Birthers lose to an empty chair

February 5, 2012

Yes, really.

Despite dire warnings from an administrative law judge in the Georgia Secretary of State‘s office, Obama’s attorneys refused to even put in an appearance at the hearing to decide whether Barack Obama is eligible to run for president under the Constitution’s natural born citizen clause.  Facing a contempt citation, they refused to lend the attention that an appearance by the president’s lawyer would give to such a circus trial.

Empty Chair, by Jim Strong Photography, copyright 2006

Beautiful photo of an empty chair, by Jim Strong, copyright 2006 — go buy a print from him (click the picture), and have him autograph it. That empty chair’s cousin made better arguments in a Georgia courtroom that did Orly Taitz or any other birther.

Pleading their case before a judge mad at Obama, with no defense put up by Obama’s lawyers at all, the birthers still lost.  Their case does not cross the threshold of credibility a case needs to be taken seriously, the judge ruled.  Obama is a natural born citizen, Obama is perfectly eligible for the presidency due  to his Hawaiian birth, and the birthers should fold their tents and go back to their figurative plows or knitting.

The birthers lost to a defense argued (badly) by an empty chair.

If your livelihood depends on their going back to their plows and needles, you’re in trouble.

Were you surprised?  Birthers have lost every one of these suits.  Birthers still don’t give up.

Here, read the decision at SCRIBD:  Barack Obama is who he says he is.

View this document on Scribd

Judge Michael Malihi was not pleased with Obama’s lawyers for their failure to show.  That tactic force the judge to actually look at the evidence presented and rule that what was presented by the birthers not only does not make the case that Obama is not a natural born citizen, but that the evidence does not even make a prima facie case that further arguments are needed — the evidence sheds no light, it’s “not probative.”

Technically the ruling is advisory to the Georgia Secretary of State; no one expects the SOS to go completely off the rails, barking down the halls of the capitol building to graze the lawn, and decide contrary to the recommendation from Judge Malihi.

Several birthers allowed themselves to get excited that their string of bad luck and courtroom smackdowns might be changing.  They have been disappointed.

The world works, and law again proves its value.

More, Resources:

Tip of the old scrub brush to reader Whatever4, who alerted us to the decision and gave us the link to Scribd.

7 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Barack Obama, Birth Certificate, Political Smear, Politics, President Obama, Presidential Eligibility | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Oregon’s special election: Democrat Bonamici took 54% of the vote, heads to Congress

February 1, 2012

Suzanne Bonamici won the Congressional seat for Oregon’s North Coast in a special election Tuesday, Oregon Congressional District 1.  She had 54% of the vote, in an area that often votes Democrat and supported Barack Obama in 2008.

She will replace Rep. David Wu, a Democrat who resigned after he was accused of making sexual advances towards a daughter of a campaign donor. Bonamici must stand for election in November, too.

Check out the results from The Daily Astorian, one of the finer small daily papers left in America, a paper that still does real news reporting.

Watch one of her last campaign ads:

Is this a bellwether?  Democrats had a scandal-plagued representative, but won anyway.  The area traditionally votes Democratic.  Portents of November results appear rather dim.

More: 

Tip of the old scrub brush to Brenda Penner.

3 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Democratic Party, Education, Elections, U.S. Congress, U.S. House of Representatives | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Fruits of the Republican War on Education

January 16, 2012

You didn’t think it was working already?

This story appeared in the Los Angeles Times, which is why Republicans discourage newspaper publishing, and why they discourage programs to teach people to read well and remember history.

In South Carolina, a discrepancy on federal spending

Campaigning Republicans draw cheers with their calls for cuts to government programs. But the state benefits from such programs to a greater extent than many others.

By Alana Semuels, Los Angeles Times

January 14, 2012, 7:55 p.m.

Reporting from Beaufort, S.C.—

When Rick Santorum stood in front of voters at a yacht club in this small town and pledged to slash government spending, especially entitlement programs, Nancy Garvin knew she had found her candidate.

Garvin, 54, said she was sick of seeing government squander money through agencies that don’t do anything, and wants expenditures cut “in half.”

