RSS

Tag Archives: Politics

72% support raising taxes on the rich?

11 May

So, the Republican Tea Party (GOTP) members of Congress keep preaching they must cut, slash, and cut spending deeper, or the country will find itself in dire straights, with dogs and cats living together … blah, blah, blah … problem is most Americans don’t see it that way …

The way they do see it – according to a Washington Post/ABC poll – is the way the President sees it, lowering the debt by first raising taxes on the rich.

Funniest thing about the poll was that the numbers of people surveyed who claimed to support cuts to Medicare and Medicaid — 21 percent and 30 percent, respectively — is close to the same percentage of people who regularly rot their brains on non-stop viewing of FOX PAC.

But, back to the intelligent people; seventy-eight percent of the A+ crowd opposed cuts to Medicare, while 69 percent opposed Medicaid cuts.

And which plan, between the President’s, and Paul – aka Eddie the Munster – Ryan’s was the most popular? Well, that would be the President’s, the plan where the government offsets the debt by raising taxes on Americans who make $250,000 or more annually; in fact, of those surveyed, 72 percent said they support tax increases on people with incomes of more than $250,000, including 54 percent who strongly support them. Twenty-seven percent are opposed, including 17 percent strongly, gee once again, that would be the ditto heads and FOX & Friend groupies.

Truth is Americans, all Americans, are going to have to suck it up and expect some cuts coupled with some tax increases; but increases need to start with those who can most afford it – that’s the top 2% – and cuts need to come from the one sector which can best absorb it – the sacred cow of defense spending. Another good way to help raise revenue would be to take away subsidies to corporate America – aka the oil companies – and change free trade agreements to fair trade agreements.

 
1 Comment

Posted by on May 11, 2011 in 2012 Election, Health Care, Medicare, Politics, Taxes, Tea Party

 

Tags: , ,

Limbaugh Is Wrong Again?

11 May

During one of his radio shows late last month, the “leader” of the GOTP, Rush Limbaugh claimed the President was going to start cutting Medicare, start the “death panels”, and the rationing of health care, and this was why seniors in USA Today had been recently granted a waiver.

“Because it’s drastic. It’s rationing. And it wasn’t supposed to happen till 2013. But now, you know, it’s happening before the election. That’s not the way it was supposed to happen. It’s been elevated some — or sped up. So here comes a waiver for the seniors,” Limbaugh claimed.

He then went on to praise the Paul Ryan plan, stating, “There’s not one rules change under Paul Ryan.” And how under the President’s plan changes were drastic and immediate, “But under Obama, it’s immediate. And not to be repetitive and redundant, but to be repetitive and redundant, it was just yesterday that Obama granted another waiver to senior citizens to keep them away from his IPAB board, who could have denied them coverage for — just because they wanted to.”

Wow, really Rush? For someone who claims to be 99.9% accurate you sure get a lot a stuff not just wrong, but really wrong; but of course when you’re making stuff up it’s hard to keep truth and reality from lies and fables isn’t it Rush?

First off, the “waivers” you’re making such a big deal about had nothing to do with the new Health Care Law, and everything to do with existing Medicare Advantage.

In fact those “waivers” were made to help those seniors – millions of them enrolled in popular private insurance plans offered through Medicare – by awarding quality bonuses to hundreds of Medicare Advantage plans rated merely average. The $6.7 billion infusion could head off service cuts to the more than half the roughly 11 million Medicare Advantage enrollees are in plans rated average.

Not rationing at all Rushdie, but actually awarding quality bonuses. Let’s see, that means one of two things, first, you just don’t know what you’re talking about, or second, you’re a liar. Well, there’s a third option, which actually suits you best, that you don’t know what you’re talking about, and you’re a liar.

But, wait for it folks because Rush wasn’t through spinning his tale of woe and death panels in his effort to continually scare his ever aging audience, “Now, folks, you are going to be hearing — IPAB, I-P-A-B, Independent Payment Advisory Board — you’re going to be hearing a lot more about IPAB in the days and weeks ahead,” Rusty said. “And I want to tell you today, what IPAB is. IPAB is the death panels. That’s all you need to know, don’t doubt me. IPAB is where the rationing will take place.”

