TEAs went to the polls in 2010 licking their chops in the hopes of sticking it to the dreadful Kenyan socialist….the guy 53% of Americans voted in as president two short years earlier. TEAs were going to retake their country from the slavery of progressivism and set America free from its chains of socialistic bondage. Elected House TEAs actually regarded themselves as 'the ones we've been waiting for'…..the ones who would make Droopy McConnell's top GOP priority, a one term Obama, a rousing reality.

By god, these new House 'patriots', patriots such as have never been witnessed in all of American history, would show the Democratic communists how to create jobs, how to move and shake, how to lead us out of the deep recession the previous GOP government had led us into. TEA Republicans were going to put a wayward country back on track. And, most importantly, TEAs were not going to be weak-kneed and partially-pink compromisers with the enemy Democrats. There's no RINO in TEA.

Compromise is for appeasers. Compromise is for cowards. So, compromise was off the table. That was how very, very serious the new House TEAS were about governance. In the Shining City on a Hill template democracy which is the United States of America, TEAs would prove to the world how not compromising with your political opponents was the way forward in the 21st century. Refusing half a loaf instead of taking half a loaf became the new TEA badge of honor. Even if the entire country starved to death.

It should go without saying that this House of Representatives has been the worst House ever. They have not accomplished anything, and that has been by design.

And so as our never ending story of GOP obstruction continues today, we find that even Droopy himself, Senate GOP Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell….the guy who declared the GOP's top priority of getting rid of Obama….can't even come to terms with the cluster***k that is the House…..

Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader who negotiated the two-month compromise with the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, has been largely silent, in effect standing by his deal and letting House Republicans stew in the controversy. Mr. McConnell believed he had Mr. Boehner’s backing for whatever deal he won, lawmakers say, but House Republicans rebelled when Mr. Boehner presented it to them on a Saturday afternoon conference call.

When House TEAs behave so crazily that even "make Obama a one term president" McConnell can't defend them….you know you're dealing with an irrational and incompetent bunch who need sent home next election.

The shameless House TEAs took it on the chin all day yesterday from such Leninist believers as the Wall Street Journal, Karl Rove, John McCain, Bob Corker, and Lisa Murkowski.

How quaint….an intramural cat fight. Republicans battling Republicans out in the open. It simply doesn't get any better.

The point here is how extremely radical the GOP controlled House actually is…and how Speaker Boehner has absolutely no control over his renegade Republican members. Americans who now give Congress an 11% approval rating…Americans who now approve of the Dark Knight Kenyan President Obama by 49% (a 10 point increase in the last few months),…have seen enough. If an election were held today, Democrats would retake the House.

All I can say is …good job TEA men. You've stayed the course, you haven't compromised. You've kept to your stiff-necked, authoritarian and anti-democratic stance. You've worked hard to bring the government within an eyelash of a standstill 3 times in less than a year. Your chants of "cut it or shut it" and "shut it down" probably still send chills down your own diseased spines…and yet, you're also entirely responsible for the first downgrade of U.S. debt in its history…and now, you're acting like dimwitted spoiled brats over a freaking tax cut, whose non-passage will affect 160 million Americans.

Come next November, Americans will know what to do with uncontrollable, petulant, spoiled brats who suffer from illusions of grandeur. Not only will voters take the keys to the car away from the TEA drivers in the House….they will also leave the extremists along the side of the road, by themselves. Because that's where they belong.

Elections matter. Nowhere has that been more apparent than in the House that Boehner built. The House of Tea. While discouraged progressives and moderates stayed home November, 2010….the TEAs rallied in hatred of all things Democratic, all things Obama…and took back the House of Representatives. The TEAs did it fair and square. They deserve a lot of credit for their enthusiasm and steadfastness. TEAs worked hard…and it paid off. Republicans regained the majority in the House.

However, as many progressives predicted following the election, House Republicans had absolutely nothing to offer the nation other than gridlock. The only policy objective from the right has been the goal to make Obama a one term president.

What Boehner's House Republicans will not do…is compromise. The ability of a democracy to succeed as a democracy is based on the given that compromise is essential to the legislating process. Unfortunately, compromise was the first victim of the new TEA Party led House.

Over the weekend, this refusal of TEA driven House members to compromise has produced more gridlock….but this time is even worse than before. On Friday, the Senate approved a two month extension of payroll tax cuts, unemployment insurance and the Medicare doc fix. Senate Republicans also demanded a provision requiring Obama to say yea or nay on the Keystone XL pipeline….and Democrats accepted that provision, I assume, in a compromise deal.

Whatever….the point here is that the Senate voted 89-10 to pass the bill. 89-10. That's what bipartisanship looks like. That's what compromise is able to produce. Even though I think a year's extension of the measures would have been preferable, two months is what the Senate compromised on. The shortness of the extension means that legislators will be revisiting this "debate" in the middle of the GOP primaries. Not sure why Senate Republicans want that to happen, but then, it doesn't have to make sense…it's the Congress.

