Big Republican Gains in Congress. Is President Obama Secretly Celebrating?

Is Obama, in his heart of hearts, delighted at the results of last week's election? After all, it didn't take President Obama long to sell out the progressives in his first term when his cabinet picks didn’t include a single liberal and he extended, not to mention, expanded, many of the Bush administration's policies: from increasing drone strikes in foreign countries to drafting legal justification for killing U.S. citizens abroad to signing the Bush tax cuts into law to spying on Americans to deportation of immigrants. Unfortunately, President Obama has no problem helping his financial friends on Wall Street.

Now, Obama is very good at spouting liberal rhetoric and Fox News is very good at spreading the delusion that he's some extreme left-wing socialist, if one looks at Obama's actions, they clearly prove otherwise. Obama, as author and activist Cornel West said, is a "Rockefeller Republican in blackface."  

“AMY GOODMAN: It’s good to be with you. So we’re right here in the president’s city. In fact, he just flew out on Wednesday after his re-election. Cornel West, the figures—who is ahead? Who isn’t? As your book is titled The Rich and the Rest of Us.

CORNEL WEST: Well, one, I think that it’s morally obscene and spiritually profane to spend $6 billion on an election, $2 billion on a presidential election, and not have any serious discussion—poverty, trade unions being pushed against the wall dealing with stagnating and declining wages when profits are still up and the 1 percent are doing very well, no talk about drones dropping bombs on innocent people. So we end up with such a narrow, truncated political discourse, as the major problems—ecological catastrophe, climate change, global warming. So it’s very sad. I mean, I’m glad there was not a right-wing takeover, but we end up with a Republican, a Rockefeller Republican in blackface, with Barack Obama, so that our struggle with regard to poverty intensifies.

One thing is for sure: the Republican Congress and President Obama certainly agree on one very important issue: prioritizing and fast tracking the very secretive Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which virtually exempts multinational corporations from national laws.  In other words, even more protection for corporate profits..."NAFTA on steroids".

Fast-track legislation was introduced in January but Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid would not allow a vote. Many Democrats fear that opening markets to countries with lower wages and standards will cost American jobs. Republicans tend to be supportive, because from the small leaks, since the TPP is negotiated mostly in secret, seem to indicate favoring US big business above overseas consumers (e.g entertainment, pharmaceuticals etc.)

After the election, when Mitch McConnell was asked what specific areas he could work on with President Obama:

“ Trade agreements. The president and I were just talking about that right before I came over here. Most of his party is unenthusiastic about international trade. We think it’s good for America. And so, I’ve got a lot of members who believe that international trade agreements are a winner for America. And the president and I discussed that right before I came over here, and I think he’s interested in moving forward. I said, "Send us trade agreements. We’re anxious to take a look at them." -- Sen. Mitch McConnell, November 5, 2014 

Links:

McConnell and Obama are Already Planning to Undercut Liberal Democrats in Congress

“Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Wednesday that he and President Barack Obama are already discussing plans to cut corporate tax rates and pass free trade agreements, following the GOP's major gains in Tuesday's elections.

...

“Obama has struggled to sell Democrats on the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a pact his administration is negotiating with 11 other Pacific nations. Leaked drafts of the text have sparked a host of liberal concerns. Consumer advocates are worried about potential restrictions on food safety and other regulations, environmentalists fear it will undermine environmental protections, and global health experts are concerned it will curb access to low-cost generic medicines.

U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman has a testy relationship with many Democrats in Congress and with many liberal policy organizations, who accuse him of making promises on key Democratic priorities and then retracting them as trade negotiations continue.

Large swaths of the Democratic Party are simply wary of free trade deals in the mode of the 1993 North American Free Trade Agreement. Some studies have concluded that such deals exacerbate income inequality and depress wages. While the NAFTA and World Trade Organization treaties have helped to expand overall U.S. economic growth, many economists argue they have had substantial negative consequences for American workers.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, however, is a strong supporter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which has not yet been finalized. The pre-eminent American corporate lobbying group almost exclusively supports Republican candidates.

Trade and Income Distribution: The Debate and New Evidence

“Trade policy in particular has at times been hostage to the fears of some (including Ross Perot) that international trade and globalization are reducing living standards for American workers.

Stop TPP

Expose the TPP

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ALEC: Ghostwriting Law For Corporate America for Decades

Who or what is ALEC? The American Legislative Exchange Council?