And he continued his bloviating, “These are the death panels. These are the people that are gonna decide who gets coverage and how much coverage will be paid for. Ergo the rationing. Congressional approval? There will be none. Whatever this board decides case by case happens by presidential fiat.

“They’re there. It’s one. There is one death panel. It is IPAB. The Independent Payment Advisory Board. Current Medicare recipients, individual cases, decided on by these 15 people. Two things. Will there be coverage or not? And if so, how much will they be paid.”

Once again Rusty, YOU”RE WRONG! The IPAB Is actually prohibited from rationing, and according to the New England Journal of Medicine the Affordable Care Act “Establishes Specific Target Growth Rates For Medicare And Charges The IPAB With Ensuring That Medicare Expenditures Stay Within These Limits.”

In its 26 May 2010 edition, NEJM states, “Provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (now being referred to as the Affordable Care Act, or ACA) create an Independent Payment Advisory Board (IPAB) to meet the need to oversee health care system costs. The legislation establishes specific target growth rates for Medicare and charges the IPAB with ensuring that Medicare expenditures stay within these limits. The IPAB must also make recommendations to Congress as to how to control health care costs more generally.

“The board is charged with developing specific detailed proposals to reduce per capita Medicare spending in years when spending is expected to exceed target levels, beginning with 2015. The DHHS must implement these proposals unless Congress adopts equally effective alternatives. The board is also charged with submitting to Congress annual detailed reports on health care costs, access, quality, and utilization. Finally, the IPAB must submit to Congress recommendations regarding ways of slowing the growth in private national health care expenditures.”

Gee, who to believe? Rusty Limbaugh, who dropped out of college after the first semester, unable to pass even ball room dancing, or the New England Journal of Medicine?

But hold on there’s additional expert commentary – far from what Rush ever gives. The Kaiser Family Foundation while attempting to explain the current health care reform has said, that the IPAB cannot “Ration Care, Increase Taxes, Change Medicare Benefits Or Eligibility, Increase Beneficiary Premiums And Cost-Sharing Requirement, Or Reduce Low Income Subsidies Under Part D.” From KFF’s “Explaining Health Reform: Medicare and the New Independent Payment Advisory Board”.

That sound like it can’t do what the fellow from Missouri is claiming. Once again who to believe? The guy who abused illegally obtained prescription drugs to the point he destroyed his own hearing, or the Kaiser Family Foundation?

Kaiser goes on the clarify that “… the Board is prohibited from submitting proposals that would ration care, increase taxes, change Medicare benefits or eligibility, increase beneficiary premiums and cost-sharing requirements, or reduce low-income subsidies under Part D. Prior to 2019, the Board is also prohibited from recommending changes in payments to providers and suppliers that are scheduled to receive a reduction in their payment updates in excess of a reduction due to productivity adjustments, as specified in the health reform law. The law establishes specific rules and deadlines for Congressional consideration of the Board’s recommendations, and specific timelines and procedures for Congressional action on alternative proposals to achieve equivalent savings.”

This is the part Limbaugh listeners never get. Rush tells you every day, “Don’t worry about looking stuff up, or checking into things, that’s what I’m here for”. But he isn’t telling the truth, he isn’t right 99.9% of the time, he’s frequently never right, or even close to right. As said earlier, Rush either doesn’t know what he’s talking about or he’s lying. Odds are it’s the latter.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on May 11, 2011 in Health Care, Lunatics, Politics, Right Wing Crazies, Right Wing Radio, Tea Party

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Conservatives Attack Obama For Referring To Birtherism As “Silliness”

04 May

Seconds after President Obama concluded his press conference on the release of his long form birth certificate the right-wing media talking heads began attacking him like a murder of angry crows, and all because he dared to call birtherism “silliness” – well, what is it if not silliness? – but then they – right-wing bloviators – really got steamed when he and the First Lady dared to go to Chicago to film an interview for Oprah, followed by fundraising events. And who do ya think was first out of the gates with an attack? Why it was the fine folks at FOX PAC of course.

