Tea Party

CONSPIRACY: Republicans Want The IRS To Go After The Tea Party

Posted by on February 18, 2014 at 3:43 pm. 3 Comments :

It’s hard to know how to present the discussion that took place this weekend on Fox News. During their recurring segment on Political Insiders, Fox contributor Pat Caddell floated his theory that it is Republicans who are responsible for the alleged targeting of Tea Party groups by the IRS (video below).

False Flag

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Caddell: The establishment Republicans want the IRS to go after the Tea Party. Got it? They want to go after the Tea Party. Because the Tea Parties are an outside threat to their power hold. And, I’m telling you, the lobbying, consulting class of the Republican party, the Republican leadership, who have been attacking the Tea Parties and alienating them, they want the IRS doing this.

If that’s true, then Caddell has uncovered a clandestine plot by the GOP to sabotage their strongest conservative allies and most reliable Republican activists and voters. Did the Republicans infiltrate the IRS and orchestrate a strategy to deny Tea Partiers tax-exempt status? Did they conduct sham hearings in the House, led by the crusading committee chair (and recidivist criminal) Darrel Issa, all the while maneuvering secretly to oppress Tea Party organizations and cast the blame on Democrats? It’s not unlike a scenario I mockingly offered last year that accused the GOP of a False Flag Operation.

It’s kind of a brilliant plan that would stifle intra-party rivals while putting Democratic foes in a negative light. And there are elements of the story that could be corroboration for such a plot. For instance, it turns out that the IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, and Lois Lerner, the head of the agency’s Tax-Exempt Organizations division, were Republicans hired by George W. Bush. So it never made sense that they would be engaged in a conspiracy to help Democrats silence the Tea Party.

On the other hand, Caddell could be in the throes of severe dementia resulting in his imagining a wild conspiracy wherein the GOP is just another enemy of the patriots waving tea bags around. If his musings hold weight, should we expect Issa to convene new hearings indicting Republicans for their complicity in the alleged scandal? For that matter, can we expect apologies from Issa, and dozens of other Republican politicians and pundits, who falsely accused the Democrats of conspiring against the Tea Party?

So which is it? Is Caddell breaking news or smoking crack? It’s often hard to tell with many of the ludicrous theories that waft from the halls of Fox News.

Oy Vey: Tea Party Xenophobes Think ‘E Pluribus Unum’ Is English

Posted by on February 9, 2014 at 1:51 pm. 20 Comments :

The rightist wing of the Republican Party (aka Tea Party) has never been shy about making fools of themselves, particularly with regard to popular culture. An advertisement by Cheerios that featured a biracial family was a recent example of this as the conservative wackos went ballistic over a tweet that correctly predicted they would hate the ad. Following that, Coca-Cola incited wingnut rage by committing blasphemy with a multilingual rendition of “America the Beautiful” during the Superbowl.

Not content to growl menacingly at heart warming celebrations of America’s diversity, Tea Party factions are now claiming that their bigoted tantrums have won them a victory over the liberal multiculturalists in charge of the international soda conspiracy.

Breitbart News is reporting that Coke has “surrendered” to the Tea Party after complaints that their commercial offended right-thinking conservative xenophobes who are unable to tolerate people who show their love for America in a variety of languages.

Breitbart Tea Party Coke

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It is the evidence of this surrender that is so strikingly preposterous. The Coke ad was reworked a bit when it was broadcast during the opening ceremonies of the Olympics. A short segment was added to the beginning of the ad with the words “E Pluribus Unum. Out of many, one.” It is that modification that the BreitBrats are asserting is proof that their vilification of human harmony was successful. So let’s get this straight. Coke, they said, “bowed to conservative critics” who insist on English-only by inserting a short phrase in — Latin.

These are the same rocket scientists who carried signs to their Tea Party rallies saying “Government hands off of my Social Security.” They are the same people who pledged to burn their ObamaCare cards (which do not exist). And now they think that appending a Latin phrase onto an ad is a testament to their strength in getting a cold corporation to acquiesce to their demands for an English-centric America.

