We’re Not Going There!

The Republican Party’s drift to the right, to a world without a social conscience where enemies real and imagined, foreign and domestic abound may have finally awakened a sleeping electorate. The Republicans have been getting away with the big lies for so long that they may have started believing those lies. My brother takes the lies personally. “They think I’m a fool,” he shouts. “I’m not a fool! The voters are not fools. They will wake up, and when they do there will be hell to pay!”

The Republicans promised to create jobs, but here is what they are really doing:

1. They held the budget and tax breaks for the middle class hostage so they could enrich the rich. Contrary to the lies they tell us this does not create jobs.

2. They have attacked the reproductive rights of women and tried to defund Planned Parenthood. This does not create jobs.

3. They have tried to defund the Environments Protection Agency. This does not create jobs.

4. The have tried to repeal the health care reform act, which they call Obama care. This actually costs jobs.

5. The have refused to extend unemployment benefits. This decreases demand for goods and services and costs jobs.

6. Now they want to turn Medicare into a voucher program to further enrich the insurance companies. What the hell does that have to do with jobs?

7. They have attacked unions and collective bargaining, much to the detriment of the men and women of this nation.

This is only a partial list of the things they are trying to do that actually makes our economic situation worse. Of the things on my list the two that have the voters up in arms are the Ryan plan to privatize Medicare and the attacks on collective bargaining. The voters are finally saying: “Hell no! We’re not going to let you take us there! We’re not going to let you privatize Social Security either!”

The Republicans have ignored the polls before and gotten away with it. Now they are threatening to cause us to default on our debts if their demands are not met; they are doing this by not raising the debt ceiling. In other words, they are willing to cause a world wide depression in order to dismantle Medicare so that the rich can get another huge tax cut. President Obama has already stated that he will veto the Ryan plan in the unlikely event that it actually gets through the Senate. Mr. Boehner talks about compromise but he also says that an increase of taxes on the rich and a bill that does not include drastic cuts in government services is a non-starter. There can be no compromise. Any bill that meets Mr. Boener’s demands is another case of the Democrats caving, and another step closer to a world without a social conscience. President Obama and Harry Reid must stand firm. They must stand eyeball to eyeball with the Republicans and call their bluff!

If the Republicans refuse to raise the debt ceiling it will cost their masters, Wall Street and the large corporations, billions of dollars. Furthermore, the voters will be furious about the Republicans causing a great depression in an attempt to dismantle very popular programs for the sake of the rich. This is the worse case scenario for the Republican Party. It could literally cause its political death! It should cause its political death!

Oops!

As most of you probably know, I have a fiction blog as well as this blog. The goal of the fiction blog is simply to entertain. You also know from reading this blog that I have some very strong political views. Lately my frustration over what the Republican Party is doing has made me so angry that it was difficult to think of anything else. I simply cannot believe that the voters are not up in arms over the tactics and dark world the Republicans want to create. This anger and frustration has prompted me to write several political pieces that I posted on my fiction blog. The last of those was posted last week. It was inspired by the brilliant comic strip, Pogo, and as in the comic strip I was thinking of animal characters. In re-reading it I discovered that it was a bit brutal. Apparently others had the same opinion. I did not receive any comments about it, but all the links people had formed to my fiction blog suddenly disappeared. I must admit that posting that satire on my fiction blog was bad manners because it is not what people expect when they visit that Blog. I do not know if the people deleting links to that blog did so because they were offended by my bad manners or because they are afraid of the right wing. Regardless of their motives I am strongly considering deleting some of the political things from that blog. That is why I am now posting the satire inspired by Pogo on this blog. It is as follows:

Oligopolmy Swamp

I recently looked up the Pogo comic strip by Walt Kelly. It was comic strip I greatly enjoyed in years past. The characters and satires were wonderful. The following is my attempt to honor Mr. Kelly’s work by writing something similar, but without the art work and, I must admit, without the brilliance. Hey, we all have to give up something in this economy.