“The President Said He Doesn’t Have The Time For Such Silliness … [And] As Soon As He Said It, He Got On A Plane … To Do The Oprah Show,” talking head Charles Krauthammer said. “The president is right on this … this is not a serious issue,” however? “[w]e saw how the president said he doesn’t have the time for such silliness … and as soon as he said it, he got on a plane to Chicago to do the Oprah show.”

Fellow FOX Droid Bret Baier added in response, “And then [he] went to New York for some fundraising.”

Ouch, boy does that hurt. Really? This is what you two have to say? The President calls birthers silly, but what’s more silly in the eyes of FOX PAC contributors? Giving an interview to Oprah and attending fund raisers? That’s it? That’s all ya got? And of course, no Republican President ever attended anything as silly as a fund raiser …

But then the little Leprechaun, Sean Hannity, chimed in “[Obama] Said ‘No Time For This Silliness,” But “He Literally Today Went To Fundraisers [And] Taped Oprah.”

The President “literally” taped a show? He didn’t figuratively tape it?If he does something Sean, then it would be literally. You keep using this word, I don’t think it means what you think it means.

Hannity didn’t stop with this one attack however, the little guy devoted several segments to discussing the president’s release of his long form birth certificate.  During one segment, he said, “The president literally today went to fundraisers, taped Oprah, you know, he said, ‘no time for this silliness,’ he has a lot of important things to do. I don’t think taping Oprah and playing golf and his other extracurricular activities is more important than, say, fixing the economy.”Now see, there you go using that word again, he “literally” went to fundraisers. Gee, Sean, you “literally” keep using the word “literally”.

But,you know, you’re so right Sean, fixing the economy is the most important thing, and how many bills has the Republican Tea Party (GOTP) controlled House introduced with the goal of fixing the economy? (cue chirping crickets) Anyone?

Bueller?

Hannity?

Hello?

Is this thing on?

That’s right, none. But they have had plenty of time to introduce more than 100 bills aimed at ensuring federal money isn’t used to fund abortions; correcting something that is already prohibited.

Of course no FOX PAC attack would be complete with out the brain trust of FOX & FRIENDS chiming in, and chime in they did, spending several segments bashing President Obama for referring to birtherism conspiracies as “silliness” and then of course his having attended fundraisers and taping an interview for Oprah.

Steve Doocy daringly led the FOX & FRIENDS charge, “That’s right, in the 9:00 hour yesterday, Gretchen [Carlson, co-host], right here on the Fox News Channel, in fact, during a Donald Trump press conference, the President of the United States released his long form birth certificate. He was clearly frustrated. At one point, he said, ‘We do not have time for this silliness. We’ve got better stuff to do. I’ve got better stuff to do. We’ve got big problems to solve.’ Said we didn’t have time for silliness — and then he left to be on Oprah.”

Then in charges the sports guy with his really huge intellect, Brian Kilmeade, “It’s going to be on the last Oprah show, so that was it. He went and taped that. But then it was back to business. Three fundraisers in New York City. So … ”

“No time for silliness,” Doocy chimed.

“Yeah, no time for silliness,” Kilmeade rejoined. “Had to go back to work to campaign when he doesn’t have an opponent in the Democratic primary and won’t have a Republican opponent for about a year, but he wanted to raise money, and he did, in the millions of dollars.”

Riveting journalism there boys, truly riveting. Do you guys stay up all night thinking this stuff up? Because it looks like you just pull it out of somewhere, I don’t know where, but …

But wait, these two Einsteins were followed by the queen of silliness, Michelle Malkin.

“[H]ere we have him — had him have his press conference in DC lecturing us about the need to be serious, and then he turned his heels and immediately went to that serious venue, Oprah Winfrey. And then off to New York City for three very serious campaign fund-raisers. He’s on the job.”

You guys are so on top of this, thanks for keeping the trailer court crowd up to date on what is really important out there. I mean, how would they know what to think about this if you three hadn’t been right in the thick of this story?

Seriously, the President of the United States, the first Black President, is hounded for years to present his birth certificate, just to prove, you know, that he’s really an American, and you three have no problem with that? Jim Crow mean anything to you? Or do you think it’s a brand of whiskey?

