We Promise to Change

So now it comes; the inevitable conservative "mia culpa" (not really), and promises to change their approach after losing the national campaign (badly).

And the chorus is loud, and often, and as usual, wrong.

First, the Libya controversy is still being stirred by Fox News and Senator McCain.  The tragedy in Libya, with four people murdered by "bad guys" (we don't still know who they specifically were), is an "issue".  Supposedly, the Administration covered up who really did the violence.

The question is why?  Why cover it up?  If the perpetrators were terrorists, which they were if you apply any kind of definition, then why call them demonstrators gone mad?    The President, in his first public statement, famously said the nation would not be cowered by "terrorists"; why say that if you were scheming to depict the act as a "demonstration"  Romney walked into a buzz saw when he thought he had the President in the debate remember.

 Somehow, this tragedy, we are told by the Cons, disproves Obama's successful foreign policy in the Middle East, which was an election issue: and the election is OVER.  So why keep beating on it?

That is "we promise to change"?  NO, that is we will continue the gotcha  game no matter what!

What difference does it make?  The Middle East is a dangerous place, revolutions leave chaos in their wakes, and people get hurt.

But the cons are working ceaselessly to keep this "issue" alive.  This includes the incredible statement by McCain, that "Watergate type hearings be held".

What?  Where on earth is there any administration culpability in this?  Are we to assume the administration planned the attack for political reasons?  

Or, made up a story, that intelligence officials contradicted within weeks of the incident, openly to everyone.  President Nixon would be shocked by the shoddy cover up behavior.  He was "successful" for over a year before Watergate ruined him.  Obama stonewalled for about a day and a half!

No, the "promise the change" that got the Republicans beat, is no promise at all.  The Libyan "issue" is proof that they are not going to change.

They are still playing payback for Watergate, when a President really did engage in a detailed and planned cover-up of a "third rate" burglary, failed to tell the truth for over a year, and finally was driven from office not for the incident, but for the cover up.

The murder in Libya occurred on September 11, it is November 16, and every depiction imaginable of the incident has been released by the administration.  The problem is finding the perpetrators and punishing them.  If we are lucky, and they talk, THEN we will know the motives...only then!

What the cons forget, is that it was months before Nixon gave an inch regarding the wall of lies that were used.  This administration has allowed all sides (?) of the intelligence agencies to postulate the reasons for the attack and the possible perpetrators, within a few weeks of the event.

Watergate?  Come on McCain, that makes about as much sense as your calling our ambassador to the U.N. "not too bright" when she is a Stanford grad, AND a Rhodes Scholar.  Not too  bright, or not white enough Senator?

And there it is.  There is the proof that no change is coming for the conservatives, now or later.

Scratch the Republican Party and you get white, old southern whites  desperate to retain a system of repression and white supremacy that simply is clueless when confronted with modern America.

If does not help that the President is a person of color.  That fact, and cons don't handle facts very well, destroys any chance to change.  In calling Ambassador Rice basically "stupid", McCain falls into the racist trap of assuming that all people of color are not equal to him.

This from a man who selected Sarah Palin as his Vice President.   Remember her, the governor who saw Russia from her front porch, who listed newspapers she reads as "all those you know", who was so clueless about foreign policy it was scary?  Not very smart huh?  A Rhodes Scholar, really?

So, we promise to change statements, are just that; promises.  The Republican Party is being run by racists who "want their country back".  The majority of statements made in the last few days, come back to  colored people cheated to win, white people can win again if we repress the vote, as their numbers dwindle, and white power succumbs to simple demographics.

We promise to change....right!

The Bubble

It is nearly impossible to believe, but the Fox Bubble Machine just continues on and on.

The latest is the Patraeus "scandal".  Fox is trying to link the infidelity of the much decorated General and CIA Director (former) with the Libya killing "scandal".

Both are completely bogus.

Patraeus, it appears, succumbed to a very attractive 40 something woman, who was his biographer.  The "affair" it seems, in no way threatened national security.  In short, the General succumbed to a beautiful woman.  Gee,  how unique!

Moreover, it appears that the Libyan "scandal" is more the product of Fox imagination than anything.

Let's see, how many Fox Scandals have actually born out?   Tell  me a couple that did?  Go on, I'm waiting.

The truth (a word Fox News has no clue about), is that Fox scandalizes practically everything, from prayers in schools, to religious artifacts.

And 99% of the time, there is NOTHING there.

What is amazing, is that Fox has admitted that it was clueless when it came to the Presidential election, attacking polls that were right, while touting polls that were very wrong.

