Trains are a highly-developed, widely-used, and very popular form of transportation -- a strange choice of culture war for the right. Yet hatred of trains, especially ones that run on time, is a pronounced theme of Mrs. Rand's Bible of selfish economic wisdom. After decades of gestation in Hollywood development hell, Atlas Shrugged Part I will soon star star Vice President Joe Biden as Dagny Taggart, Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood as Hank Rearden, and Florida Governor Rick Scott as Wesley Mouch.
In the down-ballot races, you find the real damage done to American government and culture when sane, rational people fail to vote. I can't think of a better example than the Texas State Board of Education. At Netroots Nation this year, I met two women, Judy Jennings and Rebecca Bell-Metereau, who aim to take that institution back this cycle. More after the jump...
DOWNLOADS: (1776)
PLAYS: (722)
Embed
EDIT: Video was corrected for spelling at 775 views and 29 downloads.
In February of this year, Brendan Steinhauser of FreedomWorks posted his thoughts on the tea party movement's past, present and future. Part of his post concerned the 'mainstreaming' of what was formerly presented as a populist movement. The third rail of his 'vision' for FreedomWorks was this:
Third, the movement must institutionalize itself in the culture and politics. The movement must re-invigorate the conservative/libertarian movement by utilizing the resources of free market think tanks, intellectuals, advocacy groups, books, magazines, websites, online networks and funding sources. The movement should take advantage of the existing infrastructure of conservative/libertarian politics and spread these resources throughout the movement so that millions more Americans will be exposed to the ideas of F.A. Hayek, National Review, the Cato Institute, the Hoover Institution, etc..
One might assume from that paragraph that FreedomWorks' intention was to limit itself to the United States. Not so. Yesterday, Allen McDuffee's ThinkTanked blog reported the attendance of US tea partiers in London at the Resource Bank Institute sponsored by the TaxPayers' Alliance, a Grover Norquist clone based in London as reported in the Guardian.
Today's conference will be attended by Americans who have lobbied in the US to overturn Barack Obama's healthcare plan and maintain tax breaks for the rich. Several of the groups have close links to the billionaire brothers David and Charles Koch, prominent tormentors of the Obama administration.
From Allen:
The Guardian also lists the lobbying groups that are involved, many of which most Americans would not consider lobbying organization, but nonetheless includes: The Cato Institute, FreedomWorks, Americans for Prosperity, Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation, Krieble Foundation, Heritage Foundation. Some won't be surprising and others will garner some level of protest.
Of the groups Allen listed, only one protested: Cato Institute. Their response to Allen, in part:
I've been working on an action called "Don't Get Fooled again," which would feature George W. Bush and his cohorts over his presidential reign to remind America that it was his morally corrupt administration that led our country into the abyss. Who could have predicted that the GOP would kick-start it for me? Really, thanks guys and Bachmanns.
Typically con men feed on dishonest people, but in politics they focus on the unsuspecting. What we've learned from the previous decade is that conservatism is a total failure when it comes to governance. Under Bush and Cheney we've had a massive terrorist attack, two wars, torture and a global financial meltdown. We've had Hurricane Katrina expose how conservatives respond to Americans after a natural disaster hits two states. We've had government corruption at the highest order, which resulted in Cheney's chief of staff being convicted of multiple felonies. We had the horrendous Terry Schiavo affair. We had a news network actively become a propaganda arm of the GOP. We had Wall Street inflate a mortgage bubble that almost turned into another Great Depression.
I can go on and on, but because of a timid media, they will be allowed to perpetrate their newest con. "Only conservatism can save America," will be their motto. If the media actually acted like an independent monitor of the news, we might stand a chance against the new scam, but we know better. Drudge rules their world.
The GOP is brilliant at one thing, and that is tearing people down. Because they left this country in such tatters it's an easy scam to pull off, because hard-working Americans are vulnerable pickings. They have to try and survive in a world destroyed by conservative values. The con is easy. Just blame everything on President Barack Obama. All your job woes, all your fears about how your life will recover and the future that it holds for your children. If we had a real media that would expose the Bush regime for the manifest failure it was, it would be a much harder task, but we don't, and instead news programming has turned more into endless right/left opinion discussions.