All I can say is ach du lieber. These people are obviously loco. If they had any esprit de corps with their fellow Americans they wouldn’t show such disdain toward them, capiche? After all, these are the villains upon whom they are showering their hate:

Tea Party Values: Obama Should Be Executed As An Enemy Combatant

Posted by on February 6, 2014 at 10:37 am. 28 Comments :

The right-wing outrage machine is a sensitive instrument that requires little more than a sideways glance to set off a fierce rumbling. For instance, a tweet that noted that conservatives would hate a Cheerios commercial with a biracial family, that they already said they hated, produced a fury of immense proportions. But where is their outrage when this happens:


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In a town hall meeting in the district of Rep. Jim Bridenstine (OK-Tea Party), one of his God fearing, traditional values loving constituents rose to express her patriotic desire to send President Obama to the morgue:

Crazy Lady: “Obama, he’s not president, as far as I’m concerned, he should be executed as an enemy combatant. […and congress is…] doing nothing and that legally allows this moron to make decisions. He has no authority. None!”

Obviously this woman has an inability to grasp the concept of democracy. But far more disturbing is the response of her neighbors (who laughed) and Rep. Bridenstine. Rather than admonish her for advocating birtherism and treasonous violence, Bridenstine validated her comments with examples of why he agreed with her:

Bridenstine: “Everybody knows the lawlessness of this president. He picks and chooses which laws he’s going to enforce or not enforce. He does it by decree. When he can’t create a law, or when he can’t create a law through Congress, then he uses the bureaucracies of the executive branch to create rules and regulations through executive order. And, ultimately, when he can’t even get that done, then he uses foreign bodies. He uses the United Nations to try to change the laws in the United States.”

Nothing in his response repudiated the woman’s presidential death wish. To the contrary, Bridenstine elaborated on it with charges that are the substance of the most inane conspiracy theories that swirl through Fringelandia. The right is fond of castigating this president for the use of executive orders, even though he has used them less often than any president in over a hundred years. Just today, over at Fox News, their Fox Nation website featured an article about Obama’s “Executive Order Tyranny.” [Read Fox Nation vs. Reality for more than 50 examples of documented dishonesty]

But Bridenstine can’t let facts get in the way his Tea Party agenda. At least not while he is still standing in front of his wild-eyed constituents. After the meeting, and presumably some criticism, Bridenstine released this statement on his web page:

“A public figure cannot control what people say in open meetings. I obviously did not condone and I do not approve of grossly inappropriate language. It is outrageous that irresponsible parties would attribute another person’s reckless remarks to me.”

It’s true that a public figure cannot control what people say in open meetings. But he can respond in a manner that indicates his approval or disapproval. Bridenstine, contrary to his assertion that he did not condone the “grossly inappropriate language” (that he doesn’t specify), actually did condone it by not repudiating it, and worse, by embellishing it with his own pseudo-facts.

This sort of thing is commonplace among Tea Party politicians and pundits. They demonize the President, and all Americans who hold progressive views, as traitors and commies and villains who salivate at the thought of destroying America. Then they turn around and complain if a liberal correctly points out bad behavior by a Tea Party disciple. But they cannot escape their repugnant views when they are captured on video expressing them. And sadly, this is just one more example of their vulgar hostility and seething hatred.

Tea Party Pundit Proposes Unconstitutional Resolution Against Unconstitutional Resolutions

Posted by on January 29, 2014 at 2:45 pm. 4 Comments :

In case anyone has forgotten that last year Louisiana’s GOP governor Bobby Jindal called Republicans the “Stupid Party,” Tea Party radio screamer Mark Levin has generously volunteered to remind us.

Mark Levin

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In his response to President Obama’s State of the Union speech, Levin went berserk over what he perceived as a tyrannical usurpation of power by the President. In Obama’s speech he castigated our do-nothing congress for its relentless obstructionism and gave them this rather diplomatic warning:

“I’m eager to work with all of you. But America does not stand still – and neither will I. So wherever and whenever I can take steps without legislation to expand opportunity for more American families, that’s what I’m going to do.”

That’s all it took for the the right-wing outrage machine to get fired up and begin a frantic crusade against what they believe to be an unprecedented overreach. Of course, the truth is that every president has and uses his executive authority to proceed with initiatives that Congress fails to act upon. It is consistent with the constitutional jurisdiction of the executive branch of government, but that hasn’t stopped Republicans from bellowing about dictatorship.

Mark Levin’s post-speech rant took the form of advice to the Republicans in congress. He concluded that they were toO weak to do what he really wanted – which is to impeach Obama for some reasons he didn’t bother to specify. So he proposed an alternative in the form of a congressional resolution:

“Whereas the President of the United States has exerted executive powers not granted to him under the United States Constitution, the House of Representatives hereby asserts, as an equal governing institution, that all such acts by the President of the United States are null and void. The House of Representatives further asserts that no federal department, federal official, or federal employee is authorized to appropriate any sum of taxpayer dollars in furtherance of any unconstitutional act by the President of the United States.”

