will trickle down to the working class. That much is true, but now the working class is in China or India.
They also can’t grasp the concept that massive budget reductions involve massive lay-offs of personnel. We have enough unemployment now. Why add to it?
Oh well, the next few months may be fun.
In normal times, I like to watch MSNBC, FOX and CNN news, hopefully to get a balanced view of current events. I find I can no longer watch FOX, because I can’t stand the distortions, false innuendos and outright lies they promulgate.
In the past week, I have been told about a vast conspiracy concerning President Obama’s birthplace; I have heard sly references to the “death squads” who are going to call Grandma and Grandpa in for a conference to determine if they will be allowed to live any longer; the pundits have discussed Obama’s wars; the so-called historians have pontificated about the failure of Obama’s TARP program; and they are crying great crocodile tears all about how the Administration has brought us to financial ruin.
Do you suppose the dingbats are really that stupid? Can they not read? Have they not been paying attention for the past 7-8 years? Yet they say these things with great sincerity, as if that will somehow make it true. Think about it! The “birther” and “deather” conspiracies were disproved a long time back. The wars were started under the previous administration. The first TARP program will before the last Presidential Election. The present financial crisis originated 5-6 years ago because some major financial institutions did some really stupid things.
We hear a constant bleating of the dingbat’s mantras: you know, No more taxes; smaller government; reduction of expenditures; change the Constitution; and so forth. These might all be fine sentiments, but no one has bothered to explain exactly how we are supposed to do this. It’s as if we are just supposed to vote for any dingbats, and all these things will just miraculously happen. Sorry but neither life nor government works that way.
This all reminds me of George Orwell’s Animal Farm. There, the ruling pigs had to come up with something simple the sheep could remember and repeat, over and over. In that case, it was “four legs good, two legs bad.” For the current crop of dingbats, I would propose: “Ideology over Reality” except I doubt many of them would understand it. Too many seem to suffer from a bad case of “facto prohibito” which loosely translates as “don’t confuse me with facts.”
Much has been trumpeted recently about jobs. The dingbats constantly yell that we must do something to stimulate (that’s a dirty word) job creation. The problem is that I don’t think they really understand what they say. So, let’s have a short lesson in Economics 101.
There are only two classes of jobs. Private industry, which we will call P, and Government, we call G. There is a third group, the unemployed, we call U. These three then make up the total work force, or WF. So we have a simple formula: P+G+U=WF.
This simple formula applies whether we are talking about a city, county, state or nation. It will always be in equilibrium.
WF will constantly change. It will increase as people reach employable age, or graduate from college, etc., and will decrease as people die or retire. No matter, P, G and U must change to stay in balance. Ideally we would like our formula to look like this:
P + G + U = WF. Private industry is hiring; government employment is shrinking, and unemployment is low. But we’re not there.
Private industry is not hiring. Why? There are several reasons. One, we become more efficient and automated so that fewer workers are required; Two, many of our jobs have been outsourced to other countries; and Three, we run into a paradox. Industry will not expand (and hire) until there is a demand for its products. With so many unemployed, there is little demand simply because people do not have the money to spend.
Now the dingbats want to cut government programs. So, if we suddenly decrease G, by canceling programs or departments, then P must expand hiring or U will increase to maintain the balance. The same holds true if industry, P, lays off workers. Either G or U must expand.
Another erroneous assumption is that we can realize immediate savings by an immediate reduction in the size of government. This doesn’t wash. Suppose we decide to do away with the EPA (the dingbats really hate this entity) and lay off 30,000 workers. Surely this will generate immediate savings. No! First, these are probably all covered under Civil Service. This would be a
To be truthful, since we are in a recession, our formula probably looks more like this:
P + G + U = WF. Industry is not hiring, so unemployment is rising. Government employment has stayed relatively stable, but will soon decrease. When that happens, we will see: P + G + U = WF. And that is the formula for a depression.
Our last full depression was greatly alleviated by government stimulus programs, but only fully corrected by WWII. Is that the dingbats’ final solution?
For many years I have prided myself on being totally non-partisan. I would never allow a political party to dictate to me how I should vote. I am long registered as “unaffiliated”, and I vote for the man/woman I feel is best qualified for the job. I have voted for democrats, republicans, socialists, progressives or what have you.
Times have changed. I would now find it very difficult to vote for a republican running for the office of county dogcatcher. Given no other choice, I would vote for an avowed communist over a republican. I truly feel that would be less dangerous to
It is well known that the republican party sold out to the religious right many years back. Now the party is caving in to the teabaggers. For less typing strokes, I will refer to this unholy amalgamation as the dingbats, which so aptly describes their position. To me, it seems their ultimate goal is to establish a “teaocracy” which embraces many long discredited economic policies.
I find it increasingly difficult to take these people serious! When you have dingbat leaders proclaiming on national media that the current heat wave is the result of a government conspiracy; or that the Statue of Liberty is really a Greek Goddess, and should be destroyed, or that the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution should be ignored, or that the direct election of US Senators should be repealed or hundreds of other equally stupid pronouncements, the only response is good laugh. But then, you must stop and think: My God, what would happen if these total dingbats got into power?
One must ask: Haven’t these people ever read history? Haven’t they been paying attention the past 10 years? Maybe they have been too busy going to church or searching for evidence of new conspiracies to notice reality.
My mission? To debunk as many of their asinine ideas as possible. Some may disagree with me. Fine! Get your own blog and write what you like.
The hypocrisy of some so-called leaders is appalling. I often wonder how some politicians can look at themselves in a mirror, and not understand they are looking at the image of a two-faced, forked tongued liar?
For two weeks or more, some of these “leaders” have been yelling that we must do something to help the rebels in Libya. The were roundly criticizing President Obama for not taking immediate action.
The President wisely ( I think) waited until we had UN agreement. For many reasons, this is important. Only then did we take direct action.
Now these same “leaders” are yelling that he, the President, moved too fast, that he took precipitous action, that he should have referred the problem to Congress. For what? We didn’t need a declaration of war—this is a UN action. We certainly didn’t need Congress to spend several weeks to argue, which would probably have involved a filibuster or other parliamentary tactics to delay taking any action. Our Congress can’t even figure out how to keep our government running.
Being President in this climate is a case of being damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.
Are we seeing the onset of attempted “thought control?” Consider. The Radical Republicans, by using a rather sneaky maneuver, are attempting to delete any Federal funding for National Public Radio. The “stated” reason for this is to make NPR stand on its own, supported only by the public. Anyone not living under a rock can recognize the hypocrisy in such a position.
The truth of the matter, as I see it, is not that NPR has demonstrated any bias against the world view of the Radical Republicans. NO, NPR reporting is probably as objective as we are ever going to see. Of course, it is a sad commentary on America that the most objective reporting of American news is from the BBC. No, the complaint of the RR’s is that NPR is objective. RR’s don’t like this. They want 100% support, ala Fox News. They have no time for partial or limited agreement. It’s either “agree with us or you’re trash!”
In this respect they remind me of certain religious groups, whose attitude is “We’re right, and everybody else is wrong. Either completely agree with us or you’re going to hell!”
In another development, there was an ongoing study exploring the possibility of constructing a new toll road in southern Wake County. Certain groups did not want such a road built, so they got a legislator to introduce a bill to stop it. The contents of the bill are unusual. Not only does it deny any funding for construction, but also denies funding for any further study. Consider the implication of that. The message is “Not only can you not do it, you can’t even think about it.”
Shades of Brave New World or 1984. Thought control is sneaking in the door.