Washington is throwing money away through a lot of wasteful spending,” she said, sitting at a picnic table beneath trees draped in graying Spanish moss.

But Garvin, whose husband, a carpenter, has been out of work for four years, depends on the very government she wants to see cut back. She collects disability insurance — it is what she and her husband have survived on as he’s looked for work. Her mother is on Social Security. Garvin herself used to work as a nurse at a hospital where many patients paid for services through Medicaid, another program using federal money.

Garvin’s views are similar to those of many Republican voters in this conservative state, where candidates pledging to cut government spending were met with resounding applause last week, and where former Gov. Mark Sanford tried to refuse federal stimulus funding on principle.

South Carolina and its residents benefit from government spending, more so than many other states. For every dollar the state pays in federal taxes, it receives $1.35 in federal government benefits. By contrast, California receives only 78 cents for every dollar it pays in taxes.

“We get more back from the federal government than we send in terms of revenue,” said Doug Woodward, an economics professor at the University of South Carolina. “But I’m not sure that a lot of voters would even care if they heard that. When they say they want to see less spending in the state, they’re referring to entitlement programs.”

Much of the money spent in South Carolina goes to the programs that make up a big chunk of the federal budget — defense, Social Security and Medicaid. The state has seven military bases, and received $7 billion in Defense Department spending in 2010. One in five residents in South Carolina receives Social Security benefits — compared with just 13% in California. As an aging state, South Carolina will be more dependent on federal programs such as Social Security in the coming decade, according to AARP.

“People want to see lower government spending, especially on the Republican side,” said Karen Kedrowski, a politics professor at Winthrop University in Rock Hill, S.C. “But when they’re asked specifically about high-dollar items, including Social Security and defense, they are not willing to accept significant cuts.”

Kedrowski’s university recently polled South Carolina Republicans to ask about reducing the deficit by making cuts to government programs: 73% of voters said they weren’t willing to have their current Social Security or Medicare benefits reduced to address budget concerns. More than half said they weren’t willing to cut defense spending either.

It’s not just wealthy Republican voters in the Palmetto State who say they eschew entitlement programs, Kedrowski said.

“There’s also a disproportionate number of low-income people who vote Republican because they respond to the populist messages, even when it is against their economic interests to do so,” she said.

Sheila Barton, 56, runs a floral shop in Pickens, a town that Rick Perry visited recently to stroll down Main Street and shake hands with store owners and residents.

“Americans don’t want a government that’s playing a bigger role in their lives,” Perry had said at a speech earlier that morning. “No one’s ever come up to me and said, ‘We sure need to have more government in our lives.'”

Barton agrees — in principle.

“There’s a lot of things that are wasteful,” she said, but when pressed to name some, she said she couldn’t really think of any off the top of her head. Defense spending should be increased, she said, and people who have paid into Social Security should receive their benefits. And local government programs need more funding, she said — she’s currently a guardian for local children through the court system.

There is some evidence that South Carolina’s opposition to government spending might further strangle the state’s already weak economy — if it leads to cuts in Social Security. Roberto Gallardo of the Southern Rural Development Center says that economies in many small towns in South Carolina are increasingly dependent on Social Security payments.

The percentage of total personal income in South Carolina coming from Social Security’s Old-Age, Survivors and Disability Insurance programs was 7.6% in 2009, up from 3.8% in 1970. South Carolina ranks eighth in the nation on the group’s Social Security Dependency Index, which measures how reliant local economies are on Social Security payments for job creation and consumer spending. Neighboring North Carolina ranked 23rd.

That means candidates have to walk a fine line here — promising to cut government to alleviate voters’ fears, while still preserving the programs that require most of the spending. How else to appeal to such voters as Clifton Anderson of Camden, who went to see Rick Santorum speak in a diner in Ridgeway?

“His ideas of downsizing government are most important to me,” said Anderson, about Santorum. He continued, in the next breath: “I also like his idea about strengthening defense.”

alana.semuels@latimes.com

Copyright © 2012, Los Angeles Times

2 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Education, Government, How do we know what we know, Rampant stupidity, War on Education, War on Smart | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Bigger ditch + higher speed = (Greece X Russia)

December 17, 2011

What to do about the economic ditch the Republicans have driven the economy into?

