I am really beginning to loathe these people!

Because of the innate nature of the Republican Party and what it has come to represent-- basically the longtime conservative quest to preserve the status quo of preserving THEIR propert and wealth; or the reactionary quest to push for a status quo ante-- it surprises no one when you see multimillionaires like Darrell Issa (R-CA), Michael McCaul (R-TX), Fred Upton (R-MI) feel that they are "entitled" to committee chairs. 
Of the multimillionaires who are 50 richest Members of Congress 32 are very conservative Republicans.

No doubt you've read that the DCCC also recruits multimillionaires to run as Democrats. That is how the Blue Dogs were created...

 Of course, not every single multimillionaire is a selfish prig out to serve himself an even bigger slice of the pie, but all things being equal, you can probably count on most of them to not relate to the problems faced by ordinary working American families. 

It's sad when that doesn't only apply to Republicans but to Democrats as well. Last year Steve Israel helped crush Progressive, working and middle class aspirants who wanted to run for Congress while clearing a path for more fucking ego-driven millionaires. And once they become DCCC-preferred candidates, Israel squeezes them to become politically-unhealthy self-funders.

These were some of his top recruits last cycle and how much they spent from their personal fortunes to purchase their congressional seats:

• Suzan DelBene (New Dem-WA)- $2,796,879 (63%) after spending $2,284,034 (57%) in 2010
• Scott Peters (New Dem-CA)- $2,757,452 (63%)
• John Delaney (New Dem-MD)- $2,370,556 (54%)
• Elizabeth Esty (New Dem-CT)- $545,195 (17%)
• Bill Foster (New Dem-IL)- $500,000 (14%) after spending $545,000 in 2010 and $1,998,223 (41%) in 2008
• Denny Heck (New Dem-WA)- $99,000 (5%) after spending $350,000 (18%) in 2010

Each one rushed to join the super-corrupt, Big Business-oriented Conserva-Dems.

What a coincidence! 

NOT. 

Then there's Patrick Fucking Murphy, the spoiled rich kid and lifetime Republican who switched parties so he could be in Congress? He's a Conserva-Dem too, of course, but he only self-funded to the tune of $66,743.

But don't worry, his rich Republican daddy started his own superPAC, American Sunrise, to funnel much more substantial sums into Patrick's campaign. And now that he's in Congress, he's been voting with the Republicans on financial and economic issues and working with right-wing crackpots to push the regressive Republican agenda of low wages, fewer worker protections and lower taxes for millionaires and corporations.... At the expense of jobs, upward mobility, buying power and the overall American Economy. 

Write Steve Israel today and tell him to stop supporting Conservatives pretending to be Democrats, and help elect Democrats that believe the American People are more than just "Human Resources".... Or vote his DINO ass out of Congress!

Fake Democrats Want to Fuck You Over for Oil Money

On February 16, 2012, House Republicans passed Greg Lamborn's H.R. 3408 to push forward the Keystone XL Pipeline Project and open up vast stretches of federally-owned territory to corporate oil and gas companies. It passed 237-187, with 21 Republicans who ran as Democrats joining the rest of the Republicans to pass it. 

The GOP made their point and then never bothered sending it to the Senate. These are the Democrats who backed it, show them the door in 2014, Write Steve Israel and ask him to have the DNC support actual Democrats!
• Jason Altmire (Blue Dog/New Dem-PA)- defeated in primary
• John Barrow (Blue Dog/New Dem-GA)- still hanging on
• Sanford Bishop (Blue Dog-GA)
• Dan Boren (Blue Dog-OK)- forced to retire
• Leonard Boswell (Blue Dog-IA)- defeated
• Jim Cooper (Blue Dog/New Dem-TN)
• Jim Costa (Blue Dog-CA)
• Mark Crtiz (PA)- defeated
• Henry Cuellar (Blue Dog-TX)
• Joe Donnelly (Blue Dog-IN)- saved from political extinction by Richard Mourdock
• Al Green (TX)
• Gene Green (TX)
• Rubén Hinojosa (TX)
• Kathy Hochul (New Dem-NY)- defeated
• Larry Kissel (Blue Dog-NC)- defeated
• Jim Matheson (Blue Dog-UT) came within 768 votes of defeat
• Mike McIntyre (Blue Dog/New Dem-NC)- came within 654 votes of defeat
• Bill Owens (New Dem-NY)- came within 4,985 votes of defeat
• Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN)
• Cedric Richmond (New Dem-LA)
• Mike Ross (Blue Dog-AR)- forced to retire

More proof the GOP HATES workers

Remember when the GOP used to name bills that were meant to pollute the air, the Clean Skies Act, in hopes that their low info base would vote as they were told?

