The Church of Shiny Objects

Fun Fact #1652

2010-05-04T12:11:00.000-07:00

Every drop of oil extracted on US soil goes into a global marketplace for petroliates, and is then funneled to regions which maximize profit (e.g. India, China). Or in other words, the suggestion that expanding US oil production directly benefits American consumers (i.e. “Drill, baby. Drill”) is a fucking lie.

Period.

Reversal

2010-03-25T18:56:00.000-07:00

In my opinion, the past 66 days have been among the most dramatic in US political history – a span marking the distance between the election of Republican Scott Brown to Ted Kennedy's old Senate seat (and celebrations from Fox News marking the apparent death of health reform) to the final passage of a reform bill via reconciliation today.

I have never seen such a dramatic swing of fortune in Washington, with Democrats apparently half in the grave two months ago only to stage a rapid turn-around, and toss their Republicans foes into the same hole face first.

Labor

2010-03-19T16:49:00.001-07:00

For anyone who may have noticed, my blog here has been fairly quiet of late.

This is due to me working on a fiction project which has been gestating literally for years—around seven by my count—and during the past few weeks has been growing almost daily. I hope to get the story (dubbed “Project One” for my purposes here) put to bed and submitted by September, which judging from the current rate of progress should be doable.

But in the meantime, if others are wondering why my output of political screeds has been lax lately, well, now you know why.

Self-Love

2010-03-12T14:28:00.000-08:00

I love America. I truly do. After all, it’s my home.

America is also a truly great country built on the labor (some voluntary, some not) and sacrifice of millions of people over a span of 234 years. The social progress made by Americans over the past five decades has also been astonishing.

However, I am stymied by those on the right who constantly trumpet the meme of “American exceptionalism,” as if every day they fail to do so could prompt an eagle to plummet from the sky, struck down by a lack of recognition from its fellow citizens. And nobody wants that on their conscience.

Yet we still get crap like Mitt Romney’s latest book with the loaded title, “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness,” which among other things is a slap at Barack Obama for trying to repair many foreign policy bridges torched by the Bush Administration over the past eight years. Nevertheless, Mittens is clearly on the American Exceptionalism Express so look for him to beat this particular drum early and often throughout the '12 presidential campaign.

And make no mistake, Romney will be running – both for POTUS, and away from his own record.

Starstruck

2010-03-05T08:35:00.000-08:00

I think that rumors surrounding Sarah Palin teaming up with “Survivor” producer Mark Burnett to pitch a reality show to Hollywood are ideal for the ex-governor.

After all, it would allow Palin to do two of her favorite things in one stroke: pump the media cash cow, and craft a tightly edited narrative to present herself in a scope of her own perceptions.

So for her, it’d be a win-win. I just find it deeply ironic that for someone who’s consistently moaned about the cultural evils of the Left Coast, Palin sure seems to have grown enamored with it.

Somewhere An Asylum is Missing It's Lunatic

2010-03-02T18:50:00.001-08:00

"I hope Senate Democrats tonight vote for their own 'pay fors' and show Americans that they are committed to fiscal discipline. I will be watching them closely and checking off the hypocrites one by one.”
– US Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY)

Uh, so I guess that means you’ll begin with yourself after playing chicken with people’s lives while trying to score political points over an extension of unemployment benefits? You sir, are a disgrace packing exactly the same amount of functional brain cells you indicate above.

Much Ado

2010-02-26T07:49:00.000-08:00

Although I had hoped—perhaps naively—that yesterday’s healthcare summit at Blair House would yield actual results in terms of breaking the current congressional deadlock between Democrats and Republicans, the conduct of the latter was often marked by talking points repeated ad nauseum in an effort to grind reform to a halt.

Particularly lame were Eric Cantor and John Boehner hiding behind their symbolic stacks of paper, and droning on about how the current Senate bill must be scrapped and begun again – which is just code for shelving healthcare as an issue entirely, and burying it in committee until the year of 2061 A.D.

Recall that while under GOP control, the party had countless opportunities to push for substantial health reform measures yet failed to do so. Thus, were Republicans to re-assume control of Congress this fall there’s no reason to believe they won’t do so again – paying lip service to reform with the actual intention of doing nothing.

Also, it was fun to watch Republicans at yesterday’s summit—particularly John McCain—quake in their proverbial boots regarding the notion of Congressional Dems using reconciliation to pass reform by a popular vote when the GOP has used the measure several times themselves. Watching McCain grouse about the recklessness of such a move by Democrats was pretty pathetic, as Barack Obama himself noted in so many words.

Jerry Falwell Lives On

2010-02-23T09:28:00.000-08:00

Click here for a revealing confrontation at CPAC last week between anti-gay conservative Ryan Sorba (member of the very fascist-sounding "California Young Americans for Freedom" - see his CPAC speech here), and a gay Republican who later called him out on his crap.

The way in which Sorba’s “natural law” argument versus homosexuality is dismantled is beautiful.

Hat Tip: DFTCW.