Well, ALEC, founded in 1973, is a secret private association that  sets up Republican lawmakers with pro-business corporate-written ghost-written bills and sends them off to  legislatures all across the country to benefit the corporate structure, often at the expense of the consumer, and America. In 2009, thanks to ALEC,  826 bills were introduced in the states, 115 were enacted into law. ALEC's self described mission is "unite the public and private sector in a dynamic partnership to support policy development".

On July 13, 2011, the Center for Media and Democracy unveiled this trove of over 800 "model" bills and resolutions secretly voted on by corporations and politicians through the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). These bills reveal the corporate collaboration reshaping our democracy, state by state.

Under ALEC’s published by-laws, legislators who are ALEC “state chairmen” have a “duty” to get the model bills introduced in their state legislatures. However, when ALEC legislation is introduced in state houses, it is under the name of the sponsoring legislator rather than ALEC itself, with no mention that the bill was pre-voted on by corporations through ALEC or even connecting the bill to ALEC. The task forces obscure how “corporations [get] access and influence for which they'd otherwise be publicly scrutinized." Nick Penniman, "Outing ALEC: The Most Powerful Lobby You've Never Heard Of," The American Prospect, Volume 13, Issue 12, July 1, 2002, p. 12

Some ALEC "Model" bills:

Through ALEC, Bank of America has written legislation that says seniors should be forced to give up their homes, signing over their homes through a reverse mortgage, in order to qualify for the state benefit, Medicare.

ALEC was behind the deregulation of utilities back when Enron was pulling $5 trillion out of the economy….transfer of wealth….

ALEC crafted model legislation designed to ban a Canadian-style, single-payer healthcare system: Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act.

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has a history of using its web of state legislative connections to drive national debate, quietly pushing the agenda of its corporate backers [see Kusnetz, "Where Bad Bills Come From," June 28]. With its model legislation, the Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act, ALEC is encouraging state legislators to begin chipping away at the central components of the Obama administration's healthcare reform before it's fully implemented. What's more, ALEC and its allies have already contributed to a growing legal challenge that could give the conservative Supreme Court an opportunity to overturn the legislation even if Congress does not.

Here’s a partial list of ALEC politicians who promote anti-union legislation, prison privatization, pension fund destabilization, deregulation of workplace and environmental safety, etc.

Wisconsin: Scott Walker
Florida: Rick Scott
Michigan: Rick Snyder
New Jersey: Chris Christie
Pennsylvania: Tom Corbett
Kansas: Sam Brownback
South Carolina: Niki Haley
Arizona: Jan Brewer
Maine: Paul LePage

Holdovers include:
Louisiana: Piyush Jindal
Mississippi: Haley Barbour
Indiana: Mitch Daniels

Links:

Ghostwriting the Law for Corporate America

ALEC Exposed

ALEC funding

Publicopoly Exposed How ALEC, the Koch brothers and their corporate allies plan to privatize government.

Prison Economics Help Drive Ariz. Immigration Law

Koch/ALEC Cabal - a Smoking Gun for financial connections and control...

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Right-wing Coup D'etat

“Those in power must invent noble lies and pious frauds to keep the people in the stupor for which they are supremely fit.” -- Leo Strauss, godfather of neo-con scholars

I've always wondered, why, considering the hatchet job on Clinton, while in office, and the Bush v. Gore pillage, did the neo-cons let an African-American Democrat follow on the heels of the Republican political front man, George W (credentials: inadequately educated "party boy" blatantly manifesting an anti-intellectual, cowboy machismo and religiosity, whose repeated failures in business earned him the position of Gov. of TX) they plundered into office?

Because no matter what you think of W, he accomplished a hell of a lot to further the neo-con agenda, which entailed taking over Washington, steering the US into a Middle Eastern war, nominating necon "activist judges" (Alito and Roberts: his most important mission), deregulating Wall Street, promoting the rights of corporations over individuals, unchecking the power of the President, shredding the Constitution...in other words, basically leaving this country in a shambles (Project for the New American Century ).

So, why after all the trouble the neo-cons went to over the last three decades, in order to usher in their agenda, would they allow someone who seemingly represented the antithesis to W, carte blanche?

