We know from past history that the shtick of the GOP and its Tea Bagger faction is to sink government in a bathtub if they can get enough dumb people to believe they can do it. The primary principle or precept is that "big gubmint" is bad and dammit, we're going to stop it from protecting workers' interests - say from slaving away in a mine filled with methane, or people drinking water from a lake laced with cryptosporidium.
The GOP and its conservo Huns who assert the Constitution is their main book (but can't tell you the difference between the 9th and 10th amendments and the meaning of unenumerated rights) thus would rather you die from being gassed in a mine, or from cryptosporidium than that the government extend its power to protect you, the citizen. (But, the same lamos won't blink when gov't is perverted to protect the interests of corporations).
Enter now House bill, H.R. 5078, which overrides a rule proposed in March by the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers, seeking to clarify two Supreme Court decisions that had made it difficult to determine whether waterways that are dry for part of the year are protected by the Clean Water Act — confusion that polluters have readily taken advantage of. (As seen in several recent cases including in West Virginia and North Carolina - where tens of thousands were left without drinking water for weeks)
The new rule would give the EPA regulatory authority over millions of acres of wetlands along with about 2 million miles of small streams, the latter of which feed into rivers, lakes and reservoirs that provide drinking water for more than 115 million Americans (all of whom, presumably, prefer that water to be pollution-free). It would also protect critical fish and wild habitats.
The EPA emphasized (quite ardently) that it would not be expanding the Clean Water Act, only reasserting its authority over water sources that have historically been protected.
”We are clarifying protection for the upstream waters that are absolutely vital to downstream communities,”
EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said in March, going on to point out - as if it was really necessary - though these days you have to wonder:
"Clean water is essential to every single American, from families who rely on safe places to swim and healthy fish to eat, to farmers who need abundant and reliable sources of water to grow their crops, to hunters and fishermen."
How much cancer H.R. 5078 will generate is hard to say, but over time it's a good guess that at least 1 in 10 of the 115 million affected will develop a cancer of the liver, kidneys, pancreas or bladder, and possibly brain - not to mention leukemia. Will the GOP lay out their big pocket books to pay for all those cancer treatments? I somehow doubt it. Hell, they even have a boner to kill Obamacare. So why would they give a damn if some destitute farmer in the Appalachians were to develop cancer?
They wouldn't.
Then there is the illness we know will spread from fouled water, including from pollutants as well as the sort of red algae pollution that recently fouled the water of Lake Erie - not to mention the violent illness from crypto-sporidium. Ask the 490,000 people of Milwaukee who became ill from such an outbreak back in 1994.
It seems quite evident to me that if people seriously want their water protected - and with it their health interests- they will have to besiege the House and its anti-government buffoons with letters, emails, cards, whatever..... and let them know in no uncertain terms that their override is unacceptable.
Unless, of course, they have no problem with getting ill and having to deal with the inevitable mess and medical bills all by themselves. Which option is kind of incredible even given the purported Yankee affinity for "self reliance" - and the fact that the corporations meanwhile are laughing all the way to the bank over all the help the government is giving them. (For example, monumental corporate welfare to the tune of $180b each year, including tax "inversion".)
Europeans, by contrast, would never tolerate such nonsense. They demand and expect their governments to have THEIR interests at heart which is why - for example - one beholds much greater degrees of data protection, as well as health costs covered. Oh, and having all GMO foods labeled, which Americans have been convinced (by their own gov't and corporations) isn't necessary.
Will Americans ever wake up to insisting that their government - and ALL political parties - protect their interest, otherwise known as the "general welfare"?
Doubtful, given that many don't even know the general welfare clause exists and is clearly stated in the Preamble of the Constitution. Maybe these Americans need to re-read it sometime.
Showing posts with label House Tea Party extremists. Show all posts
Showing posts with label House Tea Party extremists. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 10, 2014
Thursday, October 17, 2013
"They'd Never Do It Again!" - Think AGAIN!
The problem with too many Americans, as I've often observed, is that they are unpracticed and untutored in deep politics (which is why so many adhere to the "middle") and they have the political memory of gnats. This is why politicos can play them over and over again, and they never advance their insights as to what is happening to them and why. It is also why author Gore Vidal once referred to our nation as the "United States of Amnesia".