But why stop with the morons of FOX PAC when we’ve got over a dozen GOTP members of Congress who are either birthers or won’t denounce the idea that Obama wasn’t born in the United States. So-called lawmakers in at least 10 states have introduced birther bills this year. But, hold on, self-appointed leaders of the birther movement are now saying that even this latest gesture by Obama isn’t enough. Yeah, but it’s not silly, or racist, or anything. Just because none of them will accept any document doesn’t mean they’re racist. No it means they are racist and ignorant. C’mon people, none of the previous 43 presidents has ever been asked to produce proof they were born here, only this guy. Why? First, he’s black, and we can’t have one of them in the White House, and second, he has a Muslim father, and we really can’t have one of them in the White House …

Anyone who is engaging in this conspiracy needs to look deep into their soul and ask why this matters. It isn’t because they love America, or because they love the Constitution, it’s because they hate having a Black man as their president.

There is no other logical explanation here. If you are among the group of people who proudly call themselves “birthers” you’re a racist. Sorry, but there it is.

 
2 Comments

Posted by on May 4, 2011 in 2012 Election, FOX PAC, Lunatics, Politics, Racism, Tea Party

 

Tags: , , , , ,

Give Bush Credit?

03 May

So, conservatives believe we should give George W Bush some credit? OK, here goes nothing …

Thanks for appointing such extremely incompetent people to head your intelligence/national security teams; you know the ones, the folks who couldn’t have gotten a scouting report for a pee wee football team right, much less figure out if Bin Laden was a threat, and who didn’t think it was odd for a group of Arab men to want to learn how to fly jet airliners but who didn’t want to learn how to land them …

Thanks for allowing those same terrorists to attack the United States on our own soil, killing close to 3,000 innocents …

Thanks for expanding the Federal Government beyond any other previous president’s dreams …

Thanks for creating/expanding federal agencies beyond all scope – DHS and TSA…

Thanks for fighting two wars – one of which was unnecessary and illegal – without raising taxes, and for paying for those wars “off budget” thereby exploding the federal debt and deficit …

Thanks for giving the OK to US troops and CIA ops to violate our own laws, and international laws, and to torture prisoners …

Thanks for unlawfully and unconstitutionally suspending habeas corpus …

Thanks for opening secret CIA prisons in former Soviet Block nations …

Thanks for giving no bid contracts to Cheney’s homeys in Iraq and Afghanistan – Halliburton ring any bells? – and for spending $2 billion per week there …

Thanks for allowing Cheney to decide your administration’s energy policy in his secret meetings with oil executives who stripped the guts out of regulations so badly the oil industry turned around and rewarded us all with the BP Deep Water Horizon spill in the Gulf …

Thanks for your ever so inspiring leadership during one of the worse natural disasters in American history, and for appointing a horse breeder to over see FEMA … “heck of a job Bushy!”

Thanks for driving the economy off the cliff …

Thanks for those tax cuts, especially for the ones at the top, you know those top 2% who were going to use their cuts to create jobs … um, still looking, and waiting for those jobs to be created … what’s that? They created millions of jobs, problem is they’re overseas …

There ya go, credit given where it was deserved … I wish I could list a whole bunch of positives concerning the Bush presidency, but I can’t think of any … W was one of the worse presidents in American history, and that’s really saying something …

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on May 3, 2011 in War on Terror

 

Tags: , , , ,

Huckabee uses Holocaust to make point at NRA Convention?

30 Apr


Well, the Huckleberry is at it again. During a speech at the annual NRA convention he called himself a “gun-clinger and a God-clinger” while never talking about his plans to maybe, possibly, sort-of run for the Republican Tea Party (GOTP) presidential nomination next year.

Of course the Huckster’s comments were supposed to be a slap at a remark President Obama once made about conservatives clinging to their guns and religion.