Well, for one thing, who better to clean up after a wealthy white man, than a black man? However, aside from the fact that any President following Bush would inherit the insurmountable task of putting Humpty Dumpty together again, the real answer lies in installation of "the highly politicized conservative majority intent on working its will, even if that means ignoring precedents and the wishes of the elected branches of government" to the Supreme Court.

Yep, President Obama's election is all part of the plan. Not only is Obama their convenient "fall guy", they have nothing to worry about as far as anyone interfering in their agenda, thanks to the Republican party, who transformed itself into a two-year old, as they've become the "party of no", but even more importantly, securing traitors to American democracy in positions of power, in which it is very easy to take even more power and show America who is boss.

If we don't do something now, you can bet the neoconservatives have done, and are doing something, and that something is setting the stage for an era that will make the Bush years seem rather serene.

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Are Republicans Hijackers?

Embedded in the DNA of American culture is the notion that the activities of external life - doing, fixing, accumulating, competing, accomplishing etc. - trumps the activities of internal life - reflecting, thinking, becoming, evolving, etc. In addition, Americans tend to value obedience, conformity and simplistic thinking over depth of knowledge, dissent, and critical thinking. This type of atmosphere, where reflection, self-awareness, and intellectualism are disposable and, in some circles, seen as a sign of weakness, providing fertile ground for the agenda of despotism as it creates the perfect "hijackee" (emotional).

What is emotional hijack? Supposedly, in stressful or threatening circumstances, emotion "hijacks" our rational thought processes. The signals we receive in a "threatening" situation bypasses our "thinking brain" (cortex), and sends the signal straight to the amygdala, which is the most primitive part of our brain and functions primarily to react in a defensive and self-protective manner.

So, what does all of this have to do with politics or Republicans? Studies have shown that people retain information better when that information is accompanied by emotion; therefore, there is no better time to inform habits of thought than when the brain is seized by sorrow, fear, anger, or hate. This is the time to convince "Joe the Plumber" that his interests align perfectly with big moneyed interests.

Republicans excel at emotionally "hijacking" the American public, either as the catalyst for combustion or ready to jump in and exploit the "threatening" situation to their benefit. This is when the GOP intentionally diverts America's attention away from the actual source of the problem and targets a scapegoat - a group or program (gay, poor, African Americans, Welfare, New Deal etc.) - who, not only are innocent of wrongdoing, but are victims of the disruptive or upsetting conditions, as well. Republicans are notoriously good at paving the way to hell so that we, the people look forward to the trip, so much so, that we actively participate in our own undoing as the politically elite cash in.

So, are Republicans hijackers? It depends. Obviously, if the Republicans orchestrate an event for the sole purpose of exploiting its citizenry, the label hijacker applies. However, if Republicans did not plan the threatening event, which is more than likely the case, rather they readily pounced on the first calamity to exploit it to further their agenda, the label does not apply, because their ability to take advantage of a negative event requires our permission to do so.

Having said all that, emotional "hijacking" does not account for the complex, intricate relationship that exists between thinking and emotion in human beings. Thinking underlies our emotions and emotions propel our thinking and it is up to us to control both in such a way that we consider the good of the greatest number of people involved, otherwise, it is likely that political leaders will succeed when employing manipulative techniques to get us to act against self interest.

Ironically, if we indulge in intellectual laziness, and show no interest in evolving our thinking beyond that of a 2-year old, where everything is about me, me, me, our myopic, self-centered thought patterns will prevent us from seeing the whole picture, making us the perfect candidate for politicians who will do their very best to make us accomplices in efforts to disenfranchise ourselves.

We can prevent the greedy, power-hungry political elite from emotionally hijacking us by differentiating ourselves from them. We can do this by consciously transforming our egocentric, self-serving thinking, unconcerned with the rights of others, to a more self-aware, non-egocentric, comprehensive way of employing one's mind. Then, and only then, can we impose intelligence on our emotions and challenge the destructive dynamics that the politically elite create to remain in power and enables all 1% of them to earn more than the bottom 50% and own more than the bottom 90% of our population combined.

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Republican Spin: Federal Policy Tried to Change Banks into Charities

Charities? Banks were turned into charities?

That's certainly not my experience!

FDR referred to bankers as "banksters", but the following Republican will try to convince us that CEOs and Wall Street bankers are almost Gandhi-like and portray the CRA and do-gooder policy makers as the guilty parties who paved the well-intended path to Hell.