Campaign aides to Ron Paul, Gary Johnson and Mitt Romney advocate finding a bigger ditch and hitting the gas pedal sooner and harder.

No, seriously:  Jon Huntsman’s economics advisor, a woman with years of experience working for a balanced budget, suggested that Paul’s proposal of cutting $1 trillion from spending in 2013 lacks a great connection to reality.  Aides to the other three, after taking another toke of godknowswhat, said they could do even more cutting.

It’s as if General Washington’s physicians, interviewed December 15, 1799, claimed they could have saved Washington’s life had they bled him two or three more times — but unfortunately, he was out of blood.

At a Wednesday panel discussion hosted by the America’s Future Foundation, a club of young libertarians and conservatives in Washington who meet regularly over beer to network and debate about politics, Jennifer Pollom, Huntsman’s economic director, joined campaign aides for Gary Johnson, Ron Paul and a former Mitt Romney staffer to discuss why their candidate would best represent conservatives as the presidential nominee of the Republican Party. The real fun (by D.C. standards) started when Jack Hunter, a blogger for Paul’s presidential campaign, touted his boss’s promise to slash $1 trillion from the federal budget.

“Having been on the Budget Committee and having worked in the federal government and in the Senate for quite a while, I think a trillion dollars is kind of ludicrous,” said Pollom, who formerly served as the counsel for the Senate Republican Policy Committee. “That’s my personal opinion, that is not the stance of Governor Huntsman. We’re more concerned about tax policy right now. We’re deeply concerned about the deficit and the debt, but we’re more concerned about jobs and freezing spending where it is right now.”

That didn’t play well with the representatives for Johnson and Paul, two of the most libertarian-leaning candidates in the race. (Johnson’s plan goes further than Paul’s. He has vowed to balance the budget in his first year, which would require cutting even more than $1 trillion.)

“To call that ludicrous is actually a little surprising because this idea that we can year after year continue to spend more money than we’re taking in, to me that actually seems to be the pretty ludicrous idea from a fiscally conservative perspective,” said panelist Jonathan Bydlak, the finance director for Johnson’s campaign.

“I personally think that cutting a trillion dollars in one year off the budget–I use ‘ludicrous’ sort of loosely–but I don’t think it’s practical,” Pollom said later during the panel. “It may be an excellent aspirational dream but speaking in the real world, I don’t know that it’s actually practically going to happen.”

That’s when Derek Khanna, a panelist who worked for Mitt Romney’s finance team in 2008, jumped in.

“The idea of one trillion is not ludicrous,” Khanna said, which prompted Pollom to put her finger to her head like she was pulling the trigger of a gun. “I think that the idea of saying that being able to balance the budget is ‘ludicrous’ is kind of disturbing. We’re all here saying we support the balanced-budget amendment, but in the end we won’t support cutting a trillion dollars. It seems to be a bit disingenuous.”

What in the world could these stooges be referring to in cutting?  I can see it now:  ‘What do we need Homeland Security for, anyway?  FAA doesn’t fly any airplanes — what could possibly happen if we just shut the agency down tomorrow?  Surely we don’t need more than one aircraft carrier, one for the Pacific, and one for the Atlantic — we don’t have any territory in the Southern, Indian, or Arctic Oceans.’

You can almost hear Ron Paul, wide-eyed, explaining:  ‘President Obama is hurting the energy industry.  BP found a way to quickly get millions of barrels of oil out of ground under the Gulf of Mexico, oil we need to run industry — but Obama made them stop!’

In other news, perhaps, The Onion is considering closing down — they can’t parody this stuff any more.

3 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Economics, Government, Rampant stupidity | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Obama’s right: Saving the nation is not “class warfare”

December 17, 2011

Ross Eisenbrey laid it out at the blog of the Economics Policy Institute:

The most important part of [President Obama’s] speech in Kansas was probably his attack on the “collective amnesia” that allows some people to continue advocating the Bush administration’s tax cuts for the rich, despite their clear history of failure as a spur to job creation. Obama said:

“Remember in those years, in 2001 and 2003, Congress passed two of the most expensive tax cuts for the wealthy in history. And what did it get us? The slowest job growth in half a century. Massive deficits that have made it much harder to pay for the investments that built this country and provided the basic security that helped millions of Americans reach and stay in the middle class — things like education and infrastructure, science and technology, Medicare and Social Security.”