Yes, yes, when one tuned onto the nightly news one beheld the usual procession of interviewed 'Muricans, as in Milwaukee last night (on NBC nightly news) professing how disgruntled they are with "those politicians" in D.C. Who? WHICH politicians? The sentiment of most of these Beer City Burghers is that they are "all" to blame and "they need to learn to compromise". HUH? Don't any of you have any clue at all as to who the perps were in this fiasco?
Can you say T-E-A B-A-G-G-E-R-S?
Such nonsense responses by Milwaukeeans caused me to despair that the rank and file of Americans, voting Americans even, will ever get it. Their consistent inability to separate the political wheat from the chaff and pin the tail on "all of 'em" - as opposed to being able to discriminate, is disheartening. Why? What is the problem? Are they so overworked in their jobs they can't access basic facts? Or is it because too many are brainwashed by watching FOX News? Well, that is sad.
Any normal functioning brain, of even normal IQ, exposed to the facts of the past three weeks ought to have processed that a bellicose clique in ONE PARTY nearly succeeded in bringing the U.S. government to default, which would have been catastrophic. Why was this so hard to grasp by those interviewed Milwaukeeans, and why did the idiotic term "compromise" even enter? Compromise over WHAT?
As Rachel Maddow accurately (and assertively!) pointed out last night, there is NO THIRD WAY! You don't get to fucking threaten to shut the government down because you want to impose your will to stop Obamacare! If you lost in the forum of a 2012 general election and the Supreme Court also ruled against you, then you need to pack up your little toys and go home and cry alone. You don't get to extort concessions you couldn't get honestly in the other two venues. In other words,
YOU LOSE!
Go back, regroup, get set for another general election, where you can take the Presidency, and oh - also the Senate, THEN try again! If them apples don't suit your sorry little ass or fancy, then try for another Supreme Court ruling to overturn the Roberts one. But don't threaten government shutdown by pressuring your House reps with being "primaried" if you didn't get your way in legitimate democratic forums. And don't hand anyone the unmitigated, proto-Confederate codswallop that you are entitled to do it because "this ain't a democracy, it's a Republic!" Uh, no Jethroe! It may be a Republic but it still operates on democratic principles! As in majority votes win elections (except in 2001, but Gore would have taken the electoral as well if 170,000 African-Americans in Florida hadn't been put on felon rolls by Choicepoint.)
So the question becomes: What are the chances we all have to go through this bull shit again in three months? Many talking heads this morning, including several on 'Morning Joe' and also Sen. Chuck Schumer, think it's out of the question. Given the Repukes' political damage (they suffered a lot more than the Dems and Obama as they SHOULD have!) the argument is that they'd not do it again in a million years: hold the gov't hostage to nix Obamacare.
But the people that make such assertions have no remote idea of the morons they're dealing with. They also don't seem to grasp these people hail from extremist, backward districts with backward, ignorant and extremist people - many who pine for era of the old Confederacy. They detest that a black man holds the highest office in the land, and with every fiber of their being. Given they are at least semi-clever they realize they'd be seen for the knuckle draggers they are if they espoused outright racism - they use the subterfuge of attacking his signature law instead.
They are also enraged they've been losers in the last general election and haven't been able to swallow it since. So, no, they aren't going to go gently into that good night - they're going to return in ways that'd make "Freddy Krueger' proud.
Last night, Chris Hayes asked one of the Georgia tea bagger reps what he and his clique gained over the past 16 days. As Chris put it, "the CR (continuing resolution) could have been passed over two weeks ago without all the damage." The guy looked Chris in the eye with a weasel's grin and actually said:
"Well, we showed our beliefs and our BRAND. We demonstrated our principles to the country"
Your brand?! Your principles? At the expense of the principles of the country? He also implied this could go on again, and another Dem rep later interviewed by Chris agreed. According to that Dem, "they will do this every few months, leading up to the 2014 general elections, and they will pay dearly".
Make no mistake they will! Their ignorant, half-educated constituents will demand no less. If their current reps don't comply, a dopier ass right wing nut will be found in some backwoods moonshine joint to primary the original rep....on the right. Recall the original "model" for the primary on the Right tactic was unleashed in Delaware when Mike Castle, a nine-term Republican House Rep and former governor was "primaried" by a bimbo name Christine O'Donnell (See below).