 Today Eric "Weasel dick" Cantor is introducing his Working Families Flexibility Act (H.R. 1406), through Alabama puppet representative Martha Roby. 

It is meant to deny workers overtime pay. That is pretty much it.

There are 168 cosponsors, not one of whom is a Democrat. In fact most of them are from ultra right wing Confederate districts that have been safely gerrymandered and where anti-union and anti-worker sentiment is part and parcel of the political culture. 

Most... but not all. 

Among the cosponsors of this bill who could suffer from their anti-worker attitude in 2014 are John Kline (R-MN), Tim Walberg (R-MI), Dave Camp (R-MI), Joe Heck (R-NV), Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-WA), Buck McKeon (R-CA), Tom Reed (R-NY), Michele Bachmann (R-MN), Erik Paulsen (R-MN), Ed Royce (R-CA), Steve Daines (R-MT), Mike Rogers (R-MI), Fred Upton (R-MI), Sean Duffy (R-WI), Kerry Bentivolio (R-MI), Mike Coffman (R-CO), Chris Collins (R-NY), Scott Garrett (R-NJ), Tom Lathan (R-IA), David Reichert (R-WA), Reid Ribble (R-WI), David Valadao (R-CA), and Paul Ryan (R-WI). 

Of course South Carolina elected a proven liar, cheat, public monies stealing ass hat solely based on the "R" after his name. So there is no guarantee that intellect holds any sway in these districts at all.


The progressive Democrat running for the seat Paul Ryan is now occupying, Rob Zerban, wasn't happy to hear his congressman is cosponsoring this anti-worker bill. But he wasn't surprised either. "If you are looking for the precise year Republicans are trying to roll back the clock, it's 1886. That's the year 7 people gave up their lives demanding a right to an eight hour workday and overtime compensation right here in Milwaukee at the Bay View Massacre. We just had a memorial this past weekend on the 127th anniversary of the event. Stripping employees of their hard-fought right to overtime pay is outright robbery, and that's exactly what this bill does. "

But the GOP has been VERY busy passing legislation effectively rolling back worker's rights. women's rights, and even voting rights. Seems the conservative agenda is a return to the Antebellum mindset, where only wealthy white folk have any rights at all. 

They do not seem to understand, that all their gun toting, low info, extremely reactionary base are firmly in this demographic... I wonder what Republicans will do when THEY become the bad guys in the eyes of the fringe groups?

I loathe these buffoons, and the voters that keep electing these imbeciles! Elected officials that have no idea how government works, nor any inclination to learn....

Keith Ellison (D-MN) was very succinct: "99% of Americans have seen their income decline during economic recovery. Yet Republican are pushing a bill that ends overtime pay." 
So was Tony Cárdenas (D-CA): "Tomorrow, we vote on letting companies stop paying overtime. Paying people less for working more? Is that what our country should be about?" 
Or, as Donna Edwards (D-MD) put it yesterday morning, "The only flexibility in the GOP bill is the flexibility for workers to be abused by their employers." 

George Miller tweeted this graphic to help make clear what the Republicans are up to:

Needless to say, the Republicans hated the idea of modernizing the American workplace in Alan Grayson's amendment, the Paid Vacation Act of 2013 and wouldn't even allow a vote. It's worth reading carefully, though, because it highlights the difference between a forward-looking progressive mindset compared to what the GOP is trying to do to further diminish ordinary working families and drag the country back in time'
 Do the GOP actually believe we can go back to a slave based economy? Because the certainly want the American worker to be on par with sweatshop workers in Indonesia, working for $.45 an hour... You know to be "Competetive"

UPDATE: GOP Law To Abolish Overtime Pay Passes

It'll never get taken up in the Senate, of course, but it passed 223-204, 8 Republicans voting with the Democrats and, shamefully, 3 conservative Republicans who got elected as Democrats, crossed the aisle in the other direction: Henry Cuellar (Blue Dog-TX), Jim Matheson (Blue Dog-UT), Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN).

Send these dick holes to the unemployment office in 2014! THEY DO NOT REPRESENT AMERICAN WORKERS!!!

The Right Wing hates anything that resembles governance

A couple days ago a tape was made public of Hateriot Radio host Mark Levin's show, which has a large audience that cannot differentiate fact from bull shit, as long as Levin blames the people they hate already. 

On that tape, he denounces Paul Ryan as an "Establishment shill" and encouraged his listeners-- the ones that can't tell fact from fiction-- to vote against him in the future. 
That might be great news for Rob Zerban or anyone else that runs against him-- but Establishment Republicans just HATE when that happens. 