"Don't Get Fooled Again" should be our national slogan, because even if we disagree as liberals in the way our president has handled the situation he was elected into, we are engaged enough to know what conservatism has done to this country...read on
Bush's conservative ideology, and the right-wing propagandists planted in D.C. who enabled him led us into two wars. We attacked a country named Iraq who posed no threat to us at all after a terrorist attack on our soil. Under his leadership -- with all the tax cuts he could deliver to the rich, and all the deregulation of every financial institution in sight -- he helped create a near-catastrophic economic depression which spread globally. Let's face it, his policies were totally awesome for the uber-wealthy and they milked it for all it was worth. But ironically, it was those same grand poobahs have who have tried to banish Bush into the cellar for the last few years so America wouldn't have to see his face or hear his voice, which frees conservatives up to blame Obama for all the problems we face now, including unemployment.
Because Bush is so reviled by America, I've pitched it a number of times within our Blue America PAC, but we haven't had a chance to fully explore it. And then, a gift comes along: Republicans chose to remind America for me. It was almost as if John Cornyn was caught shopping at Tiffany's and sending me an early Christmas gift.
But look, I think President Bush's stock has gone up a lot since he left office. People appreciate his resolve and commitment in the face of a national security threat like 9/11. He had his challenges, no doubt. We have, I think, learned a lot about things we could have done better as Republicans in terms of fiscal responsibility, but when he left office, the deficit was 3.2% of the gross domestic product, today it's about 10%. We've added $2.3 trillion to the national debt since President Obama got there. I think a lot of the people are looking back with a little, with more fondness on President Bush's administration and I think history will treat him well.
Gov. Brewer: We cannot afford all this illegal immigration and everything that comes with it, everything from the crime to the drugs to the kidnapping and the extortion and the be-headings...
Governor Jan Brewer and the John McCains of Arizona are pushing the most disgusting lies about border violence to justify their race hating immigration law. In republican circles, if you repeat a lie long enough they believe it to be fact. I mean, how can any poll of Americans consider President Obama to be a socialist? But, that's conservatism for you. Jan Brewer is doing her best to match Sarah Palin, Sharron Angle and Rand Paul in her effusive lying about illegal immigration violence.
We talked a week ago about Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (R) trying to defend her anti-immigrant policies, prompting her to argue that immigrants entering the U.S. illegally are responsible for "beheadings." All available evidence suggests Brewer just made it up, and her office hasn't been able to substantiate the claim.
But Brewer seems to be leading a larger crusade among Arizona Republicans, making it seem as if their state is on the verge of immigrant-based anarchy, overrun with immigrant drug trafficking, kidnappings, and police shootings. The more the rest of the country hears about these nightmare scenarios, the more they're inclined to support measures like the odious Arizona immigration law.
Dana Milbank explained today, "Last year gave us death panels and granny killings, but compared with the nonsense justifying the immigration crackdown, the health-care debate was an evening at the Oxford Union Society."
Two months ago, the Arizona Republic published an exhaustive report that found that, according to statistics from the FBI and Arizona police agencies, crime in Arizona border towns has been "essentially flat for the past decade." For example, "In 2000, there were 23 rapes, robberies and murders in Nogales, Ariz. Last year, despite nearly a decade of population growth, there were 19 such crimes." The Pima County sheriff reported that "the border has never been more secure."
FBI statistics show violent crime rates in all of the border states are lower than they were a decade ago -- yet Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) reports that the violence is "the worst I have ever seen." President Obama justifiably asserted last week that "the southern border is more secure today than any time in the past 20 years," yet Rush Limbaugh judged the president to be "fit for the psycho ward" on the basis of that remark.
The "beheadings" lie was amusing in its hyperbole, but we're reaching a point at which nearly every claim made by Arizona Republicans and their allies is simply, demonstrably wrong. Violence from Mexican drug cartels is spreading north? There's no evidence of that. Phoenix, according to McCain, is the "No. 2 kidnapping capital of the world"? No, it's not. Most immigrants from Mexico are drug mules? That's wrong, too. Most law-enforcement shootings are at the hands of undocumented immigrants? Total bunk.
McCain, who had been courting the endorsement for over a year, said that he was “very honored by Pastor John Hagee’s endorsement.”
Demonstrating how wildly out of the American religious and political mainstream Hagee’s views are, McCain’s acceptance of Hagee’s endorsement was condemned today by conservative William Donohue, president of the Catholic League. Calling Hagee a “bigot,” Donahue said the right-wing pastor has waged “an unrelenting war against the Catholic Church” by “calling it ‘The Great Whore,’ an ‘apostate church,’ the ‘anti-Christ,’ and a ‘false cult system.’”