You might have thought that a measure which passed 89-10 in the Senate would also be welcomed by the TEA House…but you would be wrong….

The deal collapsed in spectacular fashion early Saturday. After passing the Senate with an overwhelming majority, Boehner presented the deal to his members, many of whom — including Boehner’s top lieutenants — rejected it. Sunday morning, he appeared on NBC to declare it dead on arrival.

This is the second time (at least) that John Boehner's leadership in the House has failed. Boehner worked with Mitch McConnell in the Senate to come up with a palatable bill….only to have his uncompromising TEA House members to throw it all in his face.

Anyway, the kabuki TEA theater will continue this week while Americans are busy paying attention to the upcoming holiday. It is possible that uncompromising House TEAs will be solely responsible for raising taxes on some 160 million Americans. I repeat…..House Republicans may be responsible for RAISING taxes on 160 million Americans. Republicans raising taxes.

The reason given by Eric Cantor and others who prefer TEA is that the two month extension is just too short of a period of time. For what, exactly, I have no idea.

"The House opposes (the Senate) bill because – to put it simply – we owe the middle class, employers and doctors better than a two-month extension. Washington is already causing massive uncertainty to those struggling in the Obama economy. We can do better. "

This is the same Eric Cantor who created sufficient enough "uncertainty" in August to cause S&P to downgrade U.S. debt instruments.

Boehner…

But Boehner, as well as other Republicans, made it clear that they didn't like a two-month fix.

"How can you do tax policy for two months?" he asked.

All the Senate bill does, he said, is trigger the same fight when Congress returns next month.

"I believe that two months is just kicking the can down the road. The American people are tired of that. Frankly, I'm tired of it," Boehner said.

After dragging out budget and credit extension talks all summer, Boehner is…now…."tired" of "kicking cans."

Truth be told, House TEA members calculated the political downside of having to revisit this issue during the February GOP primaries….and didn't particularly like the prospects. No matter, because what it comes out looking like is a calcified GOP House which has no intention…ever…of compromising. At least not until a Republican controls the White House.

The current House will prove to be the most do-nothing House in recent history. Having made the determination that ousting a Democratic president was more important than passing legislation that would help the American people, the TEA House set their necks to stiffer, and have never looked back.

There can be no democratic process without compromise…and yet compromise is what the House TEAs will not do.

In Ohio, 2nd amendment gun nuts enthusiasts have made it possible for Ohioans to carry concealed weapons while frequenting bars where alcohol is served.

Makes perfect sense. What could possibly go wrong?

What could be more sensible than a bar full of heat-packing Ohioans?

A Wisconsin state assembly full of heat-packing elected officials.

Concealed weapons will be permitted in most state buildings, including the Capitol, the Department of Administration announced Friday.

Wisconsin's new concealed carry statutes go into effect Tuesday. People who have gone through firearms training can begin applying for permits that day.

"State law ensures that citizens with licenses are able to carry concealed weapons and that law extends to state facilities," DOA Secretary Mike Huebsch said. "Wisconsin is the 49th state to put a concealed carry law into place. Individuals with licenses are law-abiding citizens and we must respect their right to keep and bear arms under the U.S. and Wisconsin Constitutions."

Who knew that Wisconsin's Assembly was overwhelmed with criminal assemblymen? Carrying concealed weapons, I have been told, is for self-defense purposes. Who are the criminals from whom Wisconsin state officials must protect themselves? Honestly, I have no clue. If I was going to rob people, for obvious reasons, I wouldn't start at a state's Capitol Building.

So, like Ohio's bill, Wisconsin's new packing-heat-in-the state-assembly law….must be about taking the country back…..you know, freedom.

FREEDOM. Concealing loaded guns wherever you are is known on the far right as their god-given right to express their liberty. By god.

Deadly, loaded weapons carried by dozens of elected officials who are hotly debating extremely divisive legislation….is seen as a wise and freedom inspiring move. Yet, non-dangerous, non-lethal cameras and recording devices….apparently…are so dangerous to state lawmakers that they are prohibited from the Wisconsin Assembly gallery…..

Eighteen people were arrested Tuesday for using cameras in the Wisconsin Assembly gallery, including the editor of The Progressive magazine, Matt Rothschild.

Rothschild and others had gone to the capitol to protest a series of arrests in recent weeks of individuals who carried signs or took photos or video in defiance of an Assembly ban.

"We ought to have a right to take a picture," Rothschild said.

Guns, Yes. Cameras, No.

Prompting Stephen Colbert to opine thusly…

Stephen Colbert said Governor Walker was bringing "a new freedom to America's dairyland" with the concealed carry law, but said people would not see "images of gunfire in the statehouse" because of the camera ban. "Thank God. Cameras are dangerous," he said.

Of course, as we saw during the Wisconsin GOP actions to crush unions and union workers, cameras can be dangerous enemies of the state. Loaded guns concealed by assembly people….freedom. Cameras recording reality….dangerous threats.

I'm not going to take the time to wade through any mumbo-jumbo legalese seeking to justify these obviously unjustifiable contradictions.

