The Republican Right Wing Extremist Tea Party continues to hold the US Government hostage. Looking like this could go on a while with the House crazies looking to link raising the Debt Ceiling to Obamacare. First up today a little humor. Following that is a TV advertisement that ran yesterday and captures the essence of what is going on in the House of Representatives!
I think you will like this…….
So the latest from the Republican party, by way of Dennis Ross, is that the shutdown of the US Government, and dance with the devil threat to allow the US to default on its debt, is now all about Pride. Read all about it in this article from Huffington Post.
WASHINGTON — With the government shutdown in its fifth day, many Republicans have conceded the fight is no longer about Obamacare. Rep. Dennis Ross (R-Fla.) added his name to the list on Saturday, saying the matter now boils down to “pride.”
“Republicans have to realize how many significant gains we’ve made over the last three years, and we have, not only in cutting spending but in really turning the tide on other things,” Ross told The New York Times. “We can’t lose all that when there’s no connection now between the shutdown and the funding of Obamacare.”
“I think now it’s a lot about pride,” he added.
The fight over keeping the government open began with Republicans insisting that any funding bill include anti-Obamacare provisions, starting with a full-fledged campaign led by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) to defund the health care law. When that plan was rejected by the Senate, House Republicans offered a series of spending bills that continued to chip away at Obamacare; their final offer included a one-year delay of the law’s individual mandate and a ban on federal health care subsidies to members of Congress and their staffs.
Ross told Bloomberg that Republicans had “lost the [continuing resolution] battle.”
“We need to move on and take whatever we can find in the debt limit,” he said.
But many of his colleagues, particularly in the House GOP’s right flank, have refused to back down. Comments made by Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) last week underscore Ross’ suggestion that many Republicans believe what’s at stake is no longer a matter of policy but one of pride.
“We’re not going to be disrespected … We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is,” Stutzman said.
The Indiana Republican later apologized, saying he had “carelessly misrepresented” the budget debate.
House Republicans have pushed a series of targeted spending bills to fund parts of the government, notably those that have received the most attention, such as the National Institutes of Health, Veterans Affairs, and parks and museums. The White House and Senate Democrats have rejected the piecemeal approach, pointing out that House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has the votes to reopen the entire government.
The Republican Right Wing Extremist Tea Party continues to hold the US Government hostage. Looking like this could go on a while.
Today I want to address why I am taking so much time addressing United States politics in a music blog. The bottom line is that in the United States we have small group of right wing extremist that are trying to fundamentally change our way of government. These people want to impose their political, and religious, beliefs on everyone in the United States and they are willing to ignore the rule of law to do so. I consider this to be a serious attack and feel that it is my duty as an involved US citizen to do whatever I can to fight it. This blog is my weapon.
I have always been very inspired by the poem, To Italy, by Giacomo Leopardi. My favorite section of the poem goes something like this and hopefully helps to explain what I was trying to express above:
How hast thou fallen from thy pride of place to this abyss of misery!
Are there none to combat for thee, to defend thy cause?
To arms!
Alone I’ll fight and fall for thee!
Content that if my best blood strike forth one spark
To fire the bosoms of my countrymen
If you aren’t familiar with the work of Giacomo I strongly suggest that you check him out, he is widely regarded as the greatest Italian poet of the 19th century!
The Republican Right Wing Extremist Tea Party continues to hold the US Government hostage. Looking like this could go on a while. The remainder of today’s posts is composed entirely of editorial cartoons at the focus. Let’s laugh for a while……
The Republican Right Wing Extremist Tea Party continues to hold the US Government hostage. Looking like this could go on a while. Editorial cartoon of the day is provided below. At this point you have to laugh…..
Now that we have laughed a little bit, on to more serious stuff. Here’s the a great article from Huffington Post with President Obama’s response to the quote from Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) that I posted about yesterday. Republicans continue to say the darndest things……..
President Barack Obama on Thursday capitalized on an earlier remark by Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) that Republicans had to “get something” out of negotiations to reopen the government, even if they didn’t know what they wanted in concessions.
“Just yesterday one House Republican said — I didn’t make this up,” Obama said while speaking at a small construction company in Rockville, Md., “‘We’re not going to be disrespected. We have to get something out of this, and I don’t know what that even is.'” The quote drew laughs from the audience.