Russ Roberts, professor of economics at George Mason University is who I am referring, however, he is one of many who actually believe the bank/soupkitchen spin. Here is what he had to say, word for word, in response to guest Danny Schechter, author of Plunder Investigating Our Economic Calamity, on NPR's radio show, On Point,"Investigating the Subprime Scandal."

Roberts: It's true that there were some predatory loans. It's true that some people got rich at other people's expense. There are always people trying to get rich at other people's expense...so, the question is, why did things spiral out of control in the last ten years?

The simple answer is, when housing prices are rising steadily like they did from 1995-2005, it's very easy to buy a house with no money down. It's very easy to securitize that, to bundle up a bunch of those mortgages and sell them in a package with some higher quality loans which is what people did. They found out over time that it worked. The people that bought those houses during the last ten years who put very little down were high risk...most of them made their payments. They got to keep their houses and it was a win, win situation, and everybody celebrated it.

However, it's not true that everybody was asleep on the job. Because a lot of people understood that behind this system was a bunch of structural flaws put in place by public policy...well intended...that were allowing people to spend other people's money at the behest of the government, without the government having to spend anything. Fannie Mae...Freddie Mac, and the Community Reinvestment Act...all well intended. Starting in 1995, they pushed increases in home ownership. It was a relentless beat. It was bipartisan. An increase on Fannie and Freddie who were nominally private but as it turns out implicit and really guaranteed by your money and mine to increase home ownership among Americans. They did it. Home ownership went from 64-69%. Over 12 million people got houses that didnt have them before.

Unfortunately, it was only sustainable in the time of rising housing prices and those rises were due to a large extent, not to speculation and greed, but specific public policies.

Schechter, who really knows what he is talking about, however, did not respond directly to what Roberts had to say. This started to frustrate Tom Ashbrook, host of On Point.

Ashbrook said to Schechter: "But Danny, take on the heart of this. You can hear a kind of Republican interpretation and a Democratic interpretation emerging. The Democratic interpretation says this is about greed. The Republican interpretation say this is about do-gooderism...that it was a do-gooder impulse that pushed everything out of the beauty of the market and into this mess. Speak to that specifically..."

Schechter continued to speak but still did not address what Roberts said.

Ashbrook interrupted: But did government policy lead to that dynamic. That's what Russ Roberts is saying.

Schechter continued on, but never took on Roberts insanity. So, Ashbrook turned back to Roberts.

Roberts: This claim that the special interests structured the financial system to engineer an increase in home ownership is...of course some people profited from it and pushed for deregulation. What's missing from the narrative of Mr. Schechter is the special interest that he's missing, something call members of congress and senators. They pushed Fannie and Freddie systematically to increase or stay the same, year after year the proportion of loans they bought from low income and below average income borrowers, which is a lovely idea, but they were doing it with other people's money. It was irresponsible. It was an increase in regulation that caused that...some deregulation too, not much, by the way....

I want people to remember that part of this problem was caused by the seemingly attractive idea of forcing these groups...Fannie and Freddie and this includes banks, who Mr. Schechter portrays as these greedy money making operations, but unfortunately they and we would have been better off if they stuck to making money. Unfortunately, we didn't let them stick to making money, we tried to turn them into charities..."

At this point, Ashbrook talking over Roberts said: "They made an awful lot of money for charities...Danny Schechter, speak directly to that charge! DIRECTLY TO IT...!"

Danny Schechter and Tom Ashbrook continued on with the interview. Russ Roberts disappeared from the show.

Danny Schechter was very good and well worth listening too.

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What Does McCain Truly Believe?

Experience and new information evolve our system of beliefs and values...it's called maturity. However, it's normally a gradual process. For example, when Joe Biden was asked "Do you believe gay marriage is inevitable?" in November of 2003 and then again on Meet the Press in 2007, he changed his stance from opposition in 1995 to accepting the inevitability of gay marriage in the near future and the realization that his former belief was discriminatory.

"I don't think the government can dictate the definition of marriage to religious institutions. But government does have an obligation to guarantee that every individual is free of discrimination. And there's a distinction. I think government should not be able to dictate to religions the definition of marriage, but on a civil side, government has the obligation to strip away every vestige of discrimination as to what individuals are able to do in terms of their personal conduct.