And it happens a lot, both from Levin and El Tubbo himself, Uncle Rush. 

That was the topic of the latest skirmish in the GOP civil war this week, when Republican Party toady and consultant, Frank Luntz, stepped on his dick at a University of Pennsylvania question and answer session after a speech. (You wonder why a reputable University like UoP would invite a troll like Luntz? His daddy funded a scholarship.)

The problem was with how Luntz answered a question about the polarization between the two Beltway parties. He blamed Limbaugh, Levin and the rest of the AM radio hateriots.

       "They get great ratings, and they drive the message, and it's really problematic. And this is not on the Democratic side. It's only on the Republican side… Democrats have got every other source of news on their side. And so that is a lot of what's driving it. If you take... Marco Rubio's getting his ass kicked. Who's my Rubio fan here? We talked about it. He's getting destroyed! By Mark Levin, by Rush Limbaugh, and a few others. He's trying to find a legitimate, long-term effective solution to immigration that isn't the traditional Republican approach, and talk radio is killing him. That's what's causing this thing underneath. And too many politicians in Washington are playing coy."

Coy? Must be a new use of the word. Repubs are scared shitless of the AM hateriots!
When one or two Republican officials have stood up to Limbaugh in the past, no one even had the guts to back them up and they were always forced to grovel within a day and publicly kiss his fat ass and beg for forgiveness. Now Luntz is so hysterical that getting on the bad side of Limbaugh-- and presumably junior versions like Levin-- that he's vowing to never speak at the University of Pennsylvania again and he's defunding the scholarship his father left the school! Huh? Yeah, he claims the public talk he gave was off the record. Here's some of the column in the Daily Pennsylvanian from the student who recorded it:

I made the choice to share my recording with Mother Jones because Luntz’s comments are important. They illustrate one of the largest schisms within the GOP and expose the hypocrisy of Luntz’s willingness to place blame for his party’s division upon a media establishment he has helped build. Further, his request to be taken off the record was never one to which I acquiesced. The reporter who was present was right to oblige Luntz, but in a room filled with scores of independent students, “off the record” is not a Patronus charm. Luntz may have felt that he was invited to speak candidly by acclimation, but I disagreed entirely.

...Frank Luntz has made a very successful career out of advising Republicans on the content of their message. He was asked one of the most important questions of the day in terms of American politics (“what is causing extreme polarization between the parties?”), and refused to speak freely. Why? Because doing so may harm his commercial interest. And this attitude is at the root of the problem. If influential GOP figures like Frank Luntz truly believe that the party’s media kingmakers harm the national interest but refuse to say so for fear of backlash, they knowingly work against the spirit of open and honest debate.

...Luntz told the audience on Monday that he would “rather lie than duck a tough question.” By asking to go off the record during a public engagement, he proved that he is willing to do both. This is an approach to politics which I cannot support, and I stand by my choice to expose it."

Let's end the bullshit from the right.

Let's shred some of the more established right wing talking points, or as I like to call them, lies.

Obama has been the biggest spending President in history!

 FALSE.  Year to year spending increases have been less than 1%.  They’re also at their lowest rate of year to year increases since Eisenhower.

Obama has spent more than all other Presidents in history!

 FALSE. On January 20, 2009 our national debt was $10.6 trillion, today it’s $16.7 trillion—for a $6.1 trillion increase.  For the mathematically challenged, $6.1 trillion is less than $10.6 trillion.  This also doesn't factor in the money spent in 2009, which gets tagged to President Obama, was actually passed by Bush.

*This also doesn’t take into account much of the cost of both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars had not been put on our books by the Bush administration.

Obama is a Muslim!

FALSE. You’re an idiot and I’m not even going to explain why.

Obama isn’t an American!

FALSE.  See above.

Obama is a Communist/Socialist/Fascist!

FALSE.  They’re all different—it’s impossible to be all 3.  Then with stocks setting new records, having their best 10 day stretch since 1996, and increasing by more than 100% since their lows in 2006…he would be the worst Communist, Socialist or Fascist that has ever existed
.

The economy has gotten worse under Obama!

FALSE.  Are you insane, have selective memory or both?  In February 2009, we lost  651K jobs.  In February 2013, we added 236K jobs.  Again, for the mathematically challenged, that’s a positive shift of 887K jobs from our losses in February 2009 to our gains in February 2013.