“That was a quote!” Obama said.
“If you’re being disrespected, it’s because of that attitude that you’ve got that you deserve to get something for doing your job! Everybody here just does their job, right?” the president continued. “If you’re working here and in the middle of the day, you just stopped and said, ‘You know what? I want to get something, but I don’t know exactly what I’m going get, but — I’m just going to stop working until I get something. I’m going to shut down the whole plant until I get something.'”
“You’d get fired!” he said to applause.
Stutzman said to the Washington Examiner Wednesday, “We’re not going to be disrespected … We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is.”
Today I bring you Rep. Randy Neugebauer who as you can see above is proud to be Texas’ Most Conservative. A man that feels like it’s Ok to berate a Park Ranger for doing her job by turning people away from National Monuments that are closed because of Randy and his Tea Party compatriots. The best part; however, is that he runs away like a big pussy when confronted by others about the real problem…..(Thanks to Huffington Post for the article below)……
Day two of Government Shutdown 2013 offered America plenty of surreal moments, from the brief and ridiculous re-emergence of the Grand Bargain, to the sight of multiple members of a universally reviled governing body offering to give up their paychecks as if they thought it was a move worthy of a medal. But nowhere did Salvador Dali’s clocks warp and melt under the heat of sustained stupidity as badly as they did down at the World War II Memorial in Washington, D.C.
Yesterday, it became pretty obvious that if you wanted to catch the eye of any Beltway reporter to discuss what you were enduring during the shutdown, you had to go on down to this memorial to make your case. Unfortunately, that’s where many members of Congress decided to while away their day as well. As Ryan Reilly reported, heroic members of Congress turned out to boldly grandstand at the memorial, pretending just as hard as they could that its temporary closure was the most dire effect of the shutdown … for which … they voted. Yes, that was by far the most surreal thing about it. Gawker’s Tom Scocca turned the best phrase about the whole mess, describing those lawmakers as committing “an act of civil disobedience against themselves.”
But Mark Segraves, reporting for NBC News’ Washington affiliate, managed to capture the howler highlight of the Great World War II Memorial Bleat-n-Repeat — Rep. Randy Neugebauer’s (R-Tex.) Wednesday confrontation of a poor park ranger on the scene — who was doing nothing more than her job — blaming her for the closure he voted for and telling her that she should be ashamed of herself.
Seriously, this actually happened. Per Segraves:
“How do you look at them and … deny them access?” said Neugebauer. He, with most House Republicans, had voted early Sunday morning to pass a funding measure that would delay the Affordable Care Act, a vote that set up a showdown with the Senate and President Barack Obama. With the parties unable to agree on how to fund the federal government, non-essential government functions shut down Tuesday.”It’s difficult,” responded the Park Service employee.
“Well, it should be difficult,” replied the congressman, who was carrying a small American flag in his breast pocket.
“It is difficult,” responded the Park Service employee. “I’m sorry, sir.”
“The Park Service should be ashamed of themselves,” the congressman said.
“I’m not ashamed,” replied the ranger.
From there, Segraves reports, “a crowd of onlookers got involved,” and began loudly demanding that Neugebauer lay off the park ranger, pointing out again and again that the reason everyone was in the position they were in was due to the fact that Congress very specifically put them there. Neugebauer countered that it was all really Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) fault, but that failed to impress anyone.
What’s really ghastly about this is that the whole “Harry Reid shut down the government” line is a talking point. It’s “messaging” — the mostly disingenuous bilge that politicos spit in order to gain some phantom upper hand in a war of rhetoric that plays itself out in the press. It’s not intended to be sincere, it’s all posturing — throwing sub-standard witticisms at a wall in the hopes that something will stick and convince people.
This is all stuff intended for an audience of reporters — and in that setting, all is fair. But you’re not actually supposed to extend “messaging” out into the world of ordinary human Americans in this fashion, and victimize park rangers with it.
What’s also inane about this is that, as Segraves takes pains to point out, the park rangers deployed to the World War II Memorial, while enforcing the closure of the memorial to the general public, are also there to make sure that the Honor Flight veterans who come to the memorial get access to the site. So, by impeding her from doing her job, all Neugebauer was doing was impeding access for the Honor Flight veterans. And telling the ranger that she should be ashamed? Man, that’s not a good look, and the gathered crowd made sure Neugebauer learned that the hard way.