But wait, the quick witted Huckles also said although the President has apparently helped gun owners since becoming President – such as allowing them to pack weapons on Amtrak trains and in federal parks – it wasn’t because he was their friend, and that attacks against gun owner’s rights would speed up if he – Obama – were re-elected. Of course, in true right-wing crazy world fashion Huckster didn’t elaborate on his claims, and he didn’t need to – wink, wink, nudge, nudge …

Huckleberry appealed to the far right-wing NRA membership by saying he’d come to the convention in Pittsburgh not to run for president but simply to “celebrate America and celebrate its values” – including God, family, and a Second Amendment meant to safeguard freedom, not just hunting and target-shooting. Yep, he had come to take part in celebrating God, family and guns; because you know what they say, “the family that shoots at other families together, stays together.”

But of course he just couldn’t leave it at that, after all if Michelle Bachmann was going to use the holocaust to attack tax increase, than Huckles couldn’t be out done, and he used Nazi Germany’s murder of six million Jews to suggest the next election – in 2012 – would determine the future of the country. And to illustrate his point he told a story about a comment his daughter wrote in a guest book after his family visited a Holocaust memorial in Israel years ago.

“Why didn’t somebody do something?” Huckabee said she wrote.

By these comments, just as Crazy Michelle had done, Mikey also tried to portray the current administration as being as bad as Nazi Germany, and the president as being Adolph Hitler. The inference was that we – today’s generation – shouldn’t have our children and children asking, “Why didn’t someone stand up to this evil President who took away our guns? Why?”

Considering Bachmann and Huckabee are running high in GOTP polls tells us that we – today’s generation – should be concerned with answering the question of some future generation, “Why didn’t someone stop these lunatics from running and winning?”

Of course, thank God, most Americans see through this far-right extremism and aren’t buying it. But it plays well to crowds like the NRA, Tea Party and Becks-R-Us.

 
1 Comment

Posted by on April 30, 2011 in 2012 Election, Guns, Lunatics, Politics, Right Wing Crazies, Tea Party

 

Tags: , , , ,

Bachmann Compares the Holocaust to Tax Increases?

30 Apr

In a political speech to a group of Republican Tea Partiers GOTP, made in Manchester, N.H., Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann told her audience

Bachmann said how she remembered – as a child – learning about the Holocaust and wondering if her mother had done anything to stop it. She said she was shocked to hear that many Americans weren’t aware that millions of Jews had died until after World War II ended, and then she actually had the gall to claim the GOTP’s boogey man of today’s so-called loss of “economic liberty” young Americans are supposedly facing is another “flash point of history” in which the younger generation may ask similar questions about what their elders did to prevent them from facing a huge tax burden.

“I tell you this story because I think in our day and time, there is no analogy to that horrific action,” she said, referring to the Holocaust. “But only to say, we are seeing eclipsed in front of our eyes a similar death and a similar taking away. It is this disenfranchisement that I think we have to answer to.”

So, wait a minute Congresswoman, you’re claiming you’re not making an analogy to that horrific action – the holocaust – but in the next breath you’re also claiming that we’re “seeing eclipsed in front of our eyes a similar death”? Which death are you referring to Congresswoman, when you say it’s “similar”?

You’re crazy and you’re a liar. You are talking to a group of far right-wing Tea Partiers and you’re making comparisons of the holocaust to taxes?

The Crazy One continued by claiming the current generation of Americans “just entering the work force now” could eventually see “75 percent of their earnings sucked up by income taxes, Social Security and Medicare”. She also said those young workers could one day ask “what people were doing while watching quite literally our economic liberty pulled out from under us?”

“The question comes down to this: what will you say to that next generation about what you did to make sure that wouldn’t be their fate?” she said.

Well, I for one will tell my children and grandchildren I did all I could to make sure people like you never saw the inside of the Oval Office because you’re not only a liar, you’re an insane, crazy liar who should only be looking at the inside of a rubber room, while wearing a nice tight straight jacket.

You really believe it’s OK to compare one of the most horrendous events in history to anything going on in America today? You’re also no doubt comparing President Obama, in a strictly non-analogous way to Adolph Hitler? You’re crazy show plays really well with your equally crazy followers, but thank God the majority, meaning more than 75% of the rest of us don’t live with all of you in the Twilight Zone. All of this aside, PLEASE RUN IN 2012. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE RUN!