What I am concerned about is the total lack of common sense by TEA Party extremists who would defend carrying concealed weapons on the Wisconsin Assembly floor, yet would at the same time prohibit recording devices in the building. What in the hell is the matter up in Wisconsin? What is wrong with these people?

Once again….because there are certainly no logical, intelligent, facts-based justifications for encouraging the carrying of loaded, concealed weapons by elected officials in the Wisconsin Assembly….I can only assume that this nutty and purposely provocative new law falls under the umbrella of the Rushbo Doctrine…."if it pisses off progressives and seems insanely crazy….then, do it."

I'm open to considering other reasons for what seems like total insanity.

Anyone want to try to square this circle?

It's been fun, I have to admit that. However, all good times eventually wind down, and that's what appears to be happening with the political influence and stagecraft of the TEA Party. The TEA Party burst on the scene as an anti-Democratic protest movement, primarily protesting the election of America's first black president, who also happened to be a Democrat. The TEAs were going to take back their country, although from what or from whom was never thoroughly explained.

Although TEA Party leaders and spokespeople complained loudly that what they represented was a return to fiscal discipline and smaller government, there were no sightings of this protest movement during the doubling of our national debt, the ballooning of our budget deficit, or the bloating of government programs under the Republican presidency of George W. Bush. To this blogger, that contradiction was always the biggest "tell" of who the TEA Party represented.

Now, almost three years later, we realize that the TEA Party is made up of far rightwing Republicans and conservatives…intent on sending Democrats home (and some RINOS) and replacing them with ultra-conservative Republicans who will never, ever, compromise with Democrats. Since the TEA Party "win" in the 2010 midterms, that uncompromising mentality has gridlocked our federal political process as never before, leading to the current 9% approval rating of Congress. Good job TEAs.

To show how far the influence of the TEA Party has waned, one only needs to look at the most recent polling in the secessionist state of South Carolina.

Romney has 25 percent and Cain has 23 percent, while Paul has 12 percent and Perry has 11 percent.

To be fair here, the S. Carolina poll results also explain that approximately one third of Republican voters in the state have not made up their minds.

But South Carolina? If you listen to rightwing media at all, you know that Texas Governor Rick Perry is the bonafide conservative in the GOP primary. Sure, Michele Bachmann and Rick Santorum are also far right conservatives, but let's face it, neither has a chance of grabbing the nomination.

Some may say that Herman Cain is a solidly conservative GOP candidate, however, does anyone actually believe that Cain will be Obama's opponent next November? But Rick Perry, if my political calculations are correct, was supposed to be the guy who gave the "liberal" establishment Romney a run for his money. Great campaigner, we were told. Could stand toe to toe with the likes of President Obama, we were told. Tremendous success down in the Lone Star State, we were told. A small government, anti-labor, oil-drenched, gun-fetishizing cowboy who had a record in Texas of shredding the safety net for the poor and vulnerable…just like TEA Party enthusiasts have been calling for. The vaunted TEA Party members were looking for a "true" conservative, and in Perry, they thought they had found their guy.

If the far-right conservative ideology embraced by the TEA Party is held so widely by so many patriotic Republicans….as we were told endlessly by Village squawkers for two years….how could it be that Rick Perry only registered 11% support amongst blood red South Carolina Republicans? How could it be, if TEA Party doctrines are so popular, that a "liberal" RINO with a history of (gasp) compromising with Democrats….is currently leading all GOP candidates in South Carolina?

Here's a possible answer for the sake of discussion:

South Carolina Republican voters want to defeat Barack Obama. Perhaps, S. Carolina GOP voters are concluding that Mitt Romney is the strongest national candidate to run against Obama. And despite Romney's past willingness to compromise with Democrats…and even promote Democratic policies (pro-choice, pro-healthcare mandate)….S. Carolina Republican voters are setting aside their no-compromise-with-the-Democrats policy, temporarily compromising their own rock-ribbed principles, as it were, in order to give Obama a run for his money.

That is a very pragmatic approach. Whatever works to remove the dreaded Democratic president. Following this pragmatic thinking, especially in light of Mitt Romney's "liberal" record, I think it might be safe to say that if Satan, himself, could debate Obama effectively, raise a zillion dollars, and showed promise in the polls….Republican primary voters just might vote for him.

Compromising on their own presidential candidate….in order to send a GOP'er to the White House who won't compromise with Democrats….a candidate who has a broad record of compromising with Democrats. Forgive me Republican voters, but I'm not seeing the consistency.

And neither does Ann Coulter, “If you don’t run Chris Christie, Romney will be the nominee and we’ll lose,” said Coulter.

First time The Reverend has ever agreed with Ann Coulter.

Another week, another GOP presidential candidates debate. The only thing different about this debate was the teevee network it was on. The Bloomberg Network. What struck me as different was all the Pete Peterson Foundation ads during commercial breaks. The ones which call for abolishing Social Security and Medicare. So fitting for a Republican Party debate.