Joe Biden understands that a system of beliefs emerges gradually and that America's maturation process must go through growth pains before it arrive as also stated back in November of 2003...

"...getting there will be an incredibly difficult thing for America to grapple with. It's going to be something we have to go through as part of the maturation process of the nation."

John McCain, on the other hand, has flip-flopped his belief system from a moderate, almost "liberal" Republican to a neo-conservative in a very short period of time. What's the explanation?

For instance, in October of 2000, Democratic President Bill Clinton vetoed a $400 billion tax cut as too deep and irresponsible saying it would jeopardize our surplus. Less than one year later, prior to 9/11, in the spring of 2001, John McCain and Lincoln Chafee were the only two Republican Senators to vote against a $1.6 trillion, 10-year tax cut, requested by the Bush Administration. Now, John McCain says he supports it. Why? Back in 2004 Joshua Green wrote the following:

In fact, the best Democrat may be someone who's no Democrat at all: Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). As a war hero who's hawkish on foreign policy, he more than matches Bush on the military front. As a reform-minded foe of corporate welfare, Big Tobacco, and the Republican right, he is peerless. McCain is Bush's most vociferous critic, voted against the president's tax cut, forced his hand on campaign finance reform, and federalized airport security in the face of White House opposition. He has co-sponsored numerous bills with Democrats--many of them in the presidential-aspirant class--requiring backgraound checks at gun shows (Lieberman), a patients' bill of rights (Edwards), better fuel-efficiency standards in cars and SUVs (Kerry), and expanded national service programs (Bayh). He is even drafting a bill with Lieberman to reduce greenhouse gasses and mitigate global warming. As Ronald Brownstein remarked recently in the Los Angeles Times, "[McCain] has become the most hyphenated name in Washington." -- Joshua Green

What about his rock solid stance on torture? As this Time article reports, McCain did not flip flop as much as he backed off in order to avoid more confrontation with the White House. Is that what he is doing? Is he toning down his maverick image to win the White House? Or has he sold out? Or did he have suffer some sort of mini stroke?

John McCain may very well be taking a page from the "Compassionate Conservative" manual on how to get elected. Tell the neocons what they want to hear and then, once in office, do exactly the opposite. Whatever the case, we can't afford to wait and take a chance. We need to know exactly where John McCain stands before we cast our vote.

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Politically Wild

Politically Wild is your chance to become immortalized without turning yourself into Mr. Freeze Pop. Whether you're a Democrat or a Republican you can comment on Political Wild's blog and they just might select your comment to add to either the Republican deck of cards or Democrat deck of cards.

You can chime in on any topic you want including gay marriage, gun control, social security, economy, health care, Iraq War, abortion, taxes, immigration, or you can make a clever comment about a political celebrity or a politician like this one:

Rudy GiuliaNO!

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Being Born Into the American Dream Increases Your Chances for Acquiring It...Duh.

One of the biggest obstacles to leveling the playing field in America is the part of the population, who as former football coach Barry Switzer says,

"are born on third base and go through life thinking they hit a triple."

Unfortunately, this similar thinking group is not only large in number, but having been "born on third base" has the power and money to make and enforce the rules.

Most who fail to recognize or are loathe to admit their enormous head-start in life more than likely did not struggle financially, are white, Republican, and more than likely find Bill O'Reilly intellectually stimulating, fair and balanced and even truthful. Shallow, status conscious, self-absorbed and elitist, these individuals will always believe people succeed based on the merits of their accomplishments rather than the social class into which they were born.

As harsh as that may sound, there must be an element of truth as it does not take a genius to comprehend that it's much easier to succeed born into a white, financially sound, "educated" "Leave it to Beaver" atmosphere rather than being born into the "poverty-stricken" projects to a crack-addicted mother, an incarcerated father, and having to worry whether a stray bullet will permanently disqualify him from attaining the "American Dream".

I don't know much about Barry Switzer, the man however Republican J.C. Watts, Switzer's former quarterback and the first black congressman elected to office in Oklahoma described Barry Switzer in the excerpt posted from his book, What Color is a Conservative? .

Nevertheless, whatever else Barry Switzer did or didn't do he certainly summed up why American society will find it hard to achieve anything but a veneer of democracy.