 
1 Comment

Posted by on April 30, 2011 in 2012 Election, Lunatics, Politics, Right Wing Crazies, Tea Party

 

Tags: , , , ,

Trump says Obama wasn’t qualified for Ivy League?

25 Apr

So, let me get this straight, Donald Trump said President Barack Obama had been a poor student who did not deserve to be admitted to the Ivy League universities he attended? Donald Trump, who attended such prestigious colleges as the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, and who then filed for bankruptcy multiple times, is now baselessly questioning the President’s educational credentials? Trumper offered absolutely no proof for his claim but said he would continue to press the matter as he has the legitimacy of the president’s birth certificate; which means he will continue to spin fairy tales and pull contrived stories from his fourth point of contact – also know as his hair.

“I heard he was a terrible student, terrible. How does a bad student go to Columbia and then to Harvard?” Trump said in an interview with The Associated Press. “I’m thinking about it, I’m certainly looking into it. Let him show his records.”

I’m concerned that you’re considered a serious contender for the GOP nomination, and that your hair is natural. Let’s see the roots. What kind of nonsense is this? Now we want to see a candidate’s birth certificate and transcripts? What’s next Trumper? You’re going to demand to see his shot records? Are you eventually going to have your crack team looking into if he’s really black?

Actually Trumper, President Obama graduated from Columbia University in New York in 1983 with a degree in political science after transferring from Occidental College in California. He then attended Harvard Law School, where he graduated magna cum laude 1991 and was the first black president of the Harvard Law Review. Less than 20% of students graduating from Harvard do so as magna cum laude. What did you graduate at Wharton Don?

Did you graduate summa cum laude?

Did you graduate magna cum laude?

Did you graduate cum laude?

Or was it just see ya laude?

In an interview with the Associated Press, Trump said President Obama’s refusal to release his college grades were part of a pattern of concealing information about him.

“I have friends who have smart sons with great marks, great boards, great everything and they can’t get into Harvard,” Trump said. “We don’t know a thing about this guy. There are a lot of questions that are unanswered about our president.”

Whoa there Wiggy, “there are a lot of questions that are unanswered about our president?” Well, how about unanswered questions about you Trumper?

Such as, how does someone who attended a military school until graduating in 1964 and graduating from college in 1968 avoid service in Vietnam? Why did you not serve Don? Enquiring minds would like to know.

Why have you been married three times? Don’t you possess any people skills? Or are you the typical family values conservative who has a wife and a mistress, ala Newt, Ensign, etc?

What’s your real worth; not that imaginary worth or that vastly over inflated self worth, but your true financial worth? Or are you a bankrupt pauper trying desperately to stay one step ahead of your creditors?

Is there a real person under that piece of taxidermy?

Are you “running” for the GOP nomination because you believe in America, or because you believe “there’s a sucker born every minute”?

Fact is Trump you’re a mediocre business man who’s filed for both personal and business bankruptcy multiple times; you’re a mediocre husband who’s been divorced multiple times; you’re a mediocre reality show host looking to boost his ratings; and you’re a publicity whore. Now go away.

 
1 Comment

Posted by on April 25, 2011 in 2012 Election, Lunatics, Politics, Right Wing Crazies, Tea Party

 

Tags: , ,

Arizona Governor vetoes ‘birther’ bill?

19 Apr

I honestly never thought I’d ever have to say something nice about Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, but on Monday she vetoed a bill that would have required President Barack Obama and other presidential candidates to prove their U.S. citizenship before their names could appear on a ballot in the state.

Opponents had warned the bill would give another black eye to Arizona after last year’s hullabaloo over the state’s illegal immigration enforcement law.

Brewer said she was mainly troubled that the bill empowered Arizona’s secretary of state – one individual – to judge the qualifications of all candidates when they filed to run for office. Brewer had served as Arizona’s secretary of state before becoming the Governor.

“I do not support designating one person as the gatekeeper to the ballot for a candidate, which could lead to arbitrary or politically motivated decisions,” she said. “In addition, I never imagined being presented with a bill that could require candidates for president of the greatest and most powerful nation on Earth to submit their ‘early baptismal circumcision certificates’ among other records to the Arizona secretary of state … This is a bridge too far.”