One highlight of note….Newt Gingrich, a truly walking, talking embarrassment, called last night for the incarceration of Democrats Barney Frank and Chris Dodd. For the crime of legislating.

“If you want to put people in jail, you ought to start with Barney Frank and Chris Dodd,”

Big banksters and other paper shufflers who make their fortunes by "skimming" the transactions of millions of Americans, don't like the new Dodd-Frank bank regulatory legislation passed before the TEA Party blitzkreig hit the House in 2010. While Dodd-Frank is timid in its approach to re-regulating an openly immoral industry, it it better than nothing at all….but banksters, and Republicans,….hate it.

In the American Age of the Oligarchs, even timid checks and balances on the skimmers is just too much for Republican "idea" guys like Newton. In fact, all of the GOP candidates last night were in favor of simply handing the remaining keys to America over to the richest and most powerful 1%.

All GOP candidates called for the continued deregulation of American industry. Every situation is an opportunity for Republican leaders to call for deregulation of American industry. Good economies or bad….the Republican Party is always looking to help the richest and most powerful few get richer and more powerful.

Despite the Newton's quackery, it was under Gingrich's own House guidance, during the 90's, when the insane idea that banks could police themselves…won the day….and investment banks were deregulated to create a shadow banking system where impossible money exchange schemes, like credit default swaps, were spawned. If government was at fault in the economic crash of 2008, it was from deregulating…not regulating….the banksters during the 90's.

But who gives a damn about Gingrich? He's a nut and always has been.

What about the actual GOP candidate for president next fall, Mitt Romney? Will TEA Party insurrectionists come out to vote for a Mormon candidate who says stuff like this…..

GOLDMAN: So would you or would you not be open to another Wall Street bailout?

ROMNEY: No one likes the idea of a Wall Street bailout. I certainly don't.

GOLDMAN: But you said in 2008 that it prevented the collapse of the financial —

(CROSSTALK)

ROMNEY: There is no question but that the action of President Bush and that Secretary Paulson took was designed to keep not just a collapse of individual banking institutions, but to keep the entire currency of the country worth something and to keep all the banks from closing, and to make sure we didn't all lose our jobs. My experience tells me that we were on the precipice, and we could have had a complete meltdown of our entire financial system, wiping out all the savings of the American people. So action had to be taken.

Was it perfect? No. Was it well implemented? No, not particularly.

Were there some institutions that should not have been bailed out? Absolutely.

Should they have used the funds to bail out General Motors and Chrysler? No, that was the wrong source for that funding. But this approach of saying, look, we're going to have to preserve our currency and maintain America — and our financial system is essential.

No matter how you translate the Plastic Man's words…..Romney would have done exactly what George W. Bush did in late 2008. Mitt Romney, then, given a similar future banking crisis, would come to the aid of the same banksters that blew up our national economy with their reckless and greedy behavior. Romney isn't for bail outs…..unless they're for the banksters….then he's for them. Not automakers…..just banksters.

I wonder what TEA Party members are thinking about Romney's answer on the bank bailouts. The TEAS, the principled libertarian dreamers that they are, wanted to allow the banks to fail in 2008. Let them go belly up, the TEAs recommended. So what, if 25% unemployment was the result. So what, if soup lines were the only growth industries. TEAs are principled, by god. Libertarian dreamscape principles must be upheld….no matter how many millions must suffer.

Finally, relish the weasel-dom of Mr. Mitt Romney. You see, Romney was FOR the bankster bailouts…..but….he was against how those bailouts were "implemented." This is a distinction without a difference, as it were. Congress had no vote on "implementation" in the fall of 2008. The vote was on whether or not the banksters should be bailed out. Romney would have voted with the majority.

Mitt Romney, regardless of the meaningless nuances he would have brought to the "implementation" of said bailout……was all in favor of the bailouts. TEA Party Republicans, as a rule, were against the bankster bailouts. So, if TEAs vote for Mitt Romney next fall….won't they actually be voting again for George W. Bush….a GOP president whom the TEAs now claim was too liberal?

Of course they will be. You gotta' hand it to the TEAs though…..they simply will not budge when it comes to their principles.

Back in the early goings of 2009, corporate media loved themselves some TEA Party. The hanging teabags. The Mel Gibson Patriot rent-a-costumes. The "don't tread on me" flags. The "taxed enough already" signs.

Teevee media was all-the-hell-over the TEA Party. Sister Sarah and the odd Glenn Beck embraced the TEAs early, Fox News became the TEA Party's promoter. Even "liberal" MSNBC's Chrissy Matthews, and others, were twitterpated by the enthusiasm of this allegedly grassroots conservative movement, championed by, according to Fox's Roger Ailes, the "hot" Sarah Palin.

The Taxed Enough Already motto should have been the tip-off that the TEAs shouldn't be taken seriously. Federal tax rates were, and still are, at 60 year lows and President Obama had, early in 2009, rolled back 2% of an employee's side of the payroll tax. The TEA's Taxed Enough Already motto seemed strangely disconnected from reality. Early on, The Reverend called the TEA's message, incoherent, a denial of reality.