That success energized the Tea Party morons and made them realize they could threaten any "establishment" Republican with political extermination - by picking some nitwit to run against him - if he failed to comply with their demands. That model has since been used with enormous success and there is no sign - not one, the denizens of the Tea Party will cease and desist.
That means that in another few months we will likely face another economic Armageddon and more economic damage, Ironically, these fools who bitch so much about the national debt have- with their silliness - increased it by over $22 billion. They've also slowed growth and ensured we have a deeper hole to dig out of, not to mention world markets' confidence being undermined by our crisis politics. Do they care? Hell no!
An article on salon.com ('GOP's Huge Tea Party Mess Has Just Begun') noted this morning:
"Republicans can spin it among themselves as a Democratic concession, but they can’t rightly look back at the ruin of the past month, and the content of the deal, and expect that they can extort unreciprocated concessions from Democrats next time around.The questions on everyone’s mind are, Will they try anyhow? And what will the coming months look like if they don’t?
Republicans didn’t just sacrifice an incredible amount of public cachet in this fight. Their leaders also revealed, for the second time this year, that they’re not willing to actually allow the country to default just to preserve party unity or pressure the president to cave. Unless they’re stricken with a nihilistic sense of bitterness and the feeling that they have nothing left to lose, there’s little reason to think they’re going to approach coming deadlines the same way they approached these past two. Before you object on the grounds that the past month’s events won’t make conservative House hardliners any less bloodthirsty: I agree. They can’t fight their nature, or their incentives, and they don’t even seem to want to.
My suspicion, though, is that the right will have about the same amount of sway in the months ahead as an erratic general who led his soldiers into a massacre, then re-assimilated unnoticed far down the chain of command. He’s still there, he’s still cranky, but other officers can now point to the slaughter and everyone will ignore his guidance."
Well, many other percipient observers, such as on MSNBC last night (interviewed by Chris Hayes) believe Boehner has emerged as more powerful politically for backing down, and also that he may use this leverage in the upcoming battles. So no, don't look for the Tea Party faithful to "overlook his guidance". If those of us who are suspicious are correct, we will see an even more bitter replay in January - with another shutdown - and in February, with another debt ceiling face off.
We are informed by the pundits the ongoing discussion will now be about cutting "entitlements" but don't believe the ACA won't also factor in. Obama has held strong so far, without folding like a two- bit suit, but we must expect that he will continue to preserve his spine and not become too mesmerized with a "bipartisan deal" with proven hostage takers!
Yes, yes, when one tuned onto the nightly news one beheld the usual procession of interviewed 'Muricans, as in Milwaukee last night (on NBC nightly news) professing how disgruntled they are with "those politicians" in D.C. Who? WHICH politicians? The sentiment of most of these Beer City Burghers is that they are "all" to blame and "they need to learn to compromise". HUH? Don't any of you have any clue at all as to who the perps were in this fiasco?
Can you say T-E-A B-A-G-G-E-R-S?
Such nonsense responses by Milwaukeeans caused me to despair that the rank and file of Americans, voting Americans even, will ever get it. Their consistent inability to separate the political wheat from the chaff and pin the tail on "all of 'em" - as opposed to being able to discriminate, is disheartening. Why? What is the problem? Are they so overworked in their jobs they can't access basic facts? Or is it because too many are brainwashed by watching FOX News? Well, that is sad.
Any normal functioning brain, of even normal IQ, exposed to the facts of the past three weeks ought to have processed that a bellicose clique in ONE PARTY nearly succeeded in bringing the U.S. government to default, which would have been catastrophic. Why was this so hard to grasp by those interviewed Milwaukeeans, and why did the idiotic term "compromise" even enter? Compromise over WHAT?
As Rachel Maddow accurately (and assertively!) pointed out last night, there is NO THIRD WAY! You don't get to fucking threaten to shut the government down because you want to impose your will to stop Obamacare! If you lost in the forum of a 2012 general election and the Supreme Court also ruled against you, then you need to pack up your little toys and go home and cry alone. You don't get to extort concessions you couldn't get honestly in the other two venues. In other words,
YOU LOSE!