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How the Republican Gospel Came to Be

The Infamous Brad eloquently explains the history of how the "Republican Gospel" came to be all about upper-middle class white suburban values, and instead of basing it on Jesus' life, based it on the TV show Father Knows Best . He also explains the why and how they,

"convinced the public that God Himself hated uppity Negros, feminists, rock-and-roll, and above all homosexuals, and anything else that might make a white conformist upper middle class family uncomfortable."

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The Living Dead

From a very early age I couldn't help but feel other people's pain. I guess you could say I was born a "bleeding heart" liberal. I desperately wanted to change that part of myself because I felt my excessive sensitivity made me "weak". I did everything I could to cover it up, but as I look back I can see how my efforts to make me "stronger" paradoxically made me a much weaker person. It takes an enormous amount of energy to pretend to be someone your not and to conceal true feelings, especially when one is endowed with intuitive awareness or the capacity to experience the higher emotions.

Recently I compared my family to that of the The Osbournes , and while there is a grain of truth to that, the Keaton family (Family Ties) comes a great deal closer to the truth, and of course I was Alex Keaton. I was always challenging and bashing my parent's political views as if somehow I would change their minds or convince myself. Luckily I failed miserably.

It takes a hell of a lot more courage to fully embrace a sensitive nature, rather than take the cowardly way out and render oneself insensitive, all in an effort to avoid the pain. Eventually, not only will that person avoid feeling pain, he or she will also be unable to feel anything at all including joy, hope, love and all the things that make life worth living, in other words he or she will flatline and join the ranks of the "living dead"or as many people call them, the Republican party.

Anyone can walk away from pain, but to risk feeling the pain is a sign of enormous strength, not weakness. It is purely an act of courage. Facing pain head on with the willingness to do the hard work necessary to get through it can only make one stronger because it involves conquering people's greatest fear, their own vulnerability.

Be sensitive in every way possible about everything in life. Insensitivity brings indifference and nothing is worse than indifference. Indifference makes that person dead before the person dies. Indifference means there is a kind of apathy that sets in and you no longer appreciate beauty, friendship, goodness, or anything.

So, therefore, do not be insensitive. Be sensitive, only sensitive. Of course it hurts. Sensitivity is painful. So what. Think of those that you have to be sensitive to. Their pain is greater than yours. When you talk about victims and injustice, you are speaking about something that is universal. It is with us as much today as it was during the war years.

Sensitivity is inclusive, not exclusive. If you are sensitive, you are sensitive to everything. You cannot say I am only sensitive to this person but not to others. That is not only counterproductive, it's self-defeating. It's not only because of religion, or because of social problems, or of medical problems, that you must be sensitive. There is nothing more exciting than to be a sensitive person. Because then you listen, and you go out and you hear the birds chirping and it's great. You see a person in the street, you do not know his face and you think, "Who knows what secret that person carries?" Which means you learn and you learn and you learn and you become enriched to a point that afterwards it overflows. -- Elie Wiesel

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John Edwards Passes the Substance Test According to Paul Krugman

Two presidential elections ago, the conventional wisdom said that George W. Bush was a likable, honest fellow. But those of us who actually analyzed what he was saying about policy came to a different conclusion — namely, that he was irresponsible and deeply dishonest. His numbers didn’t add up, and in his speeches he simply lied about the content of his own proposals.

In the fifth year of the disastrous war Mr. Bush started on false pretenses, it’s clear who was right. What a candidate says about policy, not the supposedly revealing personal anecdotes political reporters love to dwell on, is the best way to judge his or her character.

So what are the current presidential candidates saying about policy, and what does it tell us about them?

Well, none of the leading Republican candidates have said anything substantive about policy. Go through their speeches and campaign materials and you’ll see a lot of posturing, especially about how tough they are on terrorists — but nothing at all about what they actually plan to do.

In fact, I suspect that the real reason most of the Republicans are ducking a YouTube debate is that they’re afraid they would be asked questions about policy, rather than being invited to compare themselves to Ronald Reagan.

But didn’t Rudy Giuliani just announce a health care plan? No, he vaguely described a tax cut proposal that he says would do something good for health care. (Most experts disagree.) But he offered no specifics about how the plan would work, how much it would cost or how he would pay for it.

As Ezra Klein of The American Prospect has pointed out, in the speech announcing his “plan” — and since no policy document has been released, the speech is all we have to go on — Mr. Giuliani never uttered the word “uninsured.” He did, however, repeatedly denounce “socialized medicine” or some variant thereof.