The Stupid Party (aka the Tea Party, aka the Republican Party) strikes again. First of all, no act by the President, or the Congress for that matter, is unconstitutional until the Supreme Courts says it is. The House of Representatives has no authority to unilaterally designate something the president does as unconstitutional. Secondly, any acts declared unconstitutional by the court are already null and void and don’t require a congressional resolution to be recognized as such. Nor is a prohibition of funding necessary for an act ruled unconstitutional. Since it cannot be carried out, no funds would be allocated to it.

What is laughably pathetic about Levin’s resolution is that it would probably fail the test of constitutionality itself were it ever enacted and challenged in the court. As noted above, the legislative branch cannot rule on the constitutionality of executive actions. And even more idiotic is the fact that Levin doesn’t seem to comprehend that his proposed law could not be enacted without the President’s signature. Does Levin think that Obama would sign this asinine bill?

So what does Fox News do with this utterly delusional rant by a crackpot who clearly doesn’t understand constitutional law? Well, they feature on their Fox Nation website along with all the other blatant lies and disinformation. And thus, the cycle of stupidity continues to flow from wingnut pundits to dishonest news outlets to an audience of willful dimwits.

For Immediate Release: Secret Tea Party Conference Announced With Stephen Colbert (Invited)

Posted by on December 6, 2013 at 1:34 pm. 1 Comments :

As the public view of the rightmost fringe of the Republican Party (aka the Tea Party) continues in a downward spiral, the measures they are taking to rehabilitate themselves get increasingly pathetic. Take, for instance, today’s press release announcing the third annual Tea Party Conference.

The big attraction this year, that they say “will mark a turning point in Tea Party history,” is declared in the their opening question and answer: “What do Jewish, Black, Environmentalist and LGBTQ leaders have in common? They are all coming to The 3rd Annual Tea Party Conference.”

Wow! That IS historic. A Tea Party event that aims to represent the diversity of America. And it’s uncharacteristically honest of them to admit that their past has been dominated by straight, white, Christians, although everyone else has known this all along.

Of course, it remains to be seen who actually shows up for this conference and whether their attempt at inclusion is successful. One impediment to that is that the conference is something of mysterious affair. Their press release notes that the event will be held at “an undisclosed location In Marietta, GA.” That might make it difficult for people to attend. Further limiting attendance is the fact that it is an “invitation-only” affair, so I hope you got your invitation.

The organizers are promoting the conference with a press release that proudly declares that Stephen Colbert is one of those lucky invitees. That bit of hype is emblazoned in the headline and repeated in the body of the release saying…

“In order to ensure a fair and balanced dialogue on diversity, an invitation to speak is also being extended to America’s most beloved ‘conservative’ comedian: Stephen Colbert.”

What they don’t explicitly note is that Colbert has not accepted the invitation, nor is there any evidence that he even received it. Consequently, he has not indicated that he has any intention of attending the event, or even knows that it exists. But that didn’t stop the Tea Partiers from exploiting his name for its publicity value.

And in that same spirit of promotional quackery, I’d like to announce that Colbert, along with Michelle Obama and Batman, have been invited to my house for dinner to endorse my ebook “Fox Nation vs. Reality.” It’s a compendium of more than 50 examples of outright lies published on the Fox News community website. Like the Tea Party event, this dinner is invitation-only and will be held at an undisclosed location. That reminds me – I need to invite Dick Cheney.

Fox Nation vs. Reality

Not So Breitbart: McConnell Calls Tea Party Bullies Who Need A Punch In The Nose (Allegedly)

Posted by on November 24, 2013 at 10:18 am. 4 Comments :

The intrepid team of weasels at Breitbart News have published an “exclusive” scoop that threatens to sink the political career of Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. McConnell participated in a conference call with Karl Rove’s Crossroads PAC and a couple of dozen conservative donors wherein they discussed the political strategies for future electoral victories.

The article on Breitbart News was authored by Matthew Boyle, a notoriously dishonest reject from Tucker Carlson’s Daily Caller. Amongst his previous work for Breitbart was an article that invented the existence of ObamaCars, free vehicles that would allegedly be given out to illegal immigrants. He should be writing for The Onion.