Go back, regroup, get set for another general election, where you can take the Presidency, and oh - also the Senate, THEN try again! If them apples don't suit your sorry little ass or fancy, then try for another Supreme Court ruling to overturn the Roberts one. But don't threaten government shutdown by pressuring your House reps with being "primaried" if you didn't get your way in legitimate democratic forums. And don't hand anyone the unmitigated, proto-Confederate codswallop that you are entitled to do it because "this ain't a democracy, it's a Republic!" Uh, no Jethroe! It may be a Republic but it still operates on democratic principles! As in majority votes win elections (except in 2001, but Gore would have taken the electoral as well if 170,000 African-Americans in Florida hadn't been put on felon rolls by Choicepoint.)
So the question becomes: What are the chances we all have to go through this bull shit again in three months? Many talking heads this morning, including several on 'Morning Joe' and also Sen. Chuck Schumer, think it's out of the question. Given the Repukes' political damage (they suffered a lot more than the Dems and Obama as they SHOULD have!) the argument is that they'd not do it again in a million years: hold the gov't hostage to nix Obamacare.
But the people that make such assertions have no remote idea of the morons they're dealing with. They also don't seem to grasp these people hail from extremist, backward districts with backward, ignorant and extremist people - many who pine for era of the old Confederacy. They detest that a black man holds the highest office in the land, and with every fiber of their being. Given they are at least semi-clever they realize they'd be seen for the knuckle draggers they are if they espoused outright racism - they use the subterfuge of attacking his signature law instead.
They are also enraged they've been losers in the last general election and haven't been able to swallow it since. So, no, they aren't going to go gently into that good night - they're going to return in ways that'd make "Freddy Krueger' proud.
Last night, Chris Hayes asked one of the Georgia tea bagger reps what he and his clique gained over the past 16 days. As Chris put it, "the CR (continuing resolution) could have been passed over two weeks ago without all the damage." The guy looked Chris in the eye with a weasel's grin and actually said:
"Well, we showed our beliefs and our BRAND. We demonstrated our principles to the country"
Your brand?! Your principles? At the expense of the principles of the country? He also implied this could go on again, and another Dem rep later interviewed by Chris agreed. According to that Dem, "they will do this every few months, leading up to the 2014 general elections, and they will pay dearly".
Make no mistake they will! Their ignorant, half-educated constituents will demand no less. If their current reps don't comply, a dopier ass right wing nut will be found in some backwoods moonshine joint to primary the original rep....on the right. Recall the original "model" for the primary on the Right tactic was unleashed in Delaware when Mike Castle, a nine-term Republican House Rep and former governor was "primaried" by a bimbo name Christine O'Donnell (See below).
That success energized the Tea Party morons and made them realize they could threaten any "establishment" Republican with political extermination - by picking some nitwit to run against him - if he failed to comply with their demands. That model has since been used with enormous success and there is no sign - not one, the denizens of the Tea Party will cease and desist.
That means that in another few months we will likely face another economic Armageddon and more economic damage, Ironically, these fools who bitch so much about the national debt have- with their silliness - increased it by over $22 billion. They've also slowed growth and ensured we have a deeper hole to dig out of, not to mention world markets' confidence being undermined by our crisis politics. Do they care? Hell no!
An article on salon.com ('GOP's Huge Tea Party Mess Has Just Begun') noted this morning:
"Republicans can spin it among themselves as a Democratic concession, but they can’t rightly look back at the ruin of the past month, and the content of the deal, and expect that they can extort unreciprocated concessions from Democrats next time around.The questions on everyone’s mind are, Will they try anyhow? And what will the coming months look like if they don’t?
Republicans didn’t just sacrifice an incredible amount of public cachet in this fight. Their leaders also revealed, for the second time this year, that they’re not willing to actually allow the country to default just to preserve party unity or pressure the president to cave. Unless they’re stricken with a nihilistic sense of bitterness and the feeling that they have nothing left to lose, there’s little reason to think they’re going to approach coming deadlines the same way they approached these past two. Before you object on the grounds that the past month’s events won’t make conservative House hardliners any less bloodthirsty: I agree. They can’t fight their nature, or their incentives, and they don’t even seem to want to.