The president pointed out the folly of pursuing the same kinds of failed “you’re on your own” economic policies that got us into the worst recession in 75 years. Weak regulation helped cause the Great Recession. Why would anyone expect the same policies to get us out?

“Remember that in those same years, thanks to some of the same folks who are now running Congress, we had weak regulation, we had little oversight, and what did it get us? Insurance companies that jacked up people’s premiums with impunity and denied care to patients who were sick, mortgage lenders that tricked families into buying homes they couldn’t afford, a financial sector where irresponsibility and lack of basic oversight nearly destroyed our entire economy.

We simply cannot return to this brand of ‘you’re on your own’ economics if we’re serious about rebuilding the middle class in this country.”

Unsurprisingly, the right wing media, led by Fox News, wants to take us right back to the kind of Bushonomics that crashed the economy in 2007. Progressive taxation doesn’t sit well with Fox’s high-income anchors, let alone its billionaire owner, Rupert Murdoch. As our friends at Media Matters document nicely, Fox immediately launched a broadside against the president and the notion of tax fairness, misquoting him when it was convenient, and accusing him of class warfare and socialism.

One might almost lament that Obama lacks opposition in the primaries; debates featuring Republicans drive sane thought off of the news pages.  None of the Republican candidates appears to subscribe to the free enterprise economics of Milton Friedman and/or Paul Samuelson, for example.  The radical right wing, experimental economics bandied about in the debates stands perpendicular to free market economics as practiced successfully in the U.S. and other places over the past 40 years — but with every Republican candidate so far out on the radical economic scale, it might appear to a non-careful reader that they speak Mainstream.

Wholly apart from the disastrous economics of “off-budget” warfare given to us by Republicans, the policies of Republicans gave us an economic disaster in 2008.  As a nation we have not moved far enough to correct those errors, and now Republicans block the action of the consumer protection agency designed to prevent another housing bubble to burst America’s economic dreams.

Polls show Americans don’t think Obama deserves a second term.  I find it hard to believe that a majority of voters will choose to go back to the disaster that Obama hasn’t been able to fix, however.  Americans are not quite that stupid, I hope.

4 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Economics, History, President Obama | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Rick Perry promises war on homosexuals and religious freedom

December 7, 2011

Is there any other way to read this?

Perry imagines a “war on religion,” based on his bigoted, anti-liberty views and some gross disinformation about what the rules are for kids praying in school.

What are the odds that, if elected, Perry would say, “Oops, I was wrong; I won’t do what that ad suggests?”

Perry’s offensive and erroneous text:

I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m a Christian, but you don’t need to be in the pew every Sunday to know there’s something wrong in this country when gays can serve openly in the military but our kids can’t openly celebrate Christmas or pray in school.
As President, I’ll end Obama’s war on religion. And I’ll fight against liberal attacks on our religious heritage.
Faith made America strong. It can make her strong again.
I’m Rick Perry and I approve this message.

I’ll take Barney Frank over Rick Perry any day.  Barney Frank is twice the man Rick Perry is, especially in standing up for the Constitution and freedom for all Americans.

I’ll take Barbara Jordan over Rick Perry.  She was twice the person Rick Perry is.  It seems to me that Perry plays with fire when he makes an ad that targets genuine Texas heroes like Jordan.

Perry professes to be a Methodist; does he have the guts to leave the church if he disagrees with its positions so much?

Is Perry going negative just because he’s losing, or is it really going to be that dirty a campaign?  This man shouldn’t be governor of Texas, and he has no business running for president.

More:

Hey, Slacktivist, thanks for the link.

14 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Campaigns, First Amendment, Politics, Religious Freedom | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Elizabeth Warren: Grace under pressure (we need this woman in the Senate)

November 14, 2011

Here’s a woman who keeps her wits about her; no wonder Scott Brown is scared by Elizabeth Warren’s campaign:

Vodpod videos no longer available.