But the teevee media nurtured their own love affair with the TEA protest movement. Would Sarah ride the TEA wave to the presidency, many Serious, Professionals in media asked repeatedly and breathlessly. And even if taxes are at 60 year low rates….they COULD go up…so there.

For 2 straight years, teevee media carried water for the incoherent, astroturf, TEA group. Media "stars" rarely asked what "taking their country back" meant. Few pointed out that Obama had not raised taxes, but lowered them.

The TEAs were never about taxes, or smaller government or "taking their country back." The TEA movement was all about electing more, and more extreme, Republicans into halls of power. That's what the TEAs meant when they said they were "taking their country back"…..they simply forgot to include the "from the Democrats", part.

However, with all of the manufactured, ahistorical nonsense of the anti-Democratic Party TEAs, the one crucial issue that the TEAs and their corporate media sponsors never brought up was the banking crisis.
Not once did I here a TEA representative speak negatively or even excitedly about holding the banksters responsible for the terrible financial situation they had put the country in.

In fact, while the nation was shedding hundreds of thousands of jobs per month in the first half of 2009, and a record number of houses were being foreclosed upon, the TEAs helped spread yet another phony meme that the new recession had all been the fault of Barney Frank, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and, of course, Fanny and Freddy. The housing foreclosure nightmare, as far as the TEAs were concerned, came about because Democrats had forced Wall Street banksters to sell mortgages to millions of Americans who could not afford them. It was the government's fault, we were told, not those greedy banksters.

Alan Greenspan and numerous other government and former government officials from the world of finance testified under oath that the fault for the recession fell on bankers and various paper shuffling entities who had been left alone to police themselves. Greenspan said that he had been proven wrong….a belief he had held all of his life….that bankers could be trusted to act ethically and morally without oversight. Greenspan said under oath that he had been proven wrong.

No matter to the TEA Republicans. It was the Democrats fault…..liberalism, to be precise….and no facts, testimony or evidence would ever change their opinion.

Today, the TEAs are disapproved of by 46% of Americans while only approved of by 28% of Americans. It took awhile for Americans to decipher teevee media's code-of-bullsh*t about the TEAs….just as it did after the Iraq crime was launched…..but after the debt ceiling hostage situation, Americans have finally caught on, and the apparent love-affair with the incoherent, Democratic Party protest…is over.

So, the teevee media, ever the pimps of the rich and powerful….have simply refocused their attentions on another protest movement. This time it's the Occupy Wall Street protest. I'll be reviewing later the culpability of Wall Street in much of what is wrong with our national economy….but for now….take a look at this clip of teevee media personalities commenting on the OWS protesters. This three minute clip goes a long way in explaining why American voters are so often confused.

Warning: the arrogant and smug condescension exhibited by teevee personalities towards peaceful protesters on Wall Street may cause uncontrollable swearing by viewer…

LittleJohn Kasich is running a bit scared these days, and rightfully so. The ex-Fox, ex-Lehman Bros. employee was in Akron Tuesday to rally support for his signature union-and-Democrat destroying bill, SB5.

One issue still up in the air involves Senate Bill 5, a controversial effort that would make significant changes to Ohio law governing public workers. Opponents were successful in getting the issue on the November ballot and voters will decide whether to endorse or reject it, now known as Issue 2.

Kasich called it a matter of “taxpayer fairness” and said that public employees need to pay their fair share toward their health care and guaranteed pensions. He urged voters to read the bill and not be misled into thinking that the issue is an attack on blue-collar workers.

"Taxpayer fairness." Kasich is fibbing, of course. SB5 has never been about fairness….or even about balancing Ohio's state budget. SB5, as Mr. Executive Director of the Portage County TEA Party, Tom Zawistowski, made clear in yesterday's blog, is about damaging the Democratic Party. Wreck the public sector unions by eliminating collective bargaining rights for public employees…..wreck the Democratic Party. That's what SB5 is about…..not about "taxpayer fairness."

But since LittleJohn brought it up, let's analyze what he thinks is taxpayer fairness. Effective January 1, 2013, Ohio will no longer have an estate tax. That's because LittleJohn Fairness thinks it's "fair" to give the richest .01% of Ohioans a tax break….

11,542,645 2009 Population estimate for the State of Ohio

110,000 # of persons effected by estate tax 2009, or 0.01%

To LittleJohn Kasich, "taxpayer fairness" is when public unions, who represent average working class Ohioans, have their collective bargaining and binding arbitration rights…eliminated….because public employees don't pay enough for their health care. At the same time….the wealthiest .01% of Ohioans are entitled to a big estate tax break. That's LittleJohn's view of "taxpayer fairness."

Private sector workers would love to pay a nominal amount or nothing toward their health care and receive a guaranteed pension, he said.