Got to give credit to the ranger for standing her ground and doing her job with professionalism, in the face of an idiot who really needs to learn his place.
The Republican Right Wing Extremist Tea Party continues to hold the US Government hostage. Looking like this could go on a while. Editorial cartoon of the day is provided below. At this point you have to laugh…..
Now that we have laughed a little bit, on to more serious stuff. Here’s the Huffington Post headline from this morning and my personal pick of shutdown article of the day.
House Republicans are continuing to play hardball in negotiations over the spending bill that precipitated the government shutdown on Oct. 1, apparently out of fear that compromise would weaken their power.
“We’re not going to be disrespected,” Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) told The Washington Examiner. “We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is.”
The GOP spent much of Wednesday blaming President Barack Obama and the Democrats for the effects of the shutdown, which led to the furlough of 800,000 workers and the closure of numerous government services. They failed to mention that the spending bill didn’t pass because they loaded the bill with restrictions on the Affordable Care Act, a law that passed in 2010 and was found constitutional by the Supreme Court in June 2012.
In an effort to end the shutdown, Democrats are seeking the passage of a “clean” continuing resolution to fund the government while further negotiations on the budget take place. Most, if not all, Democrats would vote for it, and enough Republicans are publicly now on board to pass it.
At the time of this writing, however, such a vote is still being thwarted by the GOP leadership.
The Republican Right Wing Extremist Tea Party continues to hold the US Government hostage. Looking like this could go on a while. Best headline, by far, from yesterday was the following one from the New York Daily News. Couldn’t have said it better myself…….
Here is a great article from dish.andrewsullivan.com that pretty much sums up where we are and why we must continue to stand firm against Tea Party demands…….
I’ve been trying to think of something original to say about the absurdity now transpiring in Washington, DC. I’ve said roughly what I think in short; and I defer to Fallows for an important dose of reality against the predictably moronic coverage of the Washington Post.
But there is something more here. How does one party that has lost two presidential elections and a Supreme Court case – as well as two Senate elections – think it has the right to shut down the entire government and destroy the full faith and credit of the United States Treasury to get its way on universal healthcare now? I see no quid pro quo even. Just pure blackmail, resting on understandable and predictable public concern whenever a major reform is enacted. But what has to be resisted is any idea that this is government or politics as usual. It is an attack on the governance and the constitutional order of the United States.
When ideologies become as calcified, as cocooned and as extremist as those galvanizing the GOP, the American system of government cannot work. But I fear this nullification of the last two elections is a deliberate attempt to ensure that the American system of government as we have known it cannot work. It cannot, must not work, in the mindset of these radicals, because they simply do not accept the legitimacy of a President and Congress of the opposing party. The GOP does not regard the president as merely wrong – but as illegitimate. Not misguided – illegitimate. This is not about ending Obamacare as such (although that is a preliminary scalp); it is about nullifying this presidency, the way the GOP attempted to nullify the last Democratic presidency by impeachment.
Except this time, of course, we cannot deny that race too is an added factor to the fathomless sense of entitlement felt among the GOP far right. You saw it in birtherism; in the Southern GOP’s constant outrageous claims of Obama’s alleged treason and alliance with Islamist enemies; in providing zero votes for a stimulus that was the only thing that prevented a global depression of far worse proportions; in the endless race-baiting from Fox News and the talk radio right. And in this racially-charged atmosphere, providing access to private healthcare insurance to the working poor is obviously the point of no return.
The president must therefore hold absolutely firm. This time, there can be no compromise because the GOP isn’t offering any. They’re offering the kind of constitutional surrender that would effectively end any routine operation of the American government. If we cave to their madness, we may unravel our system of government, something one might have thought conservatives would have opposed. Except these people are not conservatives. They’re vandals.
This time, the elephant must go down. And if possible, it must be so wounded it does not get up for a long time to come.
I was thinking today about how everybody is being hurt by the reckless actions of the right wing extremist Tea Party and decided to feature “Everybody Hurts” in my Two’Fer Tuesday post. First up is an amazing performance of the song by the Corrs followed by REM’s original version. Enjoy…….
The Corrs Unplugged
REM
REM Live
5 hours and counting! How long will the Republican Right Wing Extremist Tea Party hold the US Government hostage?