In Boyle’s latest piece of fiction he claims to have an anonymous source who was on the conference call with McConnell and Rove and had some juicy tidbits to expose. The opening paragraph of Boyle’s article declared that…

“Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said on a conference call organized by Karl Rove’s Crossroads organization for large donors and their advisers on Oct. 30 that the Tea Party movement, in his view, is a ‘nothing but a bunch of bullies’ that he plans to ‘punch … in the nose'”

Oh my lord. Mitch McConnell is threatening to assault the noses of some Tea Party bullies. And it must be true because there isn’t any indication in that paragraph that the remarks were conveyed by an unknown third party with no proof.

McConnell has had prior run-ins with Tea Party noses. [Author’s Note: You cannot imagine the willpower it took to avoid saying that “Tea Party noses are running.”] A couple of months ago McConnell’s campaign manager, Jesse Benton, who was hired specifically to appeal to Tea Party voters in Kentucky, was recorded telling a colleague about his reluctant association with McConnell. Benton said…

“Between you and me, I’m sort of holdin’ my nose for two years because what we’re doing here is going to be a big benefit to Rand [Paul] in ’16.”

Subsequent to that gaffe, the McConnell campaign released a lighthearted attempt at damage control showing McConnell standing next to Benton who was holding his nose. But now that we know how McConnell really feels about those Tea Party guys, perhaps Benton isn’t avoiding the stench. Maybe he just got slugged in the schnoz by the scrappy minority leader.

Mitch McConnell

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Ordinarily, embarrassing revelations about Republican politicians would be a welcome treat. And this one fits the bill because McConnell has previously expressed concerns about fringe candidates mounting primary challenges against sitting Republican senators and then losing winnable seats to Democrats. Boyle’s source told him that McConnell explicitly attacked the Tea Party and some of it’s rising stars like Ted Cruz and Mike Lee.

Upon reading Boyle’s article, however, there were some gaping holes that a conscientious reader could not ignore. For instance, McConnell is a highly partisan, right-wing, attack machine, but he isn’t stupid. It seems highly implausible that he would make derogatory remarks amount a significant bloc of constituents during a telephone conference call on which he doesn’t know who might be listening. What’s more, by citing an anonymous source in this sort of political dust-up, Boyle prevents his readers from having any sense of who is making these charges. It might very well be a supporter of Matt Bevin, the Tea Party candidate who is challenging McConnell in his own Kentucky primary.

Boyle did include a response from a spokesman for Karl Rove who flatly denied the charge that McConnell had demeaned either the Tea Party or Cruz:

“Your source is ascribing things to the call that simply were never said […] nothing about the Tea Party or Sens. Cruz or Lee.”

That unambiguous denial didn’t stop Boyle from posting an article that maligned McConnell. As it turns out, there was good reason to be suspicious of Boyle’s exclusive. Washington Examiner reporter Charlie Spiering did what real reporters actually do. He contacted Rove’s people and arranged to hear a recording of the conference call. In his column he noted that…

“McConnell’s comments about dealing with “schoolyard bullies” by punching them in the nose, as reported by Breitbart News, were accurate but were explicitly directed at the Senate Conservatives Fund, not the Tea Party or a specific conservative senator.”

So it appears that Boyle’s source was something less than credible, which is something that wouldn’t much bother Breitbart or Boyle. It is no secret that the BreitBrats are openly hostile to establishment Republicans and that they frequently promote Tea Party challengers. It would be consistent with their agenda for a mysterious McConnell critic to surface and assign comments to him that would harm his reelection effort. And Boyle is just the guy to invent a controversy that would help a candidate running against McConnell. It wouldn’t be the first time that Boyle has come to the aid of McConnell’s opponent. He’s written at least six other articles for Breitbart that feature Bevin favorably and McConnell disparagingly.

Despite the Examiner’s debunking of Boyle’s source, there has been no retraction on the Breitbart website. That’s typical of their shoddy brand of dishonest journalism. Even so, it’s hard to know who to root for in this affair. McConnell the repugnant, Republican pugilist, or Boyle the disreputable, right-wing hack. I must admit, though, it’s a highly entertaining show.

Tea Party Republican Is Florida’s Own Version Toronto’s Crack Smoking Mayor

Posted by on November 19, 2013 at 4:00 pm. 4 Comments :

Mayor Rob Ford of Toronto has consumed an enormous amount of media attention since he was exposed as an unrepentant crack smoking slimeball. In the wake of that scandalous affair on America’s northern border, Florida, in a fit of envy, has entered the sweepstakes to claim the title of “Most Depraved Politics.”