I see this silly comparison being made more often lately. This is a way for those who are servants of the wealthy to coax average working class Ohioans to look negatively at public employees. Benefit envy, I'd call it. LittleJohn explains that non-union, private sector employees are looking at the health benefit package of public employees…..and are outraged that they don't get the same health care benefits as public employees.

My response to that? Poppy-freaking-cock.

Do you know what kind of health care benefit package private sector workers would really like to have? The health care benefits that the corporate brass and the CEO where they work receive. Do you know what kind of pension plan benefit package private sector workers would really like to have? The same one that the "golden parachuting", stock option accumulating, CEO and top executive lackeys where they work receive.

Talk about waging class warfare. Kasich and his Kronies in the TEAs are purposely pitting average working Ohioans against average working Americans. Why? To distract Ohioans away from the real war going on. That war pits the top 2% against the rest of us. And by the way, that's what Occupy Wall Street is essentially all about.

Now to the sickening part. Hold your nose….

“Everyone should join in and sacrifice,” the governor said. “That’s how you build a happier family. And a more solid community. And a more solid state.”

Shared sacrifice. Don't you just love it? "Shared sacrifice", to LittleJohn One Term, is making teachers, firefighters, police, road workers, nursing home workers,….public employees….pay more for benefits. "Shared sacrifice", to LittleJohn-"that cop's an idiot"-Kasich, is stripping teachers, firefighters, EMTs, police, road workers, nursing home workers….public employees….of their collective bargaining rights.
But "shared sacrifice", according to Ohio's diminutive governor, for the state's top .01%…..is a big, juicy estate tax holiday.

I hope the awful "sacrifice" of the top .01% doesn't crush the poor dears.

LittleJohn Kasich was in Akron yesterday because his approval ratings after SB5 are in the sewer. Kasich was in Akron yesterday because his signature legislation working with the Ohio TEAs to eliminate public employee unions is about to be rejected emphatically by Ohio voters come November 8.

Naturally, faced with such a predicament, Kasich rolled out the manure spreader of desperation. SB5 is not about paying a "fair share", whateverthehell that would be. SB5 is not about "shared sacrifice", just go ask the top .01% what they are sacrificing. Instead, SB5 is a union busting, Democratic Party-starving political plan to reinforce Republican Party control of Ohio.

Vote No on Issue 2…..and remind all of your friends to do the same.

Over the weekend, I obtained a copy of an e-mail written to members by the Executive Director of the Portage County TEA Party, Tom Zawistowski. The substance of the e-mail concerns itself with the November referendum vote in Ohio to keep or reject SB5, the now-infamous collective bargaining smashing legislation passed by Governor Kasich and his Tea Party Confederacy in Ohio's state legislature.

The ballot issue will be Issue 2. The vote is on November 8, just a few short weeks away. To vote to end collective bargaining for public employees, Ohioans will vote "yes." To vote to kill SB5 and thus maintain the collective bargaining rights of public employees, Ohioans will vote "no."

The last polls I saw showed SB5 being scrapped by voters by a 51%-38% margin.

As you can imagine, Ohio's Tea Party, Governor LittleJohn, and Republicans in the state legislature are worried. As they should be. Even Ohio citizens who are not especially fond of labor unions have seen the unfairness and extremity in SB5.

This GOP worry in Ohio is why Mr. Executive Director of the Portage County TEA Party sent out his e-mail. The e-mail is seasoned with doom and gloom if SB5 is defeated. What I found most interesting was the candid nature of Mr. Zawistowski's remarks. Many times, in the early days of SB5, Republicans usually explained that the bill was necessary to balance the state's budget. But that was never true…..

"So, let me be clear. Everyone else can have whatever motivations they want to support issue 2, but for the TEA Party/Patriot movement our number one goal is to de-fund the union leadership and thus their exclusive partners in the Democratic Party and take back control of our government."

I want to thank Mr. Zawistowski for not being mealy mouthed about the reason the TEA Party members he leads should be for SB5. From the inception of the TEA Party 3 weeks after Barack Obama was inaugurated, I explained to readers that the protest movement had nothing to do with differences in opinion over political policies…..President Obama had barely enough time to set forth any policy details before the first TeaBagged headware was sighted at protest gatherings.

Instead, as Mr. Zawistowski makes clear, the TEA Party movement is but a Republican Party movement dressed up to appear to be something else. The GOP has long sought to hollow out and eliminate labor unions….public or private. Traditionally, labor groups have supported the Democratic Party and their candidates, primarily because the Democratic Party, despite wavering in recent years, has been a strong defender of unions and labor rights. Republicans, not so much.

The Portage County TEA Leader goes on….

"When we pass Issue 2, and the Democratic Party and the Unions are defunded, they will not have the money to compete in Ohio next year."

At least for Portage County TEA Partiers, SB5 is about doing damage to the Democratic Party. Therefore, all along, SB5 has been only a political tool to strengthen the electoral prospects of Republicans and do damage to their political opponents, the Democrats. Sorry, but I told you so.

Zawistowski goes on….