“Oligopolmy Swamp,” the name always brought a smile to the faces of the more prominent citizens there. The only store in the swamp was the Shop ‘n Buy Mart owned by Daddy Swampbucks. Daddy Swampbucks also owned the Crabapple Pie Company, which made the most popular pies sold at his store. The pies were reasonably priced because the little old ladies working at the Crabapple Apple Pie Company were paid in ready to fry opossum legs and the hair nets the ladies had to wear on the job.

It was a cold day by swamp standards. Thick black smoke, caused by burning Cockbros Swamp Moss in stoves made by Cockbros Energy, drifted throughout the swamp. Much of that smoke came from the stovepipe protruding through the tin roof of the Shop ‘n Buy Mart.

Warming him self next to the moss burning stove at the Shop ‘n Buy was Apol Grumpypaws. A blinding flash lit up the store and tossed Apol’s shadow across the room. Seeing his shadow thrown about in such an abrupt manner frightened him.

“Damn! What was Dat?” he asked.

“It’s just the Cockbros dryin’ the moss,” Daddy Swampbucks replied.

“Did one of dere dryin’ ovens blow up?”

“No, they decided the ovens take too long to dry the moss. They’re now dryin’ it by settin’ off the clouds of swamp gas.”

“But dem clouds shift with de wind. How do dey know where da flash of fire’s gonna go?”

“It don’t matter. There’s moss growin’ everywhere.”

“Dere’s also folks livin’ everywhere.”

“Wet as it is here they’ll just get singed a bit. Besides, swamp gas is really bad for you. The Cockbros think the government will even subsidize them for gettin’ rid of it.”

This is when Hog Holler entered the store.

“Say, I just seen ol’ Skunkbutt Doublespeak go inta dat odd, round buildin’.”

“That’s the Cockbros’ new stink tank,” Daddy Swampbucks said.

“Stink tank you say?”

“Yeah, the Cockbros want ‘ol Skunkbutt to convince folks that them tea dunkers are doin’ the right thing if they shut down the government in order to keep it from protectin’ lady parts and the environment.”

“Don’t sound too smart to me,” Apol said.

“You don’t have to be smart iffen you can buy smarts.”

“And rich folks can buy anything dey wants from de government now dat’ city-sons been un-knighted,” Hog Holler said.

Apol looked annoyed. “Dis conversation’s meanderin’ like moss smoke. How’er dem Cockbros gonna buy government subsidizin’ for clearin’ out de swamp gas if de government ain’t open for business?”

Apol’s question went unanswered because there was another blinding flash of fire. Hog Holler looked out the window. He then turned to Apol, who was checking to see if his shadow had returned to its proper place.

“Looks like de Cockbros just burnt de bark off de wall of your log cabin, Apol.”

“Damn it! Dat means I might have to paint de place.”

Daddy Swampbucks looked out the window. He clearly saw how he could profit from what the Cockbros were doing.

“Only the front wall, and I got some dandy paint I can sell you. Iffen you want to buy enough to paint the whole cabin I’ll even throw in a piece of Crabapple pie.”

What You Don’t Know Often Kicks Your Ass!

Ignorance is not bliss it is dangerous! It is not the dumb asses who listen to the likes of Rush Limbaugh or watch the Fox disinformation factory that frustrate me. The percentage of people who are that stupid is small but constant. What I find so frustrating is a much larger percentage of ignorant people. The ignorance Jay Leno reveals when he Jay walks is not an aberration. MSNBC revealed a similar ignorance when they asked randomly selected people to name the Speaker of the House of Representatives. A very large percentage of the people asked could not answer that question. They had absolutely no idea who John Boehner is. The thing is that people get so caught up in their daily struggles that they fail to recognize many of the factors that are making those daily struggles more difficult. It took a great depression to make an earlier generation understand how much the government or lack of government impacts our daily lives. When this earlier generation finally figured it out, they re-elected Franklin Roosevelt three times.