The entire G.O.P. field, then, fails the substance test.

There is, by contrast, a lot of substance on the Democratic side, with John Edwards forcing the pace. Most notably, in February, Mr. Edwards transformed the whole health care debate with a plan that offers a politically and fiscally plausible path to universal health insurance.

Whatever the fate of the Edwards candidacy, Mr. Edwards will deserve a lot of the credit if and when we do get universal care in this country.

Mr. Edwards has also offered a detailed, sensible plan for tax reform, and some serious antipoverty initiatives.

Four months after the Edwards health care plan was announced, Barack Obama followed with a broadly similar but somewhat less comprehensive plan. Like Mr. Edwards, Mr. Obama has also announced a serious plan to fight poverty.

Hillary Clinton, however, has been evasive. She conveys the impression that there’s not much difference between her policy positions and those of the other candidates — but she’s offered few specifics. In particular, unlike Mr. Edwards or Mr. Obama, she hasn’t announced a specific universal care plan, or explicitly committed herself to paying for health reform by letting some of the Bush tax cuts expire.

For those who believe that the time for universal care has come, this lack of specifics is disturbing. In fact, what Mrs. Clinton said about health care in February’s Democratic debate suggested a notable lack of urgency: “Well, I want to have universal health care coverage by the end of my second term.”

On Saturday, at the YearlyKos Convention in Chicago, she sounded more forceful: “Universal health care will be my highest domestic priority as president.” But does this represent a real change in position? It’s hard to know, since she has said nothing about how she would cover the uninsured.

And even if you believe Mrs. Clinton’s contention that her positions could never be influenced by lobbyists’ money — a remark that drew boos and hisses from the Chicago crowd — there’s reason to worry about the big contributions she receives from the insurance and drug industries. Are they simply betting on the front-runner, or are they also backing the Democratic candidate least likely to hurt their profits?

All of the leading Democratic candidates are articulate and impressive. It’s easy to imagine any of them as president. But after what happened in 2000, it worries me that Mrs. Clinton is showing an almost Republican aversion to talking about substance.

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It's OK to Hate Gay People?

It should come as no surprise that Mr. Bush and the Republican Party think it's OK to hate this group of Americans. Mr. Bush and friends are making sure "gay-bashing" remain alive and well in this here country.

Hate crime legislation exists to protect marginalized Americans from violence because members of minority groups are more likely to be targeted for this type of crime. But when our own government has no qualms about "bashing" this group (LGBT) of Americans, especially when Bush, Cheney and Rove want to focus our attention elsewhere, there is little to no chance that they will support a bill that condemns their strategy for success.

There is no question that people in the LGBT community have always been a target of hate crime and continue to be an "acceptable" scapegoat of haters today; this group, in particular, need the extra protection this law provides.

"Hate crimes" affect a group or community of people rather than an individual, therefore having greater impact than a crime committed against an one person. The victim of a hate crime acts as a symbol of the community that person represents and sends a clear message that any person associated with that group could be next. It's an act of terrorism and we know how strongly the President feels about terrorism, so why does the President object to legislation that will aid in curtailing terrorism against this group of Americans? Maybe because "gay bashing" is what enabled this administration to "accomplish" all that they have "accomplished".

"A White House spokesman has reiterated that President Bush will veto Congressional efforts to extend federal hate crimes legislation to cover gender identity and sexual orientation."

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Family Fun?

A planned Republican fundraiser in New Hampshire aims to promote gun ownership in America by letting supporters fire powerful military-style weapons -- from Uzi submachine guns to M-16 rifles.
The Manchester Republican Committee is inviting party members and their families to a "Machine Gun Shoot" where, for $25, supporters can spend a day trying out automatic weapons, said organizer Jerry Thibodeau.
"It's a fun day. It's a family day," said Thibodeau of the August 5 event. "It's quite exciting."
Local Democrats say the event is in poor taste amid a spike in violent crime in Manchester and seeks to glorify the use of machine guns for political gain. The right to own guns has come under heightened scrutiny since the April shooting at Virginia Tech where a gunman killed 32 people.
"It is downright offensive," Chris Pappas, the Manchester Democratic party chairman, told the Union Leader newspaper.
Thibodeau said he invited all the Republican candidates in the 2008 presidential race to the event at Pelham Fish and Game Club outside of Manchester, the state's largest city, but he said they declined. He said all shooters would undergo training.
Buying a gun in New Hampshire, whose official motto is "Live Free or Die," is relatively easy.
The state does not require buyers to obtain a handgun license or undergo safety training before buying a handgun, according to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, a gun-control lobby group.