"…they (Democrats) will not have the money to compete in Ohio next year. Barack Obama and Sherrod Brown will lose Ohio and be thrown out of office in 2012. The Governor and the Ohio Legislature will be emboldened and thus willing to introduce more conservative legislation like Workman's Comp reform, Right to Work, School Choice and much more…"

Couldn't be clearer, could it? Right to Work…School Choice…..looks like a theme. Because it is a theme. And that theme is killing organized labor in the state of Ohio in order to advance the far right Republican agenda. The TEA Party movement is nothing but the most extreme portion of the Republican base. After Bush, I can understand why these extremist conservatives wanted to camoflauge their political identity with a new TEABagged identity….but….in the end….it's still, and only, the same old radicals from the Republican right.

Whether teachers, firefighters, police, etc can collectively bargain has never been the driver of state budgetary shortfalls. Union negotiators have often agreed to concessions and givebacks when times are tough. So, right from the get-go, busting up Ohio's public unions using SB5 as the bludgeoning tool, was never about balancing the budget. And now, as Tom Zawiskowski has spelled out, we know that SB5 was always about doing political damage to Republican opponents. Starving unions, according to TEA Party leaders, is the way to starve the Democratic Party of funding, and therefore, the way to do irreparable damage to the Party of the People.

If Ohioans want to maintain and improve their state's public education program. If Ohioans still want to have professional police, fire and EMT services in the state. If a state spirit of "we're in this thing together" is not to be killed off and replaced by an "every rich man for himself" way of life…..then it is necessary to vote "no" on Ohio Issue 2.

I take Mr.Tom Zawiskowski at his word. SB5 is all about destroying public employee unions in order to give Republican candidates an advantage. But state legislation which has no other purpose other than political gamesmanship at the expense of average working Ohioans…..has no business being passed in the first place.

Say Hell No on Issue 2.

Washington Post…

Antiabortion activists who have sought for months to shut down a Germantown (Maryland) clinic picketed its landlord outside a Montgomery County middle school where his daughter is a student, school and police officials said Monday.

Keep in mind here, picketers protesting abortion did so at the middle school where the daughter of the landlord of a building which rents space to an abortion clinic attends school. The picketing at the middle school can only be interpreted as an act of intimidation against the daughter in order to put fear into the father, enough to kick the abortion clinic out of his building.

A small group of protesters stood outside Robert Frost Middle School in Rockville on Thursday, holding signs and a banner, during back-to-school night, officials said.

The student’s father, who did not want to be named to protect the safety of his daughter, a sixth-grader at the school, said he saw the five protesters when he went to the school event.

Some held a large banner that showed his photo, his full name, his phone number and the words “Please STOP the Child Killing.” Others held posters showing aborted fetuses.

The man owns the property in the Germantown office park where LeRoy Carhart has been performing abortions late in a pregnancy at the privately owned Reproductive Health Services clinic. Antiabortion protesters have repeatedly demonstrated outside the clinic since Carhart arrived in Maryland in December.

Abortion is legal in the United States. No American woman has ever been forced to have an abortion against their own will. While I understand both sides of the so-called abortion debate, until federal laws are changed by Congress and/or the Supreme Court, there is no defense for so hatefully picketing a middle school where the daughter of a landlord who rents space to an abortion clinic attends school.

While, apparently, no laws were broken by the picketers in Maryland, what is being reinforced by their actions is the inhumanity, cruelty, guilt-by-distant-association tactics, and hate filled intimidation…which, more and more, have become the defining characteristics of America's extreme right.

As the Tea Party right sings the praises of "freedom", many members are often simultaneously working to keep other Americans from exercising theirs.

There's much to criticize about today's American right…but it's the basic inhumanity, I think,…the callousness…which disturbs me the most. With the election of Obama, for what ever reason, it seems like this inhumanity and callousness have intensified.

Anti-abortion folks often claim morality in defense of their rigid and intolerant positions. But isn't it true that many of today's anti-abortionists are also part and parcel of the Tea Party movement? Here are the results of the last two years polling of Tea Party members….

2010 CBS poll…

They are more likely than American adults overall to attend religious services weekly (38 percent do so) and to call themselves evangelical (39 percent). Sixty-one percent are Protestant, and another 22 percent are Catholic.

NY Times, CBS poll August 17, 2011…

So what do Tea Partiers have in common? They are overwhelmingly white, but even compared to other white Republicans, they had a low regard for immigrants and blacks long before Barack Obama was president, and they still do.

More important, they were disproportionately social conservatives in 2006 — opposing abortion, for example — and still are today.

And, of course, it has been the Tea Party which has led the way in cutting government spending in the midst of our worst recession. You see, it is moral to picket at a middle school where the child of a landlord, whose renter runs an abortion clinic, attends school….because abortion is oh-so-immoral. But it's also immoral, according to the Tea Party, for the government to spend money to relieve the plight of the unemployed, the elderly and the poor in the middle of our deepest recession….because the country has a deficit.

