February 22, 2011
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November 21, 2010
The Tattlesnake – Debunking Five Current Media Myths Edition
“Those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”
– George Bernard Shaw
1. The Republicans are going to end earmarks. Ha, ha! Both parties, but especially the GOP, thrive on earmarks – not only does it bring home the bacon, but it’s a nice covert way to reward their corporate sponsors. The typically devious Republicans, with the help of some Blue Dog Dems in the Senate, are just going to change the name to something like ‘help American families add-ons’ or ‘freedom appropriation inserts’ and continue to happily earmark away.
2. The Republican Party is now strong. Another laugher. The GOP had to rebrand as the ‘new Tea Party GOP’ in 2010 and none of their candidates dared campaign with Junior Bush. In TV ads, many GOP candidates did not even mention they were Republicans. Rand Paul, the only true Teabagger in the Senate, is now making noises like a “go along to get along” guy, and various naïve Teabaggers in the House, like the anti-government-paid health care dimwit who demanded his government-paid health care ahead of schedule, have begun showing their strong streak of stupid, even before January’s official swearing in. Most of us have noticed it’s not the mid-90s anymore, with the booming economy of the Clinton years, except for Republicans like Rep. Darrell Issa. Tying the House up in endless attempts to impeach Obama is not going to endear the GOP to a crumbling nation dealing with what is really the second Great Depression. And some of the Teabaggers may be gravely offended to discover that the GOP has been lying to them. It’s going to be a fractious two years in Congress that won’t come out well for the GOP in 2012.
3. The Republicans have a plan to restore jobs. Related to the item above, and every bit as hilarious, the GOP has nothing except ‘tax cuts’ (spin and repeat, ad nauseum), and that isn’t going to create any jobs except at corporate PR firms trying to peddle the fraud that tax cuts are working to create jobs, and that’s not nearly enough to refloat the fast-sinking economy. As the fading middle-class notices its nails are ripping off trying to hang on to what they have left, brand ‘Tea Party Republican’ will become a political curse as loaded with negative connotations as ‘Communist’ or ‘Cheney’ is today.
4. The Republicans can balance the budget. The GOP hasn’t been able to balance the federal budget since Reagan took office, and without Clinton-inspired tax hikes and a few turns by Big Bill, there wouldn’t have been a surplus in 2000. Since the GOP doesn’t want to end two over-priced wars from which their corporate supporters are getting wealthier, truly reform our wastefully expensive health care system, remove corporate tax loopholes, separate commercial and investment banks, and cut the defense budget drastically, that leaves social spending like Social Security and Medicare on the block. The unvarnished truth: Even if the GOP junked all federal social programs, which they won’t be able to do, they still wouldn’t be able to balance the budget. In fact, with their tax cuts for the wealthy of prime importance, along with preserving corporate tax loopholes, they’ll be adding another trillion dollars to the debt. They’ll remain the ‘put it on the credit card and blame the Democrats’ party they’ve been for 30 years.
5. The Democrats lost because they went too far left. Au contraire, mon frere, as George Carlin used to say. Think of it: In spite of the corporate millions that poured into the Senate race in Nevada, the GOP couldn’t score what should have been an easy victory. In California, progressive and GOP target Barbara Boxer prevailed, and the Tea Party proved its basic worthlessness in the “I’m not a witch” fiasco that was Christine O’Donnell in Delaware. Only in those areas of the country dominated by Fox News and AM radio right-wing talkers, and not much counter-balancing local media, where the Teabaggers could work without serious scrutiny, did they score wins, mostly against Blue Dog Dems. The reason a lot of Dems stayed home in 2010 is that they were tired of voting for progressive Democrats and getting Republican Lite. Obama and the Dems should listen to the wisdom of Harry Truman, a Democrat who prevailed during a bad time for Dems in the late 1940s, “Given the choice between a Republican and a Democrat who acts like a Republican, people will vote for the real Republican every time.”
Obama and the Dems might also heed this advice from Give ‘Em Hell Harry: “Carry the battle to them. Don’t let them bring it to you. Put them on the defensive and don’t ever apologize for anything.”
But let’s not expect too much.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
November 3, 2010
The Tattlesnake – Sifting Through the Post-Election Ashes Edition
First off, in my previous ‘Toast and Coast’ pieces, I accurately predicted that Republican Teabaggers Linda McMahon, Carl Paladino, and the Sisterhood of the Traveling Palins, Sharron Angle and Christine O’Donnell, were all toast, along with the Billionaire Girls Club of Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina. G.I. Joe Miller in Alaska and Ken Buck in Colorado are still undecided at this hour. That leaves two where the Tattler’s crystal ball was cloudy – Rand “There’s Something About an Aqua Buddha Man” Paul in Kentucky and Mark “Captain Blight” Kirk in Illinois – but 6 out of 8 ain’t bad. Ron Paul’s offshoot was the biggest surprise, but probably should not have been in a Red State that elected a turtle wax replicant like the sour-lipped Mitch McConnell to the Senate.