Trey Radel is a freshman congressman who won election in a conservative Florida district by running as committed Tea Party crackpot. True to form, Radel began his term in the House by advocating the impeachment of President Obama without bothering to come up with any justification for doing so.

Today it was announced that he was arrested for cocaine possession in the District of Columbia. In the customary statement of contrition that is always delivered after getting caught, Radel used a familiar excuse for his depravity:

“I’m profoundly sorry to let down my family, particularly my wife and son, and the people of Southwest Florida. I struggle with the disease of alcoholism, and this led to an extremely irresponsible choice. As the father of a young son and a husband to a loving wife, I need to get help so I can be a better man for both of them.”

Just like Mayor Ford, Radel only submitted to the sin of cocaine use because he must have been in a drunken stupor. In addition to his substance abuse problems, he had an interesting career prior to getting elected to Congress, including brokering pornographic Internet domain names. But even more interesting was his media resume:

Radel was trained as an actor and a comedian and performed improvisational work at Second City in Chicago. Radel began his working career as a journalist, working as both an anchor and as a reporter. He interned for CNN at their Headquarters in Atlanta. He then worked for the CBS affiliates in Houston and Chicago. He was a TV and radio talk show host of Daybreak, on WINK-TV & 92.5 Fox News Radio.

Fox News is deeply ingrained in this family as he is married to FOX-4 anchor Amy Wegmann. It will be interesting to see if Fox News reports Radel’s arrest on the air. A fallen Tea Party congressman ought to be big news. Fox would certainly report it if it were Democrat. Of course, Fox always has the option of reporting it but identifying him as a Democrat, a tactic they have used before.

Fox News

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Comedy Or Dementia? Townhall’s “8 Reasons The Republican Party Has A Bright Future”

Posted by on November 17, 2013 at 8:43 am. 4 Comments :

It’s been a rocky couple of months for Democrats. After suffering through a government shutdown orchestrated by wing-nutsack Ted Cruz and the baleful John Boehner, Republicans embarked on a wild ride of ObamaCare bashing, Benghazi hoaxes, and all around crackpottery of the highest odor. So just in the nick of time the uber-rightist news aggregator, Townhall, has excreted a blast of crapola with the deranged headline, “8 Reasons The Republican Party Has A Bright Future.” Now, there could actually be some plausible reasons for Republicans to be throwing a Mad Tea Party, but the ones itemized in this article are uproariously funny.

gop-bright-future

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1) We have the most potent grassroots movement in politics:
Their very first reason for jumping for joy cites their ownership of the Tea Party. If that is representative of the GOP’s bright future, then they can throw away their sunglasses. The Tea Party has been steadily losing support since their debut. Their “very unfavorable” numbers have tripled since 2010, and they currently can brag about an approval rating of 30%, an all-time low. That’s about the same as the Republican Party itself. And we’re just getting started.

2) 2010 was the GOP’s best year since 1948:
Recognizing a sixty-five year slump hardly seems like a good place to start a celebration. Especially when the only thing that Republicans have to look forward to is looking back fondly on the anomaly of an off-year election where low turnout and corrupt gerrymandering helped them to temporarily win control of the House. Even so, somehow they have erased from their simple minds the 2012 election where they lost to a gay, socialist, Muslim from Kenya, for the second time. And they also lost eight of the House seats, and two in the Senate, that they won two years earlier in their much ballyhooed best year in six decades.

3) We should control the House at least until the next census:
The article makes this assertion without providing any evidence to back it up. It is, at best, wishful thinking. They also seem to think that the past three years of having accomplished nothing more than 47 failed attempts to repeal ObamaCare amounts to “control” of the House. The truth is that, after being handed the reigns of power, they demonstrated their pitiful incompetence and a unique inability to govern. In addition, the article admits that their current majority is the result of gerrymandering, and that their primary legislative goal is to “slam the brakes on government.” However, most polls show that Democrats are in a better position than ever to retake the House in 2014, and last month’s government shutdown helps them toward that goal immensely.