This "living in a bubble of created reality" probably contributed to Romney's substantial loss, and may have cost some conservative congressmen their jobs.

Fox basically gave cons the impression, based on no facts, that Romney was going to win in a landslide and bring Republicans with him.

Of course, this was nonsense.  But Romney perceptibly "coasted" through the last few days of the campaign.  He even visited Pennsylvania, which he had no chance in.

Of course now, Fox has had the gall to actually launch a couple "stories" (as in once upon a time), claiming ominously that some areas  in Pennsylvania actually went 100% for Obama.  Right, people were so pissed off with voter suppression, they all voted for Obama...No surprise!

This from a network that actually cheered on the voter suppression efforts of Republicans, that had the unintended consequences of actually INCREASING minority turnout, and dooming Romney (and  apparently other radical conservatives) to defeat.

Absolutely unbelievable!

We Didn't

I had a dream last night.

I dreamed I saw hundreds of people standing in line, waiting hours to vote.  They were standing, often, in the ruins of a recent Hurricane.  They stood patiently, offered coffee by volunteers from the Democratic Party while the Republicans stayed away.

I dreamed of the Republicans in the background hoping and scheming to get people off the line, forcing  voters to stay home.

They didn't.

I dreamed of women, being elected to the U.S. Senate in record numbers.  I dreamed of Republicans, shouting that they know what decisions women should make during the most difficult times of their lives.  I dreamed that women agreed to let religious zealots take control of their bodies.

They didn't.

I dreamed that voters would buy the con that people were dependent on government, that it was killing their spirit.  I dreamed that people would agree about this evil, and would vote to end programs that were keeping millions of elderly citizens living in comfort.

They didn't.

I dreamed that voters would turn their back on the millions of immigrants, that we all were once, and vote for policies that would punish and not welcome.  I dreamed that the walls would be approved by the voters.

They didn't.

Finally, I dreamed that the "I Have a Dream Today" of Martin Luther King would die as he did, in a  wave of racist reaction; that people of color cannot lead, that only whites should be President.  I dreamed that American citizens would renounce the we, and embrace the me and kill the social contract  we all share with this generation and the next.

We didn't.

The Work Needs to Start

Truth:  The government needs revenue.  It just does.  There are no smoke and mirrors to fake it.  

The trick will be to allow the Bush tax cuts to expire, but in a measured manner.

I personally think allowing them to expire on people who make over $250,000 is a great idea.  We also need to look at the other tax cuts, even for the middle class, and phase them out gradually, to begin getting the deficit under control.  We also need to NOT dramatically cut spending, do not make the same mistake we made in 1936.

President Obama's balanced approach is sensible.  I hope he doesn't get bullied into anything less.

President Bush caused a huge deficit by cutting taxes irresponsibly while getting us into two wars, a huge addition to entitlements, and don't forget Homeland Security (a new federal agency with practically limitless funds).

All this was done on the Republican watch.

Then, incredibly, when President Obama was elected, they immediately turned from cut tax and spend, to deficit hawks.  They literally pivoted on a dime.

This was all a ruse, a con, too pin the deficit on the new President, make him the fall guy for the damage it did to the economy, and make him a one term President.

It almost worked.  Really, it almost did.

And, with a limitless amount of money to literally buy the election, the odds were great for a Republican sweep of the Senate, House and White House.

But, from the beginning, it appears, more Americans were on to the con than the cons themselves.

Any betting person would have figured it would work.  Billions were spent to make it work.  Fox News pounded away, year after year, that it was all Obama's fault.

And it did not work.  The con backfired.   The American People got it, saw the truth, and punished the Republican party for not honestly working with the President.

Billions were pissed away, gone, wasted.  I wonder how much gas prices will have to go up to pay for all the money Big Oil spent to elect Republicans, pass anti-union propositions; etc.

The real work needs to start to straighten out the problems facing our country.  Ruses, cons, and deceit were detected and punished severely last night.

Conservatives need to shake this infatuation they have with conning people, take Karl Rove out of their dialogue completely, insist Rush Limbaugh be fired, stop listening to nutso radio, stop the conspiracy theories and start working for the good of the nation.

The con did not work.  Immense amounts of money to support the con did not work.  Deceit does not make good public policy.  Karl Rove represents this principle, that deceit and lying work to win elections, regardless of the consequences.  He needs to disappear from the body politic.

The work needs to start to approach the real problems of the country, honestly, without sneaky agenda, and deceit.

Join us.

The Promise of the Center from the Right

I recently read an article by Thomas Friedman that hoped a defeat by the Republicans in the upcoming Presidential race would force the party to go back to the middle.