As I watched the televised bulletins from the Planet Xenon otherwise known as the Mainstream Media carve up and autopsy What This Election Means today, of course the MSM managed to bungle and bypass any realistic diagnosis as they became trapped in the humbug of their own quackery and delusion. A blur of the Pundit Class’ finest recruits for Perdition hilariously kept sawing on some iteration of this soggy paper-maché log: “This election will show Obama he has to cooperate with the Republicans to get things done!” Really? What has he been doing so far?
The official DeeCee Democratic Party, naturally, will take the wrong lesson from this drubbing – “We need to be more conservative!” rather than, “We have to stand for our progressive principles and stop backing down!” So, have no worries, Teabaggers, the GOP, even though a majority only in the House, will get everything it wants out of the Senate, from budget-busting tax cuts for the wealthy and further corporate deregulation to, perhaps, some curtailing of unemployment benefits and elimination of the minimum wage, hastening our final plunge off the economic cliff.
And you won’t hear John Boehner solemnly announcing, “Impeachment is off the table!” To the contrary, the Republicans will be conducting proctological investigations of every person who ever spoke to Obama in an effort to find some scrap of sleaze with which to remove him from office, aided and abetted by Fox News and the other media gangsters on the right. (Orly Taitz, get ready for your Congressional appearance!) While the GOP likely won’t be successful at actually impeaching Obama, they will so muddy his name and reputation that they’ll get their wish – he’ll be a one-term footnote in history, ‘first African-American president,’ with no other accomplishments listed.
In the Tattler’s occasional Unscientific Barroom Polls, I ask tipplers of various ages and colors to state, in a few short words, what they think conservative Republicans believe in: “Tax cuts,” “Small government,” and “Strong defense,” were the most frequent answers. I then ask the same question regarding the Democrats. Most people stared at me agape, unable to think of a thing, although one respondent said “Weakness” and another uttered “Big government.” During the time of FDR, most Americans presented with the same query about Democrats would have said, “Saving the economy,” “Fighting for the little guy,” “Creating jobs.” Will the Dems learn that lesson? You have to stand for something.
In two years America will be sick of the Republicans, or what’s left of America anyway, and ready to toss the conservatives out in favor of Democrats who think they should be more conservative, and the dance will continue until the global economic collapse that is certain unless a miracle happens and Obama starts taking tips from FDR instead of Lincoln.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
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November 1, 2010
October 22, 2010
October 21, 2010
The GOP Can Dish It Out, But They Can’t Take It
…And the MSM double-standard on negative ads
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October 20, 2010
October 16, 2010
The Tattlesnake – More Toast and Coast Edition
Because once was not enough…
Given their deep concern over budget deficits, someone in the Noose Media should ask one of these Tea Party candidates if they are willing, once in office, to save the taxpayers a little money by taking no more than $50K per year in salary, buy their health insurance the same way the average prole does, and forgo their housing allowance, generous government pension, and other perks for Congress members. Oh, right, they can’t ask them that because they run in terror from all but the ‘GOP friendly’ media.
With rumors circulating that the GOP Money Machine has quietly given up on Christine O’Donnell after her pathetic “do I need to know that?” debate performance; Sharron Angle’s bizarre Valley-of-the-Dolls, all-you-need-is-the-free-market mutual press conference with Harry Reid (where has Sharron been the past 30 years?), and Carl Paladino’s further fattening of his job resume for a gig with The Onion News Service, it’s become clear how weak the Republican Party really is these days. They are being led around by vacuous political shock-jocks like Limbaugh and Beck; their Teabagger candidates are ignorant, barely-coherent dingbats pushing stink-bomb Gilded Age economic cure-alls; and the only things keeping the sinking GOP dinghy afloat is Fox News, their dutiful handmaidens in the Big Media, and piles of undisclosed corporate cash for negative ads. If not for the aforementioned, the Know-Nothing Party would be curled up in a ball in the corner, mewling for mercy. They have no constituency except that 20 percent of the country that is uninstitutionalized wingnut – and that’s not enough to get anyone elected. Americans may be angry with the Democrats, but that doesn’t mean they want to move in with a family of moon-howling morons.
Consider that a month ago, every MSM pundit with an AFTRA card was assuring us plebes of Big Wins for the GOP in such states as Nevada, Delaware and Alaska, based on the polls and past off-year electoral history. Now, not so much — toss-ups everywhere as the Dems have come even in polls and, in the case of DE, shot up about 20 points ahead.
With that said, the Tattler again consults his Toast and Coast flash cards on some of the prominent races of Pax Americana:
Toast: Joe Miller, GOP candidate for US Senate from