My suspicion, though, is that the right will have about the same amount of sway in the months ahead as an erratic general who led his soldiers into a massacre, then re-assimilated unnoticed far down the chain of command. He’s still there, he’s still cranky, but other officers can now point to the slaughter and everyone will ignore his guidance."
Well, many other percipient observers, such as on MSNBC last night (interviewed by Chris Hayes) believe Boehner has emerged as more powerful politically for backing down, and also that he may use this leverage in the upcoming battles. So no, don't look for the Tea Party faithful to "overlook his guidance". If those of us who are suspicious are correct, we will see an even more bitter replay in January - with another shutdown - and in February, with another debt ceiling face off.
We are informed by the pundits the ongoing discussion will now be about cutting "entitlements" but don't believe the ACA won't also factor in. Obama has held strong so far, without folding like a two- bit suit, but we must expect that he will continue to preserve his spine and not become too mesmerized with a "bipartisan deal" with proven hostage takers!
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
The Corporate Media Needs Its Ass Kicked Over Its False Equivalence Shutdown Narrative
"The Tea Party is acting like lemmings, just going over a cliff. You shouldn't be taking your toys and just throwing a fit and threaten government shutdown, and that's what this strategy is."
Devin Nunes (California Republican) on CBS Early Show today
"the 'they're all bums' reaction is off-base. This shutdown, the first in 17 years, isn't the result of two parties acting equally irresponsibly. It is the product of an increasingly radicalized Republican Party, controlled by a disaffected base that demands legislative hostage-taking in an effort to get what it has not been able to attain by the usual means: winning elections.Call it the Tea Party shutdown. The group will wear the badge proudly. (USA Today, editorial, 'The SHutdown Party')
Right now, unbeknownst to most Americans, we are in the middle of a new Civil War. No, there are no bullets, not yet anyway , but the consequences in terms of pillaging the nation's treasure are just as real. The last time a shutdown happened, in 1996, it cost $2.1 billion in today’s dollars. Breaching the debt limit would be far, far worse, likely destroying this country's credit and ruining the savings of millions of Americans. But don't blame "congress" What we have is one (mainly former Confederate ) faction of one extreme Right party -Repukes- comprising maybe 50 in number, holding all three branches of gov't hostage to a terrorist demand: defunding an already passed and legit LAW.
As Chris Hayes aptly put it two night ago, on his 'All In' program,
"We have one thirtieth of the government holding the whole nation hostage".
And yes, I use the term "terrorist" responsibly, because that is what the fuck they are. Anyone who doesn't believe so is either brain dead, or a Tea Bagger. Let's get it clear here: These Tee Pee -driven Republicans are demanding that Democrats unwind their signature achievement – a piece of legislation that took 18 months to pass, survived a Supreme Court challenge and a presidential election – in exchange for a stopgap budget resolution. On Saturday, they tacked on a provision that would limit access to contraceptives. Are you kidding me? Every REAL American with real blood in his veins ought to be up in arms and bombarding the Tee Pee fruitcakes to tell them to stop this barbarism.
Idiots and fools like Condi Rice (this morning) - but more often the whole blow-dried corporo-punditry axis of bimbos and himbos keep saying they "hope both sides can sit in the same room and settle this."
Both sides? Let's get it fucking clear here once and for all that there is no "settling" anything when one side (a minority contingent of extremists) has a loaded gun to the other side's head. The gun in this case is effective repeal (they call it "defunding") of an already passed law.
Apart from the fact that this is ALL on one side, so silly talk of "congress" being responsible misses the point (it's a core of assholes within congress) think of the god-awful precedent being set. Imagine if after a repuke administration got a defense funding law passed, a majority liberal caucus in the House held the nation hostage via a shutdown unless they got their way - having it repealed or "defunded".
The whole country would erupt in outrage.
But the corporate media, the wimps who looked the other way while the NSA went hog shit wild in mass spying, are trying to portray it as a "pox on both houses" - equally blaming Repukes and Democrats. This is pure unadulterated codswallop.