According to the story at Huffington Post:

BROCKTON, Mass. — Moments into a speech before volunteers here Wednesday evening, Elizabeth Warren was interrupted by a Tea Party supporter who hurled a gender-based epithet at the Senate candidate. The man, who said he’d been unemployed since February 2010, objected to Warren’s expressed affiliation with the frustrations of Occupy Wall Street, and argued that the Tea Party has been protesting Wall Street excess for longer than the nascent global movement.

The crowd tried to shout the man down, but Warren told her supporters to let him speak. “No, no, it’s alright. Let me say two things,” she said. “I’m very sorry that you’ve been out of work. I’m also very sorry that the recent jobs bill that would’ve brought 22,000 jobs to Massachusetts did not pass in the Senate.”

There’s more.  The man called her “a socialist whore;” just to irritate the Tea Party and Republicans, probably, Warren’s organization let the guy wander away, no Tazer, no fight, no handcuffs.  Warren addressed his issues and the issues that his presence highlighted.  Civil discussion of serious matters.

This is a case of Elizabeth Warren modeling the way on bringing civility to political discussion.

Other candidates, are you paying attention?  Voters?

We need this woman in the Senate, even if you’re not from Massachusetts.

More:

6 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Dissent, Politics | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Starvation crisis in North Korea (Reuters report via Al Jazeera)

October 9, 2011

Some images may be shocking to young children.  This is information you need to have.

Al Jazeera carried this report, an edited version of a report from Reuters, who somehow got video and interviews from inside North Korea, if we are to grant credence to the report.

In a hospital in Pyongyang, doctors monitor a group of weak infants, some of whom are already showing signs of malnutrition and sickness. They are the most vulnerable members of a population suffering from extreme food shortages.

According to the United Nations, one third of all children under the age of five in North Korea are malnourished, and other countries have become less interested in donating food as the “hermit kingdom” battles efforts to constrain its nuclear program.

The UN World Food Programme says public distributions are running extremely low, and they are only able to help half the people who need aid. Meanwhile, the countries rulers stage outsized military parades, and some wonder whether food donations are being siphoned off to them.

North Korea recently granted a Reuters news crew access to the country, and Al Jazeera’a Khadija Magardie reports on the plight they found.

The longer Reuters report can be viewed here (but I can’t figure out how to embed it at the Bathtub).

Climate-change aggravated severe weather adds to the serious nutrition shortages in North Korea, according to Reuters written reports.

Famine in North Korea is one more vital topic ignored by the presidential and Congressional campaigns, and conservatives in their rush to get Obama out of office.

More:

3 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Asia, Communism, Famine, Food history, foreign affairs, Politics | Tagged: , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

“A government small enough to fit in your bedroom”

September 19, 2011

I thought I’d posted this when I first saw it in July.  Can’t find it.  It deserves a wider audience, I think:  “The Michelle Bachmann Song” by Hockey Mama for Obama.

Leave a Comment » | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Humor, Politics | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Avoid death panels; let them all die

September 17, 2011

It’s horrifyingly ironic if you think about it:  Republicans opposed expanding access to the health care system with a false claim that the Democratic plan included rationing of health care in a “death panels” clause.  Completely untrue.  The bill barely passed.

But did you see what happened last week at the Republican Party’s event featuring their candidates for president?  Here a citizen responds to the Republicans:

In their silence, Republicans appear to support rolling back current health care, foregoing “death panels” as not harsh enough, and moving on to “let ’em all die.”

Tip of the old scrub brush to MoveOn.org.

5 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Campaigns, Health care, Politics, Republican Party | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Bill Clinton: Want a good economy? Gotta have good, working government

August 19, 2011

Talking Points Memo billed it as a dig at Rick Perry’s not-grounded campaign platform, but we’d all do well to listen to former President Bill Clinton’s larger point here:  A good economy for a great nation requires a good, working government, regulations and all.

The video came from Azi Paybarah, attending Monday’s breakfast of the International Association of Firefighters convention in New York City, via Politicker NY, from The Observer.