The elections of 2008 made me think that people were finally paying attention. That was foolish on my part. The truth is that they did not have a clue. They gave the Democratic Party a resounding victory because they quite correctly blamed the party in power for the economic meltdown. Their reaction, however, was emotional rather than cerebral. When the economy did not turn around quickly enough the voters punished the Democratic Party without giving any thought to the fact that the Republican Party was using the filibuster to prevent the Democrats from doing any more to stimulate the economy. In doing so the voters gave the obstructionists still more power by giving them control of the House of Representative. As a result of this foolishness we now have the budget battles, the cutting of badly needed government services, and a continuation of the policy of enriching the rich at the expense of everyone else. If we have not already reached that point, we are quickly moving toward an oligopoly, meaning a society where all of the wealth and power is concentrated into a very few hands.

A budget deficit by definition is caused when revenue does not equal spending. The Republicans want you to believe that the deficit is caused by spending only. They want you to believe this because if you look at revenues you will want to do away with tax loopholes that allow major corporations to avoid paying any taxes, and you will insist on the rich paying a fair share of the taxes. You will also understand that it is the creation of the oligopoly that is the root cause of our economic problems. So how do we make independent voters understand this? How do we make them pay enough attention to look at the facts?

In their opposition to health care reform the tea party grabbed the attention of the independent voters by telling the big lies, disrupting meetings, and demonstrating. But you do not have to lie in order to be dramatic enough to draw attention. The people demonstrating against the reactionary Republican Governors who are attacking collective bargaining are doing a fine job of getting the attention of the independent voters in those states. The time to raise the debt ceiling in order to keep this country from defaulting on its debts and sending the world’s economy into a tailspin is fast approaching. The Republican Party already used the budget to try to dismantle Planned Parenthood and gut the Environmental Protection agency. The Republicans also used the budget to attack many vital government services. They will undoubtedly use raising the debt ceiling to renew those attacks. Their attacks are outrageous and potentially disastrous. Women’s groups and environmental groups should be demonstrating for all they are worth. They should be screaming, “Liars and Shame!” President Obama should also be screaming Shame! He should castigate the enrichment of the rich schemes in the strongest possible terms.

We must take this battle into the streets! We must shake the independent voters out of their slumber and show them what the Republican Party is doing to them! The Republican agenda will cost jobs, and it will place a disproportionate burden on the most vulnerable members of our society, the old, the ill, and the unemployed.

All Fools

One of the ways we celebrate all fool’s day is to perpetrate what we hope will be humorous hoaxes. Politicians do this every day of the year, although the humor is usually inadvertent on their part. The majority leader of the House of Representatives, Eric Cantor, recently introduced an unconstitutional bill that gave the Senate a deadline for approving a House bill and stated that if the Senate failed to meet that deadline the House bill would become law. The Republican Party rather appropriately passed Mr. Cantor’s unconstitutional bill on April First. None of the network news anchors reported this as a humorous event. This is probably because the Republicans did not add “April fools” at the end of the bill. Frankly, I do not think the Republicans got the joke either. It is really funny when you consider that it is the Republicans who insist on a strict interpretation of the Constitution!

Even more amusing than the Republicans passing a bill that even a very young “C” student will tell you is unconstitutional are the excuses the Republicans give for doing this. “We are tired of the Democrats in the Senate refusing to pass our budget bill,” the House Republicans say. “We want to send them a message!” The Republicans then recite talking points from a right wing stink tank, and many of them threaten to shut down the government if the Democrats in the Senate do not cave. The Democrats have already agreed to cut the funding of important programs in order to trim thirty-two billion dollars of spending from the budget. The Democrats did this thinking they had a deal with House Speaker Boehner. Mr. Boehner, however, was not able to sell that deal to his caucus. Now the Republicans are insisting on all or nothing. The Republicans are doing this while saying that the Democrats are acting irresponsibly and are to blame if the government is shut down.