Blogger Joshua Holland has exactly the correct take on BillMoyers.com:
"Beltway reporters who see their professed neutrality as a higher ground bear an enormous amount of responsibility for encouraging this perversion of democratic governance. With a few notable exceptions, the media have framed what Jonathan Chait called “a kind of quasi-impeachment” in typical he said-she said fashion, obscuring the fact that the basic norms that govern Congress have been thrown out the window by a small cabal of tea party-endorsed legislators from overwhelmingly Republican districts."
He goes on to observe (again, spot-on) that the "corporate media treat unprecedented legislative extortion as typical partisan negotiations, and in doing so they normalize it."
Indeed, by normalizing it the "fifth estate" betrays its responsibility to inform and educate the American public. Yet only ONE person, interviewed last night in an ABC News segment, correctly pinpointed the Tea Bagger faction as the ones responsible - all the others employed generic mush references to "they" and "congress". Can't these people THINK? Well, it's hard when: a) one isn't already a political junkie and b) one can't depend on the press to clarify issues.
But why be surprised at this media obfuscation and irresponsibility? It's been going on for years, hell decades! Look at the media's inability to properly discuss the JFK assassination in context without employing their usual dopey "tin foil hat" narrative BS. Michael Parenti in his book, The Dirty Truth, as well as his essay The Gangster State, has well documented how the media has become committed to the "one lone nut" myth almost since the Warren Commission received its specious benediction from LBJ. It didn't help that CIA disinformation hirelings were ensconced at both The New York Times, and Washington Post, so controlled any anti-Warren narratives. This was documented by Kathryn Olmstead in her book, Challenging the Secret Government (University of North Carolina Press, 1996)
In the same sense, to use an analogy, what is happening now in the U.S. shutdown coverage would be like German media equally blaming holocaust deniers and holocaust survivors, offspring for any new civic turmoil over the trial of Nazi Beate Zschäpe, see e.g. http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/06/what-are-new-german-nazis-really-up-to.html
But make no mistake that sober publications, like The Financial Times, put the onus foursquare where it belongs on the Tea Bagger- controlled House Republicans. There are also responsible bloggers and media people in the U.S. that do the same - but one must make an effort to find them, But if you believe the shutdown crazies are wreaking havoc, wait until the debt ceiling fight begins and these terrorists take it to another level! As reported by Ezra Klein:
Are we going to stand for this? Isn't there some punishment for treason? Isn't it hanging or putting before a firing squad? All of the above to me indicate blatant nativist, domestic extortion and terrorism (hence treason) no different from what American "enemy combatants" are using, as in Yemen and Somalia. If those fuckers can be taken down by a drone.....well.....don't get me started!
Devin Nunes (California Republican) on CBS Early Show today
"the 'they're all bums' reaction is off-base. This shutdown, the first in 17 years, isn't the result of two parties acting equally irresponsibly. It is the product of an increasingly radicalized Republican Party, controlled by a disaffected base that demands legislative hostage-taking in an effort to get what it has not been able to attain by the usual means: winning elections.Call it the Tea Party shutdown. The group will wear the badge proudly. (USA Today, editorial, 'The SHutdown Party')
Right now, unbeknownst to most Americans, we are in the middle of a new Civil War. No, there are no bullets, not yet anyway , but the consequences in terms of pillaging the nation's treasure are just as real. The last time a shutdown happened, in 1996, it cost $2.1 billion in today’s dollars. Breaching the debt limit would be far, far worse, likely destroying this country's credit and ruining the savings of millions of Americans. But don't blame "congress" What we have is one (mainly former Confederate ) faction of one extreme Right party -Repukes- comprising maybe 50 in number, holding all three branches of gov't hostage to a terrorist demand: defunding an already passed and legit LAW.
As Chris Hayes aptly put it two night ago, on his 'All In' program,
"We have one thirtieth of the government holding the whole nation hostage".
And yes, I use the term "terrorist" responsibly, because that is what the fuck they are. Anyone who doesn't believe so is either brain dead, or a Tea Bagger. Let's get it clear here: These Tee Pee -driven Republicans are demanding that Democrats unwind their signature achievement – a piece of legislation that took 18 months to pass, survived a Supreme Court challenge and a presidential election – in exchange for a stopgap budget resolution. On Saturday, they tacked on a provision that would limit access to contraceptives. Are you kidding me? Every REAL American with real blood in his veins ought to be up in arms and bombarding the Tee Pee fruitcakes to tell them to stop this barbarism.