39 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Campaigns, Economics, Government, Politics, Regulation | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Perry’s lack of business experience noted — by Republicans

August 17, 2011

If you followed at all the teapot tempest over the false claims that President Obama’s cabinet lacked business experience (also here and here), this headline must have made you guffaw:

Kay Bailey Hutchison won’t endorse Rick Perry for president, says she wants someone with private-sector experience

No love lost between Hutchison and Perry.  Hutchison opposed Perry for the Republican nomination for governor of Texas in 2010.  Perry was brutal in his criticism of her, and he defeated her in the primary.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry should not count on the support of his state’s seniority senator (and his 2010 Republican gubernatorial rival) if he decides to run for president.

(Polaroid photo by Sarah Tung/Hearst Newspapers)

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Dallas, told NBC’s Andrea Mitchell today that she is looking for a Republican candidate with private-sector experience as her choice for the party’s 2012 presidential nomination.

Perry is a career politician who has held elective office since 1985.

“He certainly has got government experience,” Hutchison told Mitchell on MSNBC’s “The Daily Rundown” this morning, adding that “we need people who have been in the private sector, as well.”

The Republican senator’s comments hint strongly that she’d prefer one of the GOP candidates who has run a business: former Winter Olympics organizer (and venture capitalist) Mitt Romney, former Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain or former chemical company executive Jon Huntsman.

Hutchison said she has no immediate plans to endorse any candidate.

7 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Campaigns, Elections, History, Humor, Politics, Texas | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Texas to U.S.: Sorry about Bush. Perry is worse.

August 16, 2011

See MeetRickPerry.com.

6 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Campaigns, Elections, Humor, Politics, Texas, Texas history | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Will any Republican stand up for America?

August 12, 2011

Ezra Klein’s on-line column this morning worries me more — will any Republican stand up for America?

No, I don’t mean  lip service, I don’t mean flag lapel pins.  I mean, will any Republican stand up for the policies we need to steer through the shoals of economic woe we face in the next 60 months?

At Wonkbook Klein said:

The most telling moment of Thursday’s GOP debate wasn’t when Michele Bachmann cooly stuck a knife between Tim Pawlenty’s ribs, or when Rick Santorum plaintively begged for more airtime, or when Mitt Romney easily slipped past questions about his record on health-care reform. It was when every single GOP candidate on the stage agreed that they would reject a budget deal that was $10 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increases. Even Fox News’s Bret Baier couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing. He asked again just to make sure the assembled candidates had understood the question.

Primary debates are usually watched for what they say about the candidates, but they’re generally important for what they say about the party. This one was no different. With the notable exceptions of Ron Paul and Jon Huntsman, the candidates didn’t disagree over policy. They disagreed over fealty to policy.

Bachmann didn’t attack Pawlenty’s policy proposals. She attacked him for past statements suggesting he might believe in other policy proposals, like the individual mandate and cap-and-trade. Pawlenty’s assault on Romney took the same form. This debate wasn’t about what policies the candidates believed in. That was largely a given. This debate was about which of the candidates believed in those policies the most.

The best policy in this debate wasn’t the policy most likely to work, or the policy most likely to pass. It was the most orthodox policy. The policy least sullied by compromise. A world in which the GOP will not agree to deficit reduction with a 10:1 split between spending cuts and tax increases is a world where entitlement reform can’t happen. It’s a world where the “supercommittee” fails and the trigger is pulled, and thus a world in which $1 out of every $2 in cuts comes from the Pentagon. It’s not a world that fits what many in the GOP consider ideal policy. But it is a world in which none in the GOP need to traverse the treacherous politics of compromise.

Policies discussed weren’t mainline, capitalist economic policies, either.  They’re so far out in left field they can’t even see the pitcher’s mound from where they are.  Plus, they’re looking the wrong way.

Over and over again, [Michelle] Bachmann misstated basic facts. She said that Tim Pawlenty “implemented” cap-and-trade in Minnesota. He did no such thing. She said “we just heard from Standard Poor’s,” and “when they dropped our credit rating what they said was we don’t have an ability to repay our debt.” Simply not true.