But “birthers” – almost exclusively members of the Tea Party – claim there’s no proof Obama was born in the United States, and he is therefore ineligible to be president, even though Hawaii officials have certified Obama was born in that state.

The Arizona bill would have required political parties and presidential candidates to hand in affidavits declaring the candidate’s citizenship and age. It also would have required the candidate’s birth certificate and a sworn statement saying where the candidate has lived for 14 years.

And what if the candidates had been unable – or unwilling – to conform with this new law? Well, if it couldn’t be determined whether candidates were eligible to appear on the ballot, the secretary of state could keep the names of those candidates off the ballot if she didn’t believe the candidates met the citizenship requirement. There were no provisions in the bill providing an appeals process for a candidate whose name was kept off the ballot.

The bill’s sponsor, Republican Rep. Carl Seel of Phoenix, said he was disappointed by the veto. It would have been reasonable to have the secretary of state — the state’s top election officer — decide whether a candidate had adequately documented his or her qualifications, he said.

Yeah, one person, deciding if someone could be on the state’s ballot would have been just peachy. There’s no way someone would have ever manipulated circumstances at all. Once again, just how stupid do you think we are?

Because the bill would have required candidates for all offices to submit documentation of their qualifications, he said, “it would have been excellent reform.”

An excellent reform for whom Mr. Seel? This is such a transparently clumsy move it’s laughable, thank goodness you underestimated your Governor, and thank goodness she did the right thing.

 
1 Comment

Posted by on April 19, 2011 in 2012 Election, Lunatics, Politics, Tea Party

 

Tags: , , ,

Santorum enters 2012 White House race?

19 Apr

Former Republican Tea Party (GOTP) Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum is setting up a fundraising committee allowing him to take those crucial baby steps toward a 2012 presidential campaign.

Santorum, who significantly lacks the name recognition and fundraising organization of his better-known rivals, is a favorite among the right wing of the GOTP primarily because of his anti-gay and anti-abortion stands. He recently claimed America’s Social Security funding issue was due to too many abortions in America.

“It’s time for America to be America again — an America that rewards innovation and hard work, that stands by our allies instead of our enemies, that protects even the most vulnerable of our society, and an America that says every life is to be cherished,” Santorum told supporters in an email that was sent as he announced his plans on Fox News Channel. “That’s what I believe in and that’s why I’m taking this next step in a possible run for president.”

It’s time for America to be America again? What country have we been? Or is this a new twist on the same old theme, “We’ve got to take America back”?

Of course, “an America that rewards innovation and hard work” is Tea Party code for “we’ve got to continue tax cuts for the wealthy and cut social spending to those welfare queens driving Cadillacs”.

“… an America that stands by our allies instead of our enemies”. Is Tea Party code for, “… an America where we bomb first and ask questions later, an America where we tell our allies, ‘It’s our way or the highway.’”

And,  “… an America that protects even the most vulnerable of our society, and an America that says every life is to be cherished,” is the Holy Grail for the far right wing religious fringe which bases all of its voting decisions on abortion; so, woman, don’t even think of having an abortion in Santorum’s America. If you’re raped, too bad! If you might die having that baby, too bad! There are no abortions in Santorum’s America, no matter what!

On Gay and Lesbian issues Santorum made headlines in 2003 when he declared, “If the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual (gay) sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything.”

After taking a lot of heat for his avowal, Santorum released a statement, wherein he did not dispute the accuracy of the quote, but criticized the AP and the “liberal” media for “misleading” the story.

“I am a firm believer that all are equal under the Constitution,” he said. “My comments should not be construed in any way as a statement on individual lifestyles.”

But, wait for it, according to unedited excerpts of the taped interview released the same day, by The Associated Press, Santorum spoke at length about homosexuality, and he made clear he did not approve of “acts outside of traditional heterosexual relationships.”