If a far right religious zealot like Bill Donohue was appalled, what does that say about John McCain? And why is he a weekly guest on all the Sunday Talk Shows? I predict the ex-maverick will be pushed into the Aztlan theory very soon. Maybe Brewer and McCain will appear at the next white supremacist rally put together by Barbara Coe.
Rick Santelli, the CNBC talking head who helped launch the Tea Party/John Bircher/Angry Conservative movement, was at it again on CNBC on Monday. We credit his rant against homeowners as playing a major role in originating the Tea Partiers in our new book, Over The Cliff.
He's like a lot of these free-market religious freaks who believe that tax cuts magically pay for themselves, even when Ronald Reagan proved that a fallacy. For anyone to deny the First Commandment of Conservatism was too much for him to handle and he stormed off the set.
Contributor Steve Liesman rebutted, asking Santelli, “Unaffected how? Unaffected by being much higher if more teachers and policemen were laid off?” Liesman also challenged the familiar conservative tax refrain, stating, “In general, I would say the rule is this, is that lower taxes generally do not pay for themselves.”
Liesman’s points threw Santelli into a mental breakdown. When prompted on whether tax cuts would truly help address the deficit, he and fellow right-wing economist Jeff Nielson launched into a childish tirade against government spending and the capital gains tax:
LIESMAN: Let me get this straight, all you guys wanna cut taxes en route to bringing down the deficit,
SANTELLI: No I didn’t say anything about taxes Steve. I want the government to stop spending! Stop spending! Stop spending! Stop spending! Stop spending! That’s what we want! Stop spending!
NIELSON: And cut capital gains spending! Cut capital gains. Cut capital..make it zero percent and see what happens. [...]
LIESMAN: You know, you know I just — I just keep saying what the data show and the data show that the tax cuts don’t pay for themselves. By the way –
SANTELLI: Oh you wouldn’t know data if it bit you on the nose.
NIELSON: Boo.
SANTELLI: Go read some Austrian economist instead of the funny pages!
Liesman tried one more time to question how “we are going to cut taxes and deficit spending at the same time.” Santelli yelled in reply: “Go back to Russia where you understand the state and the citizen” and walked off the set.
Santelli and Nielson are just flatly wrong on their stance on federal spending and taxes. As Nobel-prize winning economist Paul Krugman recently noted, “[P]enny-pinching at a time like this isn’t just cruel; it endangers the nation’s future” and “doesn’t even do much to reduce our future debt burden, because stinting on spending now threatens the economic recovery, and with it the hope for rising revenues.”
Santelli acts just like your typical WATB conservative when confronted. I had a similar situation with Andrew Breitbart at a panel we were on together in Los Angeles. He's a typical bully and he didn't like it very much when I got into his face after he picked up my notebook when I wasn't looking and began reading my notes. Santelli doesn't appear to be drunk, as did Breitbart, but a hissy fit is still a hissy fit. It tells us everything we need to know about them.
Oh, what a gift to John McCain. We've all seen commercials/infomercials like this before. If you just fork up $1,000, you can learn how to realize all of your dreams by learning how to get rich by applying for government grants. The hawkers claim you can send your kids to the best schools, live in that big house you always wanted, and live your dreams for the low, low price of $1,000 to attend the only conference on the planet designed for YOU.
"In less than 30 days, one student had his first grant for $110,000.00"
Hayworth quite shamelessly claims that it's totally all right to do this, because the grant money isn't really the government's anyway, it's YOURS.
Hayworth: "The money is out there. The opportunities are out there. And it's not really the government's money, it's YOUR money...The government can invest in YOU."
On its face, Hayworth's participation is just a cynical money grab. But it points out just how hypocritical this faux-conservatism is. Hayworth has no problem quoting President Reagan, the New Jesus of the Right, even as he argues that it's perfectly okay to bilk the government because that money is YOURS. His argument is predicated on the idea that government just hands out money to anyone who asks for it, with no expectation that these grants would actually be used for the purpose they are intended.
If their sales claims were taken on their face, it would look, smell, and be something like fraud. However, rest easy. What this group does is get people to shell out $1000 to sit in a day-long seminar intended to convince the audience it's too complicated for ordinary people. Then they spend some time pitching their services.
Free enterprise at its best. Make a market where none exists on the back of taxpayer funds, then charge the greedy and the gullible for the privilege of telling them they're too stupid to actually learn how to do it, then rescue them by making them pay more.
Would Arizona actually elect this guy? I know AB1070 gives them cover for the crazies, but really? We need this kind of soulless shill in the Senate?
