Politicians tell so many lies that it is hard to tell which one is the biggest or most outrageous. But one thing is certain. Pope Francis ushered in a breath of fresh air on our politically toxic culture during his visit last week. A very humble man spoke to us, including members of Congress, about hope, mercy, a call for international action to address global warming, empathy for the poor and sick, compassion for undocumented immigrants, an end to arms trade and the death penalty.
Wow. Imagine how soothing and uplifting this message sounded in a political world run by right wing ideology in which deregulation, trickle down economics, an unfettered free market and unbridled capitalism are considered the only solutions to every problem.
Tea Party Republicans musts have been squirming in their seats when the Pope spoke to Congress. These anti-government types are hardly into hope, mercy, empathy or compassion. As one who lives in Texas there is a reason why I refer to the Texas GOP as the cruel party.
Speaking of deregulation do we remember the time in which then Vice President Dick Cheney said the energy industry would regulate itself. Sure it would. And then there was Enron and brown outs and black outs in California. And then there was Enron again. It imploded. People lost their jobs. Lifetime retirement savings melted. A couple of executives went to prison. Speaking of which, how about the unchecked gambling casinos on Wall St. in 2007? They regulated themselves so well that the markets blew up and sent us into a devastating recession. Millions of lost jobs. Millions of lost homes. A global financial melt down. Only one person went to prison during that time. Bernie Madoff landed in the slammer because he had the nerve to rob billionaires.
Right wing economics is, in short, an unmitigated disaster. And most of us know it. The politicians know it too. But none will admit it. John Boehner told us as much during an interview with Face the Nation on Sunday after he announced he would be leaving the U.S. House of Representatives on October. 30. Of his tea party Republican colleagues who ran him off, the U.S. House Speaker said to beware false prophets.
But the Bible says, beware of false prophets. And there are people out there spreading noise about how much can get done. I mean, this whole idea that we were going to shut down the government to get rid of Obamacare in 2013, this plan never had chance.
But over the course of the August recess in 2013, and the course of September, lot of my Republican colleagues who knew it was a fool's errand really they were getting all this pressure from home to do this. And so we have got groups here in town, members of the House and Senate here in town who whip people into a frenzy believing they can accomplish things that they know, they know are never going to happen.
Kind of reminds me of all of those evil doing WMDs in Iraq.
That did not exist.
Texas is pervaded by false prophet politicians. Number one in line of course is Ted Cruz. He served as the chief instigator of the 2013 government shut down. My "representative" Ted Poe didn't utter a peep of protest. Ted Poe quietly lets his Party's loud mouth idiots do the leg work. While serving as a criminal judge in Houston the unforgiving Ted Poe would shame offenders, especially if they were black or brown. He would order them to wear signs "I stole from this store" and stand outside of the offended store. I will never forget the night I went to my neighborhood K-Mart to find a mortified man standing there with such a sign. Maybe Ted Poe should stand in front of the U.S. Capitol wearing a sign "I do not serve my constituents. I serve myself first and foremost."
Nor did other Texas Republican lawmakers care about the negative impact a government shut down might have on their constituents. The good old white boys do what they do.
Heh heh. Let's slap that black President around a bit and show him. Blake Farenthold rejoiced over the shutdown. So did Louie Gohmert, John Culberson and others. All knowing that Obamacare would not be repealed. They also knew, but didn't care, that non essential federal employees were furloughed without pay. Their mortgages, car payments and student loans were not furloughed however.
Greg Abbott, Governor of TX is a false prophet politician too. In response to the far right paranoia about a U.S. military exercise, Jade Helm in the state, the Governor asked the Texas Guard to keep an eye on elite U.S. military forces. Just in case the U.S. military's wickedly secret purpose was to steal Texans' guns and impose martial law on the state.
Governor Abbott knew fully well that the U.S. forces were here to train. The climate and terrain in S. Texas is similar to where our troops will deploy. Period. But the Governor chose that dark, stupid place because he, like Ted Cruz, Blake Farenthold, Louie Gohmert, John Culberson and others are integrity bereft and morally bankrupt. They play the race, fear and hate cards whenever opportunity knocks.
But, believe it or not, there is worse than one's being integrity bereft and morally bankrupt. It's called the Big Lie. A lie so cynical and reprehensible that it demands questions about one's character and whether or not such chilling dishonesty should disqualify a candidate from running for office.
I stopped watching the Republican Presidential debates on September 16 when Carly Fiorina lied about a so-called abortion videotape she claimed to have watched. The abortion, she claimed, happened at Planned Parenthood.
"Watch a fully formed fetus on the table, its heart beating, its legs kicking, while someone says, 'We have to keep it alive to harvest its brain.' "
Outraged, I turned off the TV. For I knew what Fiorina had said was blatantly dishonest. Naturally,
CNN let her get away with the lie.
The degree to which CNN prostituted itself to the Republican Party during the debate would be shocking had this frog not been slowly boiling for over a decade. To earn the right to charge advertisers 40 times its normal rate for a program that reached a record 23 million viewers, CNN executives agreed to allow the deranged right-wing radio announcer Hugh Hewitt to help steer the debate. One imagines they also instructed their own host, Jake Tapper, to invite the candidates to lie with impunity because no self-respecting journalist would have allowed himself to be part of such a degrading performance unless specifically ordered to do so.
CNN attempted to redeem itself, I guess.
And a lie it is indeed. The content of the videotape cited is actually one of a miscarriage, not an abortion. A miscarriage that took place in a hospital. It had nothing to do with Planned Parenthood.
When CNN host Andrew Cuomo confronted Deleiden about Fiorina’s graphic claims from the GOP debate stage, Deleiden said:
“Carly Fiorina was referencing a sequence in our video that shows footage of a born-alive infant from a late term abortion actually moving in the specimen pan.”
Cuomo reminded him that it was a stillborn fetus, not an aborted one:
“But if you’re talking about organ harvesting and abortions and how terrible they are why would you use a stillborn fetus, which is not a function of an abortion?”
Deleiden protested:
“It’s the same baby, whether it’s born dead or alive, whether the organs are harvested or not.”
Cuomo showed unbelievable patience as he explained why the video was so deceptive:
“It’s also completely irrelevant to the point you’re trying to make, which is, ‘Look at what they do to these babies.’” It was born stillborn. It was not aborted. Doesn’t that matter to you if you’re talking about abortion?”
Of course according to Deleiden, it doesn’t matter one bit.
“It’s the same kind of fetus,” he said.
Cuomo hammered the last shot home, saying:
“My point is context. You’re saying, ‘what they do in abortions,’ that wasn’t an abortion. That’s my point.”
And that, of course, is the only point that matters here.
But exposing the lie for the lie that is did not stop Republicans in the U.S. Congress and its
witch hunt against Planned Parenthood and its director Cecile Richards.
The right wing will stop at nothing to to smear an organization that does good work. Especially when the good work includes women's reproductive rights.
We can thank John Boehner for blowing the whistle on his Party's false prophets. His party is pervaded by them. John Boehner, like most GOP House Speakers is a big whopping failure. Cowardice is never a viable option in any circumstance for one of our nation's top leaders.
The only way out of this mess is to throw the bums out. Each and every one of them. Which means we have to get our butts to the polls in droves in 2016. Each and every butt that votes D.
Things could get a lot worse. Trust me. For I live in Texas.
Turn off the teevee and get to work.