Idiots and fools like Condi Rice (this morning) - but more often the whole blow-dried corporo-punditry axis of bimbos and himbos keep saying they "hope both sides can sit in the same room and settle this."
Both sides? Let's get it fucking clear here once and for all that there is no "settling" anything when one side (a minority contingent of extremists) has a loaded gun to the other side's head. The gun in this case is effective repeal (they call it "defunding") of an already passed law.
Apart from the fact that this is ALL on one side, so silly talk of "congress" being responsible misses the point (it's a core of assholes within congress) think of the god-awful precedent being set. Imagine if after a repuke administration got a defense funding law passed, a majority liberal caucus in the House held the nation hostage via a shutdown unless they got their way - having it repealed or "defunded".
The whole country would erupt in outrage.
But the corporate media, the wimps who looked the other way while the NSA went hog shit wild in mass spying, are trying to portray it as a "pox on both houses" - equally blaming Repukes and Democrats. This is pure unadulterated codswallop.
Blogger Joshua Holland has exactly the correct take on BillMoyers.com:
"Beltway reporters who see their professed neutrality as a higher ground bear an enormous amount of responsibility for encouraging this perversion of democratic governance. With a few notable exceptions, the media have framed what Jonathan Chait called “a kind of quasi-impeachment” in typical he said-she said fashion, obscuring the fact that the basic norms that govern Congress have been thrown out the window by a small cabal of tea party-endorsed legislators from overwhelmingly Republican districts."
He goes on to observe (again, spot-on) that the "corporate media treat unprecedented legislative extortion as typical partisan negotiations, and in doing so they normalize it."
Indeed, by normalizing it the "fifth estate" betrays its responsibility to inform and educate the American public. Yet only ONE person, interviewed last night in an ABC News segment, correctly pinpointed the Tea Bagger faction as the ones responsible - all the others employed generic mush references to "they" and "congress". Can't these people THINK? Well, it's hard when: a) one isn't already a political junkie and b) one can't depend on the press to clarify issues.
But why be surprised at this media obfuscation and irresponsibility? It's been going on for years, hell decades! Look at the media's inability to properly discuss the JFK assassination in context without employing their usual dopey "tin foil hat" narrative BS. Michael Parenti in his book, The Dirty Truth, as well as his essay The Gangster State, has well documented how the media has become committed to the "one lone nut" myth almost since the Warren Commission received its specious benediction from LBJ. It didn't help that CIA disinformation hirelings were ensconced at both The New York Times, and Washington Post, so controlled any anti-Warren narratives. This was documented by Kathryn Olmstead in her book, Challenging the Secret Government (University of North Carolina Press, 1996)
In the same sense, to use an analogy, what is happening now in the U.S. shutdown coverage would be like German media equally blaming holocaust deniers and holocaust survivors, offspring for any new civic turmoil over the trial of Nazi Beate Zschäpe, see e.g. http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/06/what-are-new-german-nazis-really-up-to.html
But make no mistake that sober publications, like The Financial Times, put the onus foursquare where it belongs on the Tea Bagger- controlled House Republicans. There are also responsible bloggers and media people in the U.S. that do the same - but one must make an effort to find them, But if you believe the shutdown crazies are wreaking havoc, wait until the debt ceiling fight begins and these terrorists take it to another level! As reported by Ezra Klein:
In return for a one-year suspension of the debt ceiling, House Republicans are demanding a yearlong delay of Obamacare, adoption of House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s tax-reform plan, construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, more offshore oil drilling, more drilling on federally protected lands, looser regulations around ash coal, a suspension of the Environmental Protection Agency’s regulation of carbon emissions, more power over the regulatory process in general, reform of the federal employee retirement program, changes to the Dodd-Frank Act, more power over the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s budget, repeal of the Social Services block grant, expanded means-testing for Medicare benefits, repeal of the public health trust fund and more.
Are we going to stand for this? Isn't there some punishment for treason? Isn't it hanging or putting before a firing squad? All of the above to me indicate blatant nativist, domestic extortion and terrorism (hence treason) no different from what American "enemy combatants" are using, as in Yemen and Somalia. If those fuckers can be taken down by a drone.....well.....don't get me started!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)