4) The party is thriving on the state level:
They may have a point here. Republicans have concentrated fiercely on state politics for the past few years. Their financiers, including the Koch brothers, have devoted hundreds of millions of dollars to local races in order to hijack state governments for the purpose of suppressing votes, subjugating women, and subverting democracy through partisan redistricting. But Republican governors are still amongst the most reviled office-holders with characters like Rick Scott (FL), John Kasich (OH), and Rick Perry (TX), competing for Biggest Boob in America.

5) Our numbers with minorities are only going to go up:
Huh? Perhaps they didn’t finish that sentence and meant to say their numbers are going to go up in flames. After the 2012 election the GOP conducted what they themselves called an “autopsy,” in which they confessed to having no noticeable support from African-Americans or Latinos. So they set about to remedy that situation by passing laws aimed at keeping them from voting, by snubbing them by refusing to attend the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, and by opposing any immigration reform that might treat them with respect. The article makes the racially insulting and absurd statement that “White Americans tend to vote Republican.” But the actual election results don’t concur. Obama won 40% of the white vote in 2012, which is more than Clinton did in 1992. It isn’t that whites vote Republican, it’s that Republicans are almost all white. Those are two very different things.

6) Short Term: Obamacare means a strong 2014:
So this is what the GOP is hanging their asshats on? To be sure, if things with ObamaCare go as badly in the next year as they have for the past month, Democrats will have a tough time of it. But if the ObamaCare website is fixed, and people like having access to affordable, quality health care, Republicans are going to be punished severely for opposing it. Remember, Social Security and Medicare also encountered resistance in the beginning.

7) Barack Obama gives us a medium term opening:
The crux of this reason for Republicans to cheer is their contention that Obama is “the single worst President in American history.” The article regurgitates just about every assault on the President that was lobbed during the 2012 election. Remind me again, who won that one? Additionally, Obama has lead a recovery from his predecessor’s economic debacle that has seen the stock market soar to all-time highs, businesses reporting record profits, and the only reason the economy isn’t producing more jobs is because the GOP has blocked every attempt to create them, even through infrastructure development that is critically necessary anyway. Then the GOP harangues the victims of their policies as lazy moochers, and moves to cut food stamps. If Obama is giving Republicans an opening, Republicans seem to be scurrying to fill it in with fresh dirt.

8) Long term, the ground is very unfavorable to the Democrats:
Once again, the article has no certifiable facts to support this argument. They quote Grover Norquist and Margaret Thatcher as if they are popular contemporaries whose ultra-conservative rantings are shaping the modern political landscape. Funny…they didn’t mention Ronald Reagan. They also didn’t mention that in 2016 Republicans will be defending 24 senate seats versus only 10 for Democrats. In 2014 the GOP is already setting up their next roster of Todd Akins and Christine O’Donnells. And the way the Tea Party is imploding, Nancy Pelosi will probably be returning to the speakership before too long.

Perhaps the funniest thing about the article is the photo that accompanied it. You really have to wonder whose great idea it was to feature a picture of John Boehner atop an article heralding the GOP’s bright future. But in their defense, who else would they use? Rand Paul? Ted Cruz? Sarah Palin? Or maybe the vulgar Jersey philistine, Chris Christie? Oh yeah, Republicans have nothing but blue skies ahead.

Tea Party Mullah Ted Cruz Thinks He Can Banish Obama From Texas

Posted by on November 7, 2013 at 3:14 pm. 39 Comments :

President Obama traveled to Texas this week to inform the citizens there that ObamaCare has benefits that specifically address their needs. Texas has the notorious distinction of being the state that has more uninsured residents than any other state in the country. A big chunk of that problem would be solved if Gov. Rick Perry and the state legislature would simply agree to expand their medicaid program to cover low income residents. It wouldn’t cost the state a single penny because it is paid for by the federal government.

Nevertheless, Perry has ruled out this expansion despite the fact that a million of his constituents will suffer needlessly due to his cynical politicization of health care. This will hurt real people who require medical attention who will not receive it, as well as people who manage to get care that they cannot afford, which will lead to financial hardships including home foreclosures and bankruptcies. Obama made reference to this dire situation in his address to the people of Dallas.

Obama: I think that all of you understand that there’s no state that actually needs this more than Texas. […] Across this state, you’ve got a million people — because this is a big state — a million people, citizens, who don’t have health insurance that could get health insurance right away if the state of Texas decided to take advantage of [Medicaid expansion].

The response from Texas senator Ted Cruz to this common sense proposal was typically arrogant and insensitive. It exposed a deeply held animus for the President and disrespect for the office.