He also remarkably intimated that the Democrats would do the same thing, .

The past four years will not be remembered by historians fondly.  You have to go back to the 1850s to find so much acrimony, hate and vitriol.

What amazes me is how observers like Friedman always try to strike a balance considering the radical agendas being shouted.  The Tea Party Republican Party is supposed balanced off by the  "?" Democratic Party.

Note the "?".  What takes its place relative to the supposed Democratic Party extremism?  Where is the "?" Party in the Democratic Party.  There is none.  Friedman, and many others, postulate that both Parties have their extreme wings.  There is no such thing in the Demoratic Party.  But there sure is in the Republican Party, BOTH  Tea Party and Libertarians...and a few moderates left.

I would postulate that an overwhelming number of non-partisan political scientists, rate President Obama as a moderate Democrat.  I also would postulate that the Democratic Party right now, is not Center/Left (as Friedman suggests) but Center.

The Republican Party is not.

Look at their Platform if you doubt the radical swing to the right.  Abortion is outlawed in ALL cases.  Their economic policy is for radical tax cuts, huge reductions in "entitlement programs"; etc.

Look at the Democratic Platform.  You see the "radical" notion of redoing the tax rates for people making $250,000 a year from 34%  to 39%.  Those are the same rates that existed during President Clinton's term, and are still much below the marginal tax rates in the post WWII era.  How on earth is this a "radical agenda"?

And then there is the Affordable Care Act, that the Republican Tea Party basically grew to power hating.  People forget the summer of 2010, when hapless Congressmen went into their districts to simply discuss the Act.  They walked into a staged, contrived agenda of anger and fury,  not seen since the segregationist south resisted Civil Rights in the 1960s.

Much of the anger was carefully rehearsed for effect, with millions of dollars provided by the health insurance companies, but much was genuine.  The sponsors of the angry demonstrations, quickly lost control of what essentiall was a white backlash to the first President of color this country ever elected.

This anger, that caught the nation by surprise, was actually the right racist wing of the Republican Party, screaming that they could not stand a Black Man being President!  Moreover, all the  old radical right agendas were trotted out:  The Federal Government is regulating us to death; there are conspiracies to take away white people's rights, the Feds are after our guns, the Income Tax is a plot to enslave us; etc. etc.

And that anger is still fueling the candidacy  of Mitt Romney.  Romney decided, early on, that either you fought them or you joined them, so he cloaked himself in his "radical conservative" clothing, took  the Koch brothers' money, and became a lackey for the far right.

Friedman explains that the major reason Romney is competitive now, and may win the election, is his swing to the middle in the first debate.  Americans had not heard this "softer, more central Mitt", who proudly proclaimed that he had "reached across the aisle" in Massachusetts while governor.  And, after all, he had championed the Affordable Care Act there...but still will repeal it?  That promise to repeal is an absolute cave-in to the radical racist right of the Republican Party.

And therein lies the invalidation of Friedman's  argument.

The nation is split almost 50/50 right now between radical conservative and the rest of us.  In real terms, it is about 60/40 moderate to radical conservative, but Citizens United makes up the difference.

The right wing can make up for their minority status by basically buying votes.  And they are doing  that with abandon.

If Romney wins, with his right wing Vice President, he will have no chance of governing from the middle.  If he tries, he will be blocked at every turn by the Tea Party.

And losing will not "reform" the Republican Party, because they have been taken over by scared white voters, who see the technicolor coalition of multi-racial Democrats growing steadily every year, and must adopt what minority white racists have always done; a repressive right wing government that rolls back civil rights, attacks fairness and equity, and eventually resorts to violence to keep its position.

South Africa comes to mind.  Still, after all the feel good movies about the defeat of Aparteid, still South Africa struggles.  Racism dies hard.

That is what the segregationists did in the south.  Pure racists were never the majority, but used fear and violence (and extra-legal discrimination), to control the south for over 100 years after the Civil War.  For over a hundred years, the social illness of racism destroyed the south, held back economic development, stifled humanity.  It is not dead yet...it lives in the Tea Party.

And that, contrary to what Mr. Friedman suggests, is what is in store for the United States no matter who wins Tuesday.

The Republican Party has become radically right wing, even fascist by the classical definition, and are being run by scared whites who are making a "last stand" for white supremacy.

So there is a reason we have seen the anger and angst of the 1960s segregationists in the Tea Party of today; because in a more sophisticated sense, they are doing the same thing that plagued this nation of 200 years.

It all comes down to race.  The one thing that historians, political scientists, and others have always warned could almost end this nation, is still there trying.

A few days after the election, a new motion picture will come out, about President Lincoln.  Its main theme is the struggle to get the emancipation proclamation passed before the war ended.  Lincoln believed that, even if the north won the Civil War, the south would never relent and abandon slavery voluntarily.  The racist bedrock of the radical right was simply too strong.

He succeeded.  We are failing.


So, Mr. Friedman alas, is wrong. What we are seeing I am afraid are the seeds of another Civil War, this time along "ideological lines" which are still painted with race.

Racism kills, and it is killing us now.

The Cost

Spain nearly burned down a couple years ago.  Remember?

Greece nearly burned down a couple years ago.  Remember?

Russia had a huge drought, weeks of 100 plus temperatures, and nearly burned down a couple years ago.  Remember.

Our Mid-West and South had a rash of huge tornadoes, that killed dozens and destroyed several towns.  Remember.

A monster Hurricane, just last year, came into New England and caused flooding that had never been encountered.  Remember.

Nashville almost washed away with record floods.  Remember.

Katrina struck New Orleans and nearly finished the city.  Remember.

Drought afflicted Texas and Oklahoma for months, with wildfires and a touch of hell.  Remember.

New Mexico, Colorado and Northern California just had huge wildfires that burned hundreds of homes.  Remember.

Hurricane Sandy just destroyed the Jersey Shore, the Atlantic Boardwalk is GONE, the New York subways are flooded, with billions of dollars in damage.   Remember.

The cost of global warming or climate change is huge and climbing every day.

Candidate Romney says we are warring on coal, that all fossil fuels need to be used as fast a possible, to create jobs.

But the cost of man made global warming is accelerating.  It will not stop.  The cost has already overwhelmed the "new jobs" that using more coal, or the Canadian pipeline with dirty oil.

The cost.....Remember?

And Then Along Came Sandy

Not a comment about global warming in the debates; not a word.  Governor Romney, as usual, has switched his position from one of advocating efforts to curb global warming, to a drill baby drill conservative collaborator.    President Obama, has not mentioned it, but his support of a balanced approach to energy includes at least attention to global warming or climate change.  These is a huge difference between the to mens' positions.

President Obama is saying the more we rely on clean energy sources, wind, solar, and yes, even natural gas, the more we approach a coordinated attack on climate change that is costing us billions every day.  Governor Romney's position is to use fossil fuels with no regard for the consequences, because not doing so will cost jobs.

But, then  Katrina was a long time ago.  The polar ice caps melting, the rise in ocean levels and temperature, did create larger Hurricanes and Typhoons but those did not hit populated areas.

Why worry?

And then along came Sandy.

"An Inconvenient Truth" which has been constantly attacked by conservative deniers, spent much screen time explaining the danger to cities like New York City, from rising ocean levels and warming  oceans.  Much of New York City lies at or near sea level, and the island nature of the city lends itself to storm surges and tidal flooding.

In short, New York and its Burroughs lies a few short feet from disastrous floods.  But, super storms never happen.  There is simply no evidence that a Hurricane of significant force could hit New York directly, because Atlantic waters are so cold, that Hurricanes typically lose force and swing out to sea.

Those few that have come inland, are of minimal power and force.

And then along came Sandy.

Sandy was a tropical Hurricane, that became a killer in the Caribbean and then headed north, to die in the Atlantic like all other Hurricanes had done.

But it didn't,  it suddenly dove west, taking dead aim at New Jersey and New York.

It did that because the Atlantic Ocean is degrees warmer than ever before.  Warm oceans feed Hurricanes.  Warm oceans create a beacon if you will, drawing the Hurricanes in.

Scientists, at first, were reluctant to attribute Sandy to climate change.  They still subscribe to the moderate position that no one weather "event" is a product of climate change.

So this time, local politicians, namely the mayor and governor of  New York, admitted that yes, Hurricane Sandy was a product of global warming, and the world had better wake up.  Mayor Bloomberg even went so far as endorsing President Obama, who he has criticized from a Wall Streeter's point of view in the past.  The reason?  The President's policies are addressing the climate change that nearly destroyed his city.

The Republican Governor of New Jersey, no friend of a Democrat,  was effusive in his praise for President Obama, because he needs federal help bad; since his state was dramatically damaged at huge cost.

Governor Christie had roundly criticized President Obama, has predicted his defeat, but suddenly could find nothing but superlatives to say about his disaster help.  What an amazing turn around!

I would not doubt that the governor has "seen the elephant" and now acknowledges climate change as the disruptor of  life on earth.  Many citizens from the east coast now are having the same realization.

Many deniers have lived in a false world of unscientific nonsense.

And along came Sandy.