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Top 20 Dumbest Republican Quotes

TOP 20 ALL-TIME STUPID REPUBLICAN QUOTES

20. The implication that there was something wrong with the war plan is amusing." --Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, on criticism of his management of the Iraq war

19. If you’ve seen one city slum, you’ve seen them all.-- Spiro Agnew

18. A good many things creep around in the dark besides Santa Claus.--" Herbert Hoover, US President

17."I like the color red because it's a fire. And I see myself as always being on fire." --California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger

16. Capital punishment is our way of demonstrating the sanctity of life."-- Orrin Hatch

15. It’s like the neighborhood I would have grown up in, I think, if I had have grown up here." --Alan Keyes, on the Chicago neighborhood he chose to rent in after moving to the state to run for the U.S. Senate

14. If you think the United States has stood still, who would have built the largest shopping center in the world?-- Richard M. Nixon

13. It may come as a shock to you who live out in the real world, but occasionally we do something up here. Not often, I admit, but sometimes. For example, I think the House has passed National Peach Month so far this year and we expect to act on it soon." --Senate Majority Leader (and Presidential candidate) Robert Dole of Kansas in 1982

12."If Lincoln were alive today, he'd be turning over in his grave.—Gerald Ford (on Nixon and Watergate)

11.The Democrats just want to ram it down my ear with a victory---George Herbert Walker Bush

10. Any lady who is first lady likes being first lady. They may say they don’t like but from my experience I know they like it.-- Richard Nixon

9. Isn't that the ultimate homeland security, standing up and defending marriage?" --Sen. Rick Santorum

8.These are not bad people. All they are concerned about is to see that their sweet little girls are not required to sit in school alongside some big overgrown Negroes. President Eisenhower commenting on racial segregationalists after the Brown vs. Board of Ed decision.

7. "For every fatal shooting, there were roughly three nonfatal shootings. And, folks, this is unacceptable in America. It's just unacceptable, and we're going to do something about it" --President George W. Bush

6. The Holocaust was an obscene period in our nation's history. I mean in this century's history. But I didn't live in this century." Vice President Dan Quayle

5. "President Washington, President Lincoln, President Wilson, President Roosevelt have all authorized electronic surveillance on a far broader scale."--Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez, testifying before Congress
(Quick! Somebody phone Al Gonzalez and tell him there were no phones or electricity during the Washington and Lincoln administrations)

4. I feel the best way to ensure Americans' freedom is to tighten restrictions on that freedom in any way possible. Only through wiretaps, illegal searches and seizures, unfettered government intrusion, a controlled media and a complete crackdown on free speech can we ensure the liberties of all people." -- Attorney General John Ashcroft

3. I think gay marriage is something that should be between a man and a woman" -- Arnold Schwarzenegger

2. "What a terrible thing to have lost one's mind. Or not to have a mind at all. How true that is."- Vice President Dan Quayle

1. Hmmm, uhh, hah -- ummm -- I, the answer is -- I haven't really thought of it that way, heh, heh. Heh. Here's how I think of it. Ummm -- heh heh. First I've heard of that, by the way, I, ah -- uhh -- the, uhh -- I, I guess I'm more of a practical fella. Uhh. I vowed after September the 11th that I would do everything I could to protect the American people. And, uhh -- my attitude, of course, was affected by the attacks.ha ha ...ummm Let me see... I knew we were at a war. I knew that the enemy, obviously, had to be sophisticated, and lethal, to fly hijacked airplanes, uhh, into -- facilities that would, we would, killing thousands of people, innocent people, doin' nothing, just sittin' there goin' to work."--President George W Bush, after being asked if the war in Iraq and the rise of terrorism are signs of the apocalypse

These quotes are just my own subjective opinion of stupidity, and if you have stupider quotes by all means step forward and we’ll have a stupid quotes duel to the death.

By the way I tried to include a diverse sample of Republican quotes, but I had to place a 2 quote limit on Dan Qualye, and George W. Bush or else they would have swept the entire top 20.

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