His views on both abortion and homosexuality are based on his Christianity, and that’s what is the most troubling about candidates like Santorum. It’s this attitude that pushing one’s so-called far right Christian values into the arena of public office is OK, but no one else’s views are permitted. For candidates like Santorum there is no separation between Church and State, unless you’re a Muslim. For the far right Christians of the Tea Party movement Islamic Sharia law is abhorrent, but Christian Sharia law is fine. Fortunately, Santorum’s appeal is fairly limited to the far right, and that areas already pretty crowded with Palin, Bachmann and Huckleberry.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on April 19, 2011 in 2012 Election

 

Tags: , , , , , ,

Barbour’s Medicaid claim, more than a little off the mark?

18 Apr

“Our rolls dropped from 750,000 to 580,000 in the first couple of years,” Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour crowed last week on Capitol Hill, referring to alleged Medicaid enrollment trends after he took office in January 2004. If it had even an ounce of truth, that would be a whopping 22.7 percent decline! There’s just one small problem, the potential 2012 GOTP presidential candidate’s numbers are misleading; at least according to statistics provided by his own administration.

Of course there’s nothing new in a conservative candidate playing fast and loose with numbers, and that’s just what Boss Barbour did both while speaking in Washington and later while pressing the flesh with voters in the early primary state of New Hampshire.

The Division of Medicaid inside the Mississippi Governor’s Office, changed the method it used for counting Medicaid enrollment in 2006, almost midway into his first term. OK, so what? Well, Barbour’s numbers only come close to working if he uses a beginning figure from the old counting method and an end figure from the new method – a huge, colossal, big time apples-to-oranges comparison.

Under the old method, some Medicaid recipients were counted more than once in a single reporting period. For example, if a person dropped off the Medicaid rolls, for whatever reason, and re-enrolled during the same month, that counted as two enrollments rather than one.  Under the new method, adopted by Barbour’s administration, the duplicate statistics for enrollment are eliminated; so when a person drops off the rolls and later signs back up in the same month, it only counts as one enrollment rather than two.

Why change the method on how enrollments were counted? No one knows for sure – or at least that’s what Boss Barbour’s people are claiming. But here’s a theory. What if he did it for the very reason he’s trying to exploit right now, so the numbers would drop, and drop dramatically, and then he could claim to be the Medicaid Messiah of the far right?

According to Mississippi Medicaid spokesman Francis Rullan, if someone uses the old method of counting, then Mississippi’s average monthly Medicaid enrollment during fiscal 2004 was 768,004. Barbour took office midway through that year. Applying the old method to today’s numbers, the March 2011 enrollment was 741,000, Rullan said. That’s a drop of 27,004, or 3.5 percent, in Medicaid enrollment since Barbour took office, not the 22.7% the GOTP hopeful is pushing.

Now, let me see, is there a difference there? Well, yeah … there’s a big difference between claiming a 22.7% drop and a 3.5% supposed drop.

But wait for it…

Iif someone uses the new method of counting, then figuring from when Barbour took office in January 2004, and Mississippi’s Medicaid enrollment was 574,852. After fluctuating up, down and then back up, enrollment hit 633,543 in January 2011. Any basic statistics class can figure this out; it’s an increase of 58,691, or 10.2 percent, during Barbour’s first seven years in office. AN INCREASE! Not the 22.7% decrease he’s claiming, but a 10.2% INCREASE!

Boss Barbour is a LIAR! Or at best, he’s a flim flam man, a con artist, a charlatan! He’s the living breathing epitome of today’s GOTP candidate.

Who cares if he’s a liar, making stuff up as he goes along? He’s white, male, southern, conservative, and Christian! And that’s all that matters to the right wing fringe – aka the Tea Party – controlling today’s GOTP. Let’s see, a man who purposefully manipulates numbers so he comes across as the greatest thing in conservatism since the Gipper. Is he electable? Not to the vast majority of voters who don’t worship at the icon of conservatism. Which, thank goodness means he may appeal to the right wing nut jobs – aka the Tea Party – but to the rest of America he’ll come across as the man he is, Boss Barbour.

 
Leave a comment

Posted by on April 18, 2011 in 2012 Election, Politics, Right Wing Crazies

 

Tags: , , ,

← Older posts
Newer posts →