I’ve seen the rebuttal to these numbers, so I’ll squash it right now before moving on:

Those jobs numbers are a lie!  No, they’re from the same source which Republicans have used to saddle Obama’s job losses (from his first year in office… and only his first year).  So you can’t use a source to support your argument, then ignore that very same source when it no longer supports what you want to believe.

Unemployment is at record highs!

FALSE.  Unemployment hit a high during November 2009 of 10%, it’s now at 7.7%.

I can already hear the Republican rebuttal to this one as well, “But that doesn't include the people who have stopped looking for work!”  I hate to burst your bubble, but the unemployment rate *never includes those who have given up looking for work*!  This isn't a change in what defines our unemployment rate, this is how it has been calculated for quite some time.

Fun history lesson:  When Reagan took office, unemployment was at 7.5%.  Within his first 18 months in office unemployment shot all the way up to 10.8%.

Obamacare is unconstitutional!
FALSE.  The Affordable Care Act was passed by Congress, signed by the President and the Supreme Court ruled that it was in fact Constitutional.

Obama has been terrible for business!

FALSE.  Corporate profits are up 171% since President Obama took office and are at their highest levels, relative to the size of economic growth, since 1947.

Obama has waged a war on the rich!

FALSE.  We’ve added over 300,000 new millionaires, for a total of 8.9 million, approaching the all-time high of 9.2 million. And some of them do not mind paying the 1996 rate....

Obama is out to take away our Second Amendment rights!

FALSE.  Well, not anymore than Ronald Reagan or George W. Bush wanted to.  He wants to put back in place the assault weapons ban that was supported by Reagan and Bush that expired in 2004.  He also wants to limit magazine size to 10 rounds and require universal background checks for all gun purchases–something that is overwhelmingly supported by most Americans, regardless of political affiliation.

I’ll stop there.  I could go on for pages, but I’d risk going into laughably ridiculous stories such as microchips and FEMA concentration camps that really don’t deserve any rational person's attention.

The point is, these statements comprise the vast majority of comments I have read, or heard from Republicans, their pundits and media "Sources", and they are all complete fabricated bullshit!

This is why political debate can go absolutely nowhere these days.  It’s hard to have rational discussion with people who are begin their argument will prejudice and completely provable bullshit!.

 Not only do they base their argument on this nonsense, they want this bullshit to be true.  To the point of ignoring observable facts and evidence!

Even when you present them with indisputable factual data that contradicts their beliefs, it makes absolutely no difference, they rationalize their willful ignorance by suggesting that the facts are a clever conspiracy, and only they are correct, it is the rest of the World that is stupid.

And therein lies the problem.  They’re suffering from a pervasive cognitive dissonance; the feeling of discomfort when simultaneously holding two or more conflicting ideas, beliefs, values or emotional reactions. Sufferers
may sometimes feel "disequilibrium": frustration, hunger, dread, guilt, anger, embarrassment, anxiety, etc.

The theory of cognitive dissonance in social psychology proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance by altering existing understandings, adding new ones to create a consistent belief system, or alternatively by reducing the importance of any one of the dissonant elements.

In effect, creating some alternate form of reality which justifies or eliminates these conflicts, in order to find consonance, information that does not support their preferred beliefs are ignored.

That’s where we are with Republicans and conservatives in general.  They want to believe the lies they've been spoon fed, even though reality does not support them.

To ease this dissonance, conservatives and Republicans have created an alternate reality where facts,science ,reality,history and math are only factual, if they support their preferred narrative.

And that’s very dangerous.

Mitch McConnel ia a hypocrite

I'd be impressed if Sen. McConnell so passionately defended the rights of ALL Americans. Sen. McConnell records demonstrates his lack of concern for the civil rights of others, but his wife's!!! That is drawing the line!!!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/02/mitch-mcconnell-kentucky-progress_n_2799471.html#comments

Even WND has issues with McConnell's wife:

"Chao’s father resides in New York City and, years ago, founded a ship brokerage and agency business, Foremost Maritime Corp. — a lucrative shipping firm that ships goods from the U.S. to China and much of Asia.

“To do this would require one having friends in high places,” or “Guanxi” (the Chinese term for political connections), the source told WorldNetDaily. “The real story here is that Ms. Chao’s father — and most likely herself — has been a family friend of the leaders of communist China for practically all of her life.”

When asked if Chao has had any contact at all with Jiang, the expert said, “Absolutely.”

And, the source added, “it’s kept very quiet, but it’s probably regular contact.”