It was at the CNN/Tea Party Express GOP "debate" the other night when audience members applauded Ron Paul's answer that everyone was on their own when it came to medical care. When Wolfie Blitzer followed up by asking if we should simply allow an uninsured 30 year old American to die because he couldn't afford pre-existing condition insurance….a few in the audience cheered "Yeah" and "let him die."

Honestly, who does stuff like that? The bloodlust was palpable.

To me, all of this is a result of the extreme right's continued self-radicalization. It is a self-radicalization that refuses to have it any other way than their way. It is marked by actions, policies and words of cruelty, intolerance and basic inhumanity.

But then maybe it's just me, maybe I'm just too sensitive.

How do you see it? Is the extreme right in the U.S., as seen in the words and actions of Tea Party members, just acting immorally moral? Or perhaps, just claiming morality, but, in reality, speaking and acting immorally?

I remember listening last week to Fox radio while driving in my car. The topic at the time was how weak President Obama was for changing the date of his speech to a Joint Session from Wednesday evening, where it conflicted with NBC's GOP candidates debate, to Thursday evening where Obama's speech would be just before the opening game of the NFL season.

Later, when it was announced that Obama's speech to a Joint Session would begin at 7PM, just prior to the NFL game on Thursday evening, I heard Rush Limbaugh blabber on about how weak Obama was because the popularity of the NFL had forced the unpopular Obama to move his speech time to the non-primetime of 7PM.

Nielsen ratings data showed that 31.4 million viewers watched Obama's address on jobs, which was carried live across 11 TV networks.

…..

Shortly after Obama closed his remarks, 27.2 million people watched the professional football's NFL kick off its season…….(the game) was the second most-watched NFL regular season primetime game on any one network in 15 years.

Apparently, the weak Obama actually helped out the popular NFL by scheduling his speech prior to kickoff.
Maybe, what President Obama has to say is actually more important to Americans than even the opening of the season of the popular NFL.

And perhaps, Fox radio, the right wing partisan freak show that it is, not only doesn't represent the American people….but is mostly wrong about…well….just about everything.

I know. Like saying the sun rises in the east.

_________________

The Republican minor leaguers had another debate last night. This time it was sponsored by the Most Busted Name In News, CNN, in coordination with the…..Tea Party Express (far right Republicans).

With these GOP presidential candidates, if you've seen one debate, you've seen them all. Obama is the worst president evah….the nation is bankrupt, especially Social Security, and the only thing holding employment numbers from exploding is taxes and regulations on business.

While watching and listening to leading Republicans, you start to get the feeling that they are talking about some other country, not the U.S. That's how foreign and foolish sounding their analysis is on most every topic.

First up last night was Social Security….Social Security is not bankrupt, nor is it close to being bankrupt. The plan's funding is good through 2037, and that's if the payroll cap is never raised between now and then. Despite the laughably nonsensical claims by several GOP candidates, including most prominently, Governor Rick Perry….there's nothing wrong with Social Security, at all. When Perry, or others, say that Social Security will not be there for the children and the grandchildren….they are lying.

The average monthly Social Security check is $1100. If nothing is done to adjust the payroll cap, Social Security will still be able to pay on average, approximately $900 per month per recipient, AFTER 2037….26 years from now. Perry, Romney and the rest…..as the Republican Party has sought to do since the inception of Social Security,…are simply telegraphing to Americans that, if given political power, they will seek to privatize Social Security…abolish it as we have known it. And just like with Paul Ryan's plan to abolish Medicare, replacing it with a privatized, for-profit system….while Wall Street would get more, Americans would get less.

In all my years, I have never seen such a brazen GOP bunch of corporate lackeys. Ashamed in the past to openly badmouth, and lie about, the two most popular government programs in our history…..now, shame has been replaced by boldness in ignorance. Governor Perry is oh-so-proud to lie to a national audience about the future of Social Security because the political party he hopes to represent no longer is shamed by bashing and spouting bogus claims about government programs for the poor, the elderly and the sick.

Second….last night's GOP candidates spoke in Tea Party tongues. Every candidate's solution to our economy was to rewind our national history tape back to 2001….and replay it. More tax cuts….and mostly for America's wealthiest. Slash regulations….and particularly for our largest industries.

We tried that.

That's what our government did from 2000-2009. Regulations on investment banking and commodities trading were basically eliminated under the triangulating moderate, Bill Clinton. Tax rates under Bush were reduced to 60 year lows, depleting the Treasury and doubling the national debt in 8 years. Despite the deep deregulation and the historically low tax rates….what Americans got in return was 9+% unemployment, a roll back of real estate and 401K values, and a standard of living like we had in the 90's, all with the added bonus of endless war.

But there they were last night. Every GOP hopeful told the audience that what we needed to do to save the economy was more of the same stuff we tried during the 00's. More of the same stuff which….failed.

Republicans still don't get it. Republican economic policies have proven to be miserable failures for the nation. Lower taxes on the rich, deregulation on the powerful….have proven to be losers for most Americans. Yet last night, what I heard again was that the U.S. needed to embrace those past failures and work to repeat them.