Step right up Republicans and pick your poison for the GOP Presidential nomination.
Your choices are as good as a Party of No, Obstruction and one in which is of by and for the 1% million and billionaires and Wall St. can deliver. For today's GOP is pervaded by a bunch of liars, demagogues and ignoramuses. Don't take it from me. This lovely assessment comes from Der Spiegel.
A Freakshow
They lie. They cheat. They exaggerate. They bluster. They say one idiotic, ignorant, outrageous thing after another. They've shown such stark lack of knowledge - political, economic, geographic, historical - that they make George W. Bush look like Einstein and even cause their fellow Republicans to cringe.
Meet the GOP Candidates.
Rick Perry: Governor of Texas whom no one knew until he decided to run for POTUS. The good people of Texas have learned that their Governor is all hat and no head. His frequent brain freezes on the debate stage tells us how little he knows about the federal government. Not to mention his deep understanding of domestic and foreign issues. Or lack thereof. His frequently slurred speech makes him sound like a discombobulated drunk. It has not been easy for the once great state of Texas to learn that it's Governor is a blithering idiot who is so bereft of substance that his campaign ads are nothing more than cheap shot personal hit jobs and factual distortions. The only thing keeping the Perry campaign going right now is fat cat money. Despite his low poll numbers Perry, who has received a government issued paycheck since 1984, thinks he can sell himself as an outsider.
Hermann Cain: Mr. 999 is a very smooth operator whose 13 year "friendship" with his mistress had nothing to do with sex. No matter, Mr. Cain has never been a serious Presidential candidate. His running for office is more about him and selling his book.
Mitt Romney, as uptight as ever, is not liked by his own party, mostly b/c many Republicans don't think that he is authentic. Like Governor Rick Perry, Mitt Romney is like a sound byte and nothing else. He will say and do whatever people want him to say and do. A pathological flip flopper Mitt has had arguments with himself.
Newt Gingrich, a nasty curmudgeon from the past is a mean, gasbag of a sourpuss who is itching for a fight. The former U.S. House Speaker wants us to forget that he left office in disgrace because of ethics violations. The serial adulterer pushed for Clinton's impeachment because of the Monica Lewinsky affair while Gingrich cheated on his then second wife. A good old Southern boy from Georgia, Gingrich barely masks his racism when he refers to President Obama. And his assessment of impoverished children would make Ebenezer Scrooge proud. According to Professor Take a Bath poor children have no work ethic except for crime.
Cross posted on Texas Kaos.
At Thanksgiving my Republican brother-in-law in Ohio asked me who is running for the 2012 Republican Presidential nomination. He said he is so "pissed off" that he won't listen to any news that has anything to do with politics. But he does trust me knowing that I am politically informed. And so I gave him his choices as mentioned above. Needless to say, my youngest brother-in-law is not very happy with what I had laid out. He has lost two jobs in the last four years. A family to support he has no patience for politicians who are liars, demagogues, ignoramuses and cheaters. I will leave it to my sister, a Democrat, to convince him to change Parties.
Ideologies from the Twilight Zone.
I did not include Ron Paul in the mix of liars, cheaters, adulterers, hypocrites, demagogues and ignoramuses because his supporters do believe that he, unlike Romney and Perry, is the real deal. What they see is what they will get. Paul won't flip flop or have "oops" moments because he actually believes what he says. He does not parrot memorized talking points like Rick Perry. Most of Paul's ideas and policies might be batshit crazy but Paul means what he says.
The same is true for Michele Bachmann. Her ideas are also from an alternative universe called the Twilight Zone but Michele, like Ron Paul, speaks from the heart. Her supporters find her authentic. And Texans should give Michele some love for calling Rick Perry out for his sleazy, self-serving love affair with crony capitalism, i.e. good old boy love fests.
A Scared Spin Doctor.