Jesus Reads

2010-02-22T08:22:00.000-08:00

Vis-à-vis DFTCW, the following piece may have some liberals alarmed, but despite my opposition to issues like organized school prayer I’m not among them. Or at least as long as “Bible As Lit” coursework in public schools is not mandatory.

Lots of colleges and public universities offer similar curricula in their English Departments as a great deal of period American and British literature is riddled with Biblical allusions and symbolism.

So IMO, this is all much ado about nothing.

Et Tu Mittens?

2010-02-18T14:45:00.000-08:00

Former MA Governor Mitt Romney never fails to confuse me.

On one hand at today’s CPAC Convention, he railed against the evils of “Obamacare” and lauded Scott Brown for stopping in its tracks while in 2006 Romney signed off on a state healthcare bill that is equal to (or more stringent) than anything Obama has proposed for reform on the national level.

The Massachusetts plan has also proven very popular in-state, and enjoys support from Scott Brown.

So to Mr. Romney, I must ask why health reforms you helped pass in Massachusetts are now insufficient for the rest of the nation (except Hawaii)?

Doubling Down

2010-02-17T08:58:00.000-08:00

When Sarah Palin says the following regarding the Teabaggers (in their myriad forms)…

“[The] Tea Party movement is not a party, and we have a two-party system, they’re going to have to pick a party and run one or the other: ‘R’ or ‘D’."

…she is absolutely wrong.

The Teabaggers don’t have to back an organized party, and would be foolish to do so as they so loudly claim to be unconnected to Republicans or Democrats. And no matter if one believes this ideal to be sincere or not, were any mainstream branch of the Teabagger movement to officially back one party, it would probably lead to in-fighting over purity of message.

However, what Palin and RNC Chair Michael Steele are doing this week to romance the Teabaggers is politically savvy from the GOP’s position as the last thing they want is for them form a third party and siphon off votes from the Republican ticket. Yet the GOP getting in bed with the Teabaggers also runs a risk of marrying a movement which could easily implode—and likely will—as soon as it sprang up.

Thus, either way such a relationship would be highly risky for both participants.

Pray On It

2010-02-07T09:43:00.000-08:00

As if we needed yet another example of why Sarah Palin is simply George W. Bush in a dress:

"I think, kind of tougher to, um, put our arms around, but allowing America's spirit to rise again by not being afraid to kind of go back to some of our roots as a God fearing nation where we're not afraid to say, especially in times of potential trouble in the future here, where we're not afraid to say, you know, we don't have all the answers as fallible men and women so it would be wise of us to start seeking some divine intervention again in this country, so that we can be safe and secure and prosperous again. To have people involved in government who aren't afraid to go that route, not so afraid of the political correctness that you know -- they have to be afraid of what the media said about them if they were to proclaim their alliance on our creator."

***Palin, in response to a Q&A at the Tea Party Convention on February 6th asking what priorities Congressional lawmakers should be setting today (for the record, Palin’s other two solutions were Federal spending cuts [duh], and energy management).

Nevertheless, Sarah has made her economic policy plain: for the US economy to improve, let's put it in the hands of an invisible deity who may or may not exist.

Oh boy, is that all? Thanks for clearing that up, ma’am.

An AP photo of Palin having scribbled Tea Party speech notes on her left hand. I kid you not.

Why I Can't Stand The Teabaggers

2010-02-06T17:24:00.000-08:00

IMO, "teabaggers"—all whopping 600 of them--gathered in Nashville this weekend for the movement’s first national convention are making a crucial mistake in claiming (over and over) that it was their grass-roots voice that tipped Ted Kennedy’s old Senate seat into Republican hands for the first time in decades.

In reality, contrary to devout claims by Fox News, the teabaggers’ ground influence in Massachusetts was (at best) marginal as arrogant Democrat Martha Coakley was as much a factor in her loss to underdog Republican Scott Brown as he himself was. But to hear it from the Nashville teabaggers today, one would think it was they who ushered Brown to victory on the star-spangled wings of their righteous movement.

But here’s the reality: they’re utterly wrong.

The mythic influence of teabaggers in state and national elections, while not non-existent, has been overblown--and heavily exploited--by the flag-waving likes of Glenn Beck, Dick Armey, Sarah Palin, Tom Tancredo, and Michelle Bachmann (among others). It isn’t teabaggers who are causing Washington to wet its pants in fear these days. It’s a potent, national fatigue over the “Great Recession” mixed with a painfully slow realization that no president nor party (nor tax cut) can fix the US economy overnight – much less in 365 days or anything close to it. Thus, such frustration has fueled a heavy vibe of anti-incumbancy, one which no elected official likes to feel.

Furthermore, no dramatic cut is Federal spending is going to help us either as America’s treasury remains deeply in debt to the Chinese due to the Bush Administration using foreign sales of T-bills to fund the Iraq War on credit, credit for which the Chinese are steadily growing inpatient on a repayment date. And until that elephantine debt is settled, the deficit we currently enjoy isn't going anywhere.