S&P has never questioned our ability to repay our debt. That’s why we remain AA+. They have questioned whether political brinksmanship will stop us from paying our debt. The downgrade “was pretty much motivated by all of the debate about the raising of the debt ceiling,” said John Chambers, head of S&P’s sovereign ratings committee. That is to say, it was motivated by political brinksmanship from the likes of, well, Michele Bachmann.

It’s fitting that the candidate best able to resist compromise is the candidate who seems least able to correctly explain the policies at issue and the choices we face. It’s a lot easier to take a hard line if you don’t understand the consequences of your actions, and a lot simpler to belt out applause lines if you’re not slowed down by the messy complexities of the issues. But where Bachmann is leading, the other candidates are following. Mitt Romney knows perfectly well that a deal with $10 in spending cuts for every $1 in tax increases is a great deal for conservatives. What he probably doesn’t know is how he’s going to explain why he pretended otherwise when he was vying for the nomination.

Winners in the debate?  Unclear.  Losers?  You, me, and every American.

Can any Republican explain where in the world they got these nightmare economic policies?  Are they being made up on the spot?

53 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Campaigns, Economics, Elections, History, Republican Party | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

Cracks appear in Rick Santorum’s personal constitution

August 6, 2011

Rick Santorum in Iowa, Huffington Post image

Rick Santorum in Iowa, Huffington Post image

Former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum’s reluctant grip on reality appeared to be vanishing fast in a stop in Iowa, Thursday.  He said America’s schools are for indoctrination of students, and he doesn’t like the current round of indoctrination.

Geeze, this ought to be in The Onion.  Is Santorum really this disconnected from America and life?  Are there actually people out there who don’t look around for the guys in the white clothes with straight jackets and nets when they hear him say this stuff?

I don’t generally cite to The Huffington Post, but when the warning claxons go off, you ought to see if there’s danger before dismissing them as error:

Rick Santorum woose voters in Orange City, Iowa - Des Moines Register photo

Rick Santorum woos voters in Orange City, Iowa - Des Moines Register photo

During a stop in Iowa on Thursday, Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum said that “schools indoctrinate our children,” the Des Moines Register reports.

“You wonder why young people can vote and flock for a guy like Barack Obama and say, if you look at the surveys, that socialism is better than capitalism — well, that’s because they don’t understand America,” he explained, according to the Register. “I said ‘indoctrination’ and I meant it,” he said.

What survey does he have that claims any group in America, other than the Tea Party or the American Communist Party, say socialism is better than capitalism?  Since curricula in every state teach the opposite, the existence of such a poll would be powerful evidence of critical thinking powers in students that most teachers would not attest to.

Maybe more important, perhaps we should  worry about just what all those thousands of nice Baptist ladies are teaching our kids in Texas, eh?  Not to mention the Lutheran ladies in Iowa.  Santorum is sniping at teachers, but if you look at the demographics, it makes little sense.  Teachers are, like the rest of America, about 90% Christian, God-fearing, flag-waving American patriots.

Well, nothing Santorum says makes much sense, does it?  Santorum lent support to the War on Education.

Santorum argued that the country’s education system is leaving students with an insufficient grasp of history. His remarks come with the widely-anticipated Ames Straw poll — a table-setter event for next year’s Iowa caucuses — less than two weeks away.

What in the hell do the schools in Ames, Iowa, look like, that Santorum can say that stuff about them?

By the way, if people learned history accurately in high school, Rick Santorum wouldn’t stand a chance in any election today.  But I digress.

The Des Moines Register article adds the details that Santorum made note of recent testing that shows American kids don’t know enough about American history — always the case, by the way — and that a college prof from Kansas said he gives his students the test required of immigrants applying for citizenship, and most can’t pass the test.

I’m game:  Let’s give the test to Santorum.  If he doesn’t pass, though, we can’t deport him.  We have no vehicles capable of getting to Mars.

HP offers information that may explain Santorum’s insanity:  The same article notes he’s touring Iowa in two vans with his seven children.  In this heat?

Does the Iowa division of child protective services know about this?  How about the division that worries about children torturing their parents?

14 Comments | 2012 Campaigns, 2012 Elections, Campaigns, Capitalism, Education, Education quality, War on Education | Tagged: , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Ed Darrell

« Previous Entries
Next Entries »