I think the unconstitutional bill the House Republicans passed speaks volumes about who is being irresponsible and who is not. Furthermore, one look at the budget bill will tell you why the Democrats cannot agree to it. Particularly egregious are the riders the Republicans have attached to the budget bill. Among those riders is an attack on the Environmental Protection Agency that if passed would eliminate much of President Obama’s green energy agenda and free up the oil industry and coal industry to do pretty much anything they want to do regardless of any adverse impact that might have on the environment. Other riders would defund Planned Parenthood and the National endowment of the Arts, and there is rider to cut funds for Amtrak. This is just the tip of the iceberg. There are many other riders, and they are nothing more than an extreme right wing wish list that has little to do with the budget. It is well documented that the Republican budget will eliminate seven hundred thousand jobs. Looking farther down the road we have another horrible prospect. Representative Paul Ryan, the Republican economic guru, is once again proposing a bill that would destroy Medicare and Medicaid by turning them into private voucher programs that would subject senior citizens and the working poor to the judgment of the insurance industry’s death panels, much to the benefit of private insurance companies.

In presenting this bill Mr. Ryan is resorting to a Republican tactic we have seen far too often. He is trying to mount a pre-emptive strike against the just criticism his bill will receive. He is saying that the Democrats will lie by calling his bill a privatization of Medicare and a voucher or coupon system. Well, it is nothing more than the same bill he himself called a voucher system and it does privatize both Medicare and Medicaid. It does not matter how Mr. Ryan tries to characterize his proposal it is what it is. Similarly, the current Republican budget bill is what it is. This budget bill is as notable for what it does not contain as it is for what it does contain. It does not eliminate subsidies for oil companies or farmers; it does not eliminate tax loopholes that provide refunds on taxes which companies like GE did not even pay. It does not even raise any revenue by making the rich assume any part of the burden.

The games the Republicans are playing in regard to their budget bill and the games they will play in regard to Mr. Ryan’s outrageous bill are illustrative of the fact that every time the Democrats try to compromise the Republicans demand still more concessions. One thing the reader must bear in mind is that this year’s budget battle is just the beginning. In 2012 we will have to raise the debt ceiling, and that is when Mr. Ryan’s bill will come into play. Then as now, the Republicans will shout that spending is causing the deficit rather than a lack of Revenue, and they will say that Mr. Ryan’s bill will cure that. They will do this in spite of the fact that Mr. Reagan’s tax cuts for the rich created the largest increase in the deficit we had ever seen and in spite of the fact that George W. Bush’s tax cuts for rich are largely responsible for the deficits we now have. How far will the Republicans go to enrich the billionaires and the multi-national corporations they really represent? DailyKos made a brilliant list that compares cuts to programs that benefit the middle class with tax cuts that benefit the wealthy. I invite all of you to use the link I have provided to that comparison.

Mr. Ryan and the Republican Party think we are all fools. In fact, they are counting on it. They are trying to wrap their economic shit in a pretty package to sell as chocolate. In doing this they are assuming we will not use our noses and brains. I say this because anyone who takes one whiff of the contents of their economic package will reject it in the strongest possible terms. Hopefully, the voters will take this whiff sooner rather than later. Please do not misinterpret what I am saying. Shutting down the government is a terribly irresponsible thing to do, particularly during a recession. I do not want the Republicans to do that, but it may be what it is going to take to wake up the somnambulistic voters who identify themselves as independents; it may be what it will take to make those voters take a whiff and reject the Republican shit! There is no doubt that this country will be much better off when that finally happens. As it now stands, the wealth of this nation is percolating up and the Republican filter is holding it far out of the reach of everyone who cannot contribute millions of dollars to political campaigns. The Republicans are in fact destroying the equitable economic system that has for decades made the American dream a reality.