The most frightened Republican on the scene right now is the party's head spin doctor. Frank Luntz, a very well known GOP pollster who runs focus groups, is the guy who writes the talking points for his party. Some members of the Party of the 1% are known to have read talking points from not only Frank Luntz but from lobbyist groups and ALEC on the floor of the U.S. House of "Representatives."
It seems that the GOP Spin Doctor and message master is worried sick about the effect the Occupy movements will have on how Americans think about capitalism. You see, the capitalism we practice today is not the fair and regulated capitalism that many of us, particularly the baby boomer generation, grew up with. Since the repeal of the Glass Steagall Act in 1999 and the heyday of the W. Bush/Cheney Administration we have been engaging in an unfettered, unregulated form of crony capitalism.
Frank Luntz is frightened that 99% of the American people are sick and tired of today's crony capitalism. In order to protect his turf, not to mention his paycheck, Luntz has created talking points for Republican lawmakers to use to fight back on behalf of the 1% they represent.
Don’t Mention Capitalism: Luntz said that his polling research found that “The public…still prefers capitalism to socialism, but they think capitalism is immoral. And if we’re seen as defenders of quote, Wall Street, end quote, we’ve got a problem.”
– Empathize With The 99 Percent Protesters: Luntz instructed attendees to tell protesters that they “get it”: “First off, here are three words for you all: ‘I get it.’ … ‘I get that you’re. I get that you’ve seen inequality. I get that you want to fix the system.”
– Don’t Say Bonus: Luntz told Republicans to re-frame the concept of the bonus payment — which bailed-out Wall Street doles out to its employees during holidays — as “pay for performance” instead.
– Don’t Mention The Middle Class Because Americans Don’t Trust Republicans To Defend It: “They cannot win if the fight is on hardworking taxpayers,” Luntz instructed the audience. “We can say we defend the ‘middle class’ and the public will say, I’m not sure about that. But defending ‘hardworking taxpayers’ and Republicans have the advantage.”
– Don’t Talk About Taxing The Rich: Luntz reminded Republicans that Americans actually do want to tax the rich, so he reccommended they instead say that the government “takes from the rich.”
Thank you, Mr. Luntz for showing us your true colors. The colors that 99% of us have suspected all along.
99% of the American people know deep inside their gut that today's capitalism is indeed immoral. Why does Mr. Luntz think people have taken to the streets? It is not because the weather is nice during the fall months in most of the U.S. We do see the GOP as defenders of Wall St. Just check the voting records and campaign contributions for all GOP lawmakers in the U.S. Congress and every state house. The Party is known for protecting job creators who do zip to create jobs.
99% gets it that the Party of the 1% does not get it at all. We know the Republican politicians will not lift one finger to work on behalf of the other 99%. Want proof? Check out the voting records of the U.S. House of Representatives since January 2011. A prime example? The GOP in the U.S. House and Senate have fought President Obama tooth and nail on his jobs bill. They chose to ignore it for purely political reasons.
The House has declined to take up Mr. Obama’s jobs package, while Senate Democrats could not muster the 60 votes needed to block a Republican filibuster against either the full $447 billion package or a $35 billion piece providing state aid, mostly for teachers’ pay. With White House support, Senate Democrats have broken the measure into its main parts to force Republicans to take a series of tough votes on proposals, each of which has broad public support, according to polls.
The Republicans believe if more people suffer and remain jobless the majority will focus their anger on President Obama. The Party of Scrooge sees this as a way to stick it to Obama but what they are really doing is prolonging the suffering and hardship for unemployed Americans. Make no doubt about it. There will be no gifts left under any of the 99% Christmas trees this year by a Republican Santa.
If the majority of the American people are in as sour a mood as my youngest brother-in-law I don't think they are going to buy the into the nonsense that the government takes too much from rich people. The mere notion that folks would actually believe this is laughable at best.
This is what happens when a Party becomes so consumed and obsessed by greed that its Presidential candidates have been reduced to liars, demagogues, ignoramuses, cheaters, adulterers and hypocrites.