Cruz: President Obama should take his broken promises tour elsewhere so Texans can continue focusing on the solutions that have allowed our state to become and remain the nation’s economic and job creation powerhouse.

Fox Nation - Ted Cruz
Correcting Fox Nation. More corrections can be found in the
ebook, Fox Nation vs. Reality

Where Cruz gets the idea that he has some authority to direct the President’s itinerary is unknown. However, what is even worse is his obliviousness to the tribulations of his fellow Texans. By focusing on the status of the state’s economy, Cruz drives home the point that the business class of Texas has prospered at the expense of working families. If Texas is such an economic success and job haven, then why are more of it’s residents struggling to get by without health insurance than any other state?

That’s a question that Cruz and Perry and the rest of the GOP Scrooges still refuse to answer. They have a no-cost solution available to them that would relieve the stress of millions, but they won’t accept it because of their overriding desire to sabotage the Obama presidency. Eventually they will have to explain that to voters.

The Tea Party’s Climate Change Denialism Is Scaring Off The GOP Regulars

Posted by on November 2, 2013 at 12:16 pm. 11 Comments :

The Tea Party has always been the GOP’s far-right flank. Despite its small membership and radical views, it has mustered up an undue measure of influence in the Republican Party due to its fanatical posturing and wealthy financial backers. Now a new study by the Pew Research Center sheds light on a profound split between Main Street Republicans and the deep right-field Tea Party. Pew’s research reveals that…

“Just 25% of Tea Party Republicans say there is solid evidence of global warming, compared with 61% of non-Tea Party Republicans.”

So a solid majority of Republicans recognize the reality of Climate Change that is affirmed by 97% of scientists who have studied the matter. But only 25% of Tea Partiers respect the peer-reviewed evidence of Climate Change. While some of the Tea Partiers say that they don’t have enough information as to whether the Earth is warming, a majority of the skeptics stubbornly insist that it’s “just not happening.”

This split between the Tea Party and the rest of their Republican pals in the public at large is not reflected in the GOP representation in Congress where a majority of the GOP caucus aligns itself with the deniers. Nor is it represented in the conservative media that stridently rejects any suggestion that the planet faces any climate risks. The inevitable result of that divergence is that a portion of the population is woefully misinformed about Climate Change. Even worse, the bias disseminated by right-wing media foments a distrust in science and scientists in general.

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Consequently we see absurd departures from reality that are based strictly on partisan propaganda. When the White House issued an executive order to facilitate “efforts to improve climate preparedness and resilience; help safeguard our economy, infrastructure, environment, and natural resources,” Fox News covered the event by saying that “Obama uses executive order in sweeping takeover of nation’s climate change policies.” The report had an alarmist tone in warning that the order will “potentially skirt legislative oversight and push a federal agenda on states.” Fox ignored the actual substance of the order that explicitly stated that “This order shall be implemented consistent with U.S. obligations under international agreements and applicable U.S. law, and be subject to the availability of appropriations.” The language addressing appropriations specifically bows to the oversight authority of Congress that Fox denied existed.

Fox’s report further injected a partisan intent on the part of the White House to deliver climate policy implementation to a cabal of Democrats. Three separate times in the report Fox noted the presence of Democrats on the task force that the executive order created. Why that should surprise anyone is a mystery. The President is entirely within his rights to appoint members of his party to executive branch committees. More importantly, why would anyone go out of their way to put the sort of climate science deniers that dominate the Republican Party on a committee tasked with mitigating the effects of Climate Change? It would be like asking atheists to lead the Christian church’s membership drive.

By disseminating false and misleading information about Climate Change, Fox News has been a significant factor in dumbing down the small portion of the electorate that is glued to their network. The more gullible among them, specifically the Tea Party faction, have become ardent opponents of reform measures to address Climate Change. And now it appears that they have drifted so far from the GOP mainstream that they have little in common with the average Republican’s position on this issue.

Nevertheless, the Republicans in Congress will continue to obstruct reasonable reforms that are supported by the majority of America, and even the majority of their party. That defiance is directly attributable to their fear of Tea Party primary challenges and their dependence on Tea Party billionaires like the Koch brothers. Until the GOP unshackles itself from their extremist wing and exhibits a willingness to cooperate on issues where they share common ground, voters must replace them with either common sense Republicans or Democrats. And if the Pew study is any indication, Republican voters are getting ready to do just that.