This example (any many others) is why I have so little respect for the “teabagger” movement, and insist on referring to them as such: their simple-minded grasp of why the US economy is where it is today, how it got here, easy placement of blame, and demand for a quick solution rooted in late 18^th century romanticism rivals that of ignorant children.

This said, do Americans have the right to be frustrated with government today? Absolutely, yes.

The current Congress is an enraging model of dysfunction - featuring one party (Democrats) which despite large majorities cannot lead, and another (Republicans) pathologically driven by obstructionism so it can employ the same fruitless policies of the past decade. Or in other words, today’s voters have no quality options in either congressional party. And despite my continued respect for him, Barack Obama is saddled trying to steer this ship of fools – not that John McCain (had he been elected in ‘08) would be in an even remotely better position today.

Does this mean I think the US is doomed?

No, we’ve been through difficult national times before, and we’ll get through this one as well once Wall Street banks—the same parties which enabled the Great Recession, and I am convinced learned nothing from their downfall—open new credit lines to businesses so they can begin rehiring.

Yet by the same token, we could probably endure faster if we had citizens--not to mention brainless pundits and elected officials--addressing national issues with a basic knowledge of what they were talking about.

Master Plan

2010-02-04T19:28:00.000-08:00

After today’s swearing in of Scott Brown as the new Junior Senator from MA, look for Congressional Republicans to double-down on the same obstructionism they have been pushing over the past year on any legislative plan offered by Democrats (which, of course, is incredibly ironic as the GOP remains the minority party by a large margin). This, in an ongoing ploy to neutralize Obama’s presidency by filibustering any major policy he proposes long enough to get more Republicans into Congress in 2010—followed by (they hope) a Republican presidency in 2012—and initiate the very same policies (e.g. tax cuts for the rich, relaxed regulation of banks, using the military as world policemen, etc) which failed spectacularly under George W. Bush.

Thus, in one respect, the GOP and Wall Street bankers have one thing in common: both are unwilling or utterly unable to learn from past blunders.

Better You Than Me

2010-02-03T08:39:00.000-08:00

As discombobulated as Democrats are right now, the following poll of Republicans on the question of “Who would be the best nominee to face Obama in 2012?” is even more muddled with “Unknown” leading the pack by a huge margin (42%), followed by Sarah Palin in a distant second (16%) and Mitt Romney in third (11%).

Incredulously, Darth Cheney scored 10% as well.

In the same poll, 53% of respondents also claim that Palin is more qualified to be president than Obama which begs the obvious question of how many were piss-drunk when questioned.

Nevertheless, as much as the GOP is still swaggering over Scott Brown’s upset Senate win in MA, these results—albeit a long way out from the ’12 Iowa Caucuses—paint a vague and troubled picture for the party’s near-future.

For The Record (Part II)

2010-02-02T14:50:00.000-08:00

Just saw an amazing segment on “Hardball” on the topic of DADT (Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell) including Peter Sprigg of the Christian conservative Family Research Council during which Mr. Sprigg claimed that gays and lesbians should: a) not be allowed to join the US military, and; b) contrary to Lawrence v. Texas (2003), states should be legally able to criminalize homosexual conduct.

I’ll give Mr. Sprigg credit for one thing: unlike many of Chris Mathews’ guests who often duck direct answers to direct questions, he openly did so when asked his stances on DADT and homosexual behavior as a legal concept.

Sprigg is also fully entitled to his First Amendment rights.

However, by the same token, I am free to retort that Mr. Sprigg’s statements above are rooted in the fucking Dark Ages, or Berlin circa 1938 (whichever you prefer).

For The Record

2010-02-02T10:34:00.000-08:00

The absurd Clinton era policy known as "don’t-ask, don’t-tell" should be abolished immediately.

In a time when the US needs all the best-trained, best-equipped soldiers and pilots it can get to help defend our security, expelling any personnel from service strictly based on their exposed sexual persuasion is at best a self-defeating act.

Kudos to President Obama for finally pulling this issue back into the light where it can be properly swept away by Congress ASAP.

Yes, We Have No Platform

2010-02-01T17:23:00.000-08:00

After spending the past year bellowing for fiscal discipline only to reject a Senate measure establishing a Deficit Commission that would have defined methods to cut state spending, the GOP has upped its own inconsistent ante by voting across the board against a PAYGO plan similar to that used in the Clinton era which mandated that for every hike in government spending other programs must be cut to compensate.

Therefore, if a billion dollars is required for “New Program A,” existing spending plans must take a loss to span the gap.

The good news, however, is that PAYGO passed the Senate – albeit by a razor-thin 60-40 vote with not even one Republican crossing over to support the measure.

I’ll give the GOP one thing: they are amazingly consistent in their dedication to obstructionism no matter if it even means rejecting a measure the party backed just weeks beforehand. Thus, the "Party of Lincoln" has utterly sold out its principles by rejecting even basic steps toward national progress in favor making short-term political jabs at their rivals.

God knows that Congressional Democrats are hardly a model of efficiency, but I genuinely wonder why their Republican colleagues bother to show up for work anymore. They are useless.