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2001/01/7823/#633Mab3S6juckZTP.99

McConnell's record speaks volumes about him:


McConnell supports staunch anti-abortion legislation. His rating is 100% National Right to Life Committee.
Voted NO on continuing federal funds for declared "sanctuary cities".
Voted NO on comprehensive immigration reform.
Voted YES on declaring English as the official language of the US government.
Voted YES on building a fence along the Mexican border.
Voted NO on allowing illegal aliens to participate in Social Security.
Voted NO on giving Guest Workers a path to citizenship.
Voted YES on limit welfare for immigrants.
Voted YES on constitutional ban of same-sex marriage.
Voted NO on adding sexual orientation to definition of hate crimes.
Voted NO on expanding hate crimes to include sexual orientation.
Voted NO on setting aside 10% of highway funds for minorities & women.
Voted NO on multiple measures to stop outsourcing to China
Voted NO on several measures intended to increase tariffs on imported Chinese goods
Voted NO on measures intended to reign in China's illegal currency/trade practices
Voted YES on ending special funding for minority & women-owned business.
Voted YES on prohibiting same-sex marriage.
Voted NO on prohibiting job discrimination by sexual orientation.
Voted YES on banning affirmative action hiring with federal funds.

Seems he is pro theocracy, pro big business, pro outsourcing, pro trade deficit, pro China, pro white, and pro homophobia...

McTurtle has worked diligently to prevent the Congress from governing, trying to rewrite or obfuscate observed facts and events, and just generally fucking up the nation for political points.

One wonders how a man, even bringing home $174K a year, is worth $30 million....  Graft? Corruption? Illegal human/turtle hybrids?

This shit is scary! Far more than any terrorist!

Occaisionally, Montana hard right Republican politician Jerry O'Neill pops his head out of the toilet he lives in to demand something quaint-- like getting paid in gold and silver for his services or having state legislatures elect senators again, rather than ordinary Americans. 

O'Neill lives in the tiny hamlet of Columbia Falls (which has under 1000 families, 96.27% of whom are white; there are a few Native Americans and even a Black person too) and people there must like him. They keep voting for him. That might change now that he's introduced a bill in the state legislature that slips corporal punishment back into the judicial system, long a goal of the crackpots in the  "Christian Reconstructionist" cult.

Max Blumenthal covers that crew of dangerous right-wing sociopaths in his book, Republican Gomorrah: Inside the Movement That Shattered the Party, starting with the man pulling the strings for these nut fuckers, R.J. Rushdoony. His whole shtick was about religionists taking over the government and reconstructing it along Biblical lines. 

According to Frederick Clarkson, a pioneering researcher of the Christian right, “Reconstructionism seeks to replace democracy with a theocratic elite that would govern by imposing their interpretation of ‘Biblical Law.’ Reconstructionism would eliminate not only democracy but many of its manifestations, such as labor unions, civil rights laws, and public schools. When would be generally relegated to hearth and home. Insufficiently Christian men would be denied citizenship, perhaps executed."

Calling for the literal application of all 613 laws described in the Book of Leviticus, Rushdoony paid special attention to punishments. Instead of serving prison sentences, criminals would be sentenced to indentured servitude, whipped, sold into slavery, or executed. "God's government prevails," Rushdoony wrote, "and His alternatives are clear-cut: either men and nations obey His laws, or God invokes the death penalty upon them." Those eligible on Rushdoony's long list for execution included disobedient children, unchaste women, apostates, blasphemers, practitioners of witchcraft, astrologers, adulterers, and, of course, anyone who engaged in "sodomy or homosexuality."

I guess nobody told Rushdoony about the difference between Levi Preist Caste Jews, and Christians.

Burning at the stake, death by "the sword," and hanging were some of Rushdoony's preferred modes of execution. However, his son-in-law Gary North, a self-styled Reconstructionist economist (who eventually fell out with his father-in-law) and former advisor to libertarian Republican representative Ron Paul of Texas (an outspoken admirer of the John Birch Society), advocated stoning evildoers to death. Rocks, North argued, are free and plentiful, making them ideal tools for the financially savvy executioner.

This is the same insanity that drives Islamic lunatics to blow themselves up for God... There is no difference between these asshats and the Taliban, they want the same thing, the murder of anyone that does not believe as they do, the subjugation of women, the elimination of individuality, art, freedom and joy.....

And these dangerous fucktards seem to have more political clout than reasonable people, who elect morons and regressive misogynists to office.

STOP IT!

Bill Moyers interviewed Rushloony, he espouse his 1st century mentality, devoid of  two thousand years of human endeavor, progress, learning, science and culture.
http://youtu.be/paL2s4HJScg


I weep for the willful ignorance needed to believe this insanity!