Republicans Fiddle and Lie, Obama Shuffles, America Burns

Republicans in the US House and Senate have been complete money grubbers when it comes to getting funds from the Democratic Stimulus Bill but, total lying sacks of dung when reporting about the real results the stimulus bill. Most of those asking for the stimulus funds in the US House have been Republicans. All of the Republicans getting any of such funds have touted their individual successes at bringing home the bacon for their districts or states. [Note: I offering numerous links throughout this post; rather than embed them, I am leaving them as text, which will make it easier to see the topics of the links based on the permalinks]. http://www.iwatchnews.org/2010/10/19/2420/tea-party-founder-texans-among-those-asking-stimulus-funds http://www.democrats.org/news/blog/gop_hypocrisy_on_recovery_act_projects_makes_news_nationwide http://www.wusf.usf.edu/news/2010/10/18/gop_congressmen_criticize_stimulus_ask_for_money [More . . . ]

Continue ReadingRepublicans Fiddle and Lie, Obama Shuffles, America Burns

Paul Ryan’s pay per view town hall meetings

Here's what happens when an ideologue politician like Paul Ryan avoids answering hard questions out in the public. When you threaten well-established social safety net programs, the program beneficiaries are quite willing to pay $15 to actually get a little face time with you, even if it means they will be arrested. When you don't hear them out, they will get annoying and disruptive. They know that when you are not inviting real criticism, the people in the audience are hearing what amounts to propaganda, which is not a meaningful political process. The test of a true leader is one who is willing to take serious inconvenient criticism to heart.

Continue ReadingPaul Ryan’s pay per view town hall meetings

As Texas burns, Rick Perry doesn’t want to talk free-market philosophy

The hypocrisy is pointed out by The Young Turks: Here's what Perry did to the fire-fighting budget:

The wildfires threatening Dunkerley and her neighbors are being met by an inadequately funded response team. Back in May, Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) signed a budget presented by the state legislature that cut funding for the state agency in charge of combating such blazes. The Texas Forest Service's funding was sliced from $117.7 million to $83 million. More devastating cuts hit the assistance grants to volunteer fire departments around the state. Those grants were slashed 55 percent from $30 million per year in 2010 and 2011 to $13.5 million per year in 2012 and 2013. Those cuts are effective now.
Apparently, the "free market" isn't enough to fight these fires. "Perry has now asked President Obama for a disaster declaration which, if granted, would help the state by paying for 75% of the firefighting costs. Rick Perry has vilified "government." He thinks that good things will simply happen, despite the lack of government organization and funding. This is a position contradicted by ubiquitous evidence, including the fires now raging around Rick Perry. His free market fundamentalism, bereft of evidence, is a dangerous religious belief. To be clear, I'm not advocating big government, per se. I understand Rick Perry's concern about large-scale government reallocation schemes, but the answer is not to completely dismantle government. I'm advocating smart government. We should reallocate tax money we are currently wasting (e.g., much of the military budget, corn ethanol, propping up too-big-to-fail-megabanks) and we should put it into things that really work to benefit the citizens and strengthen the economy (e.g., energy conservation, sustainable energy and early childhood education).

Continue ReadingAs Texas burns, Rick Perry doesn’t want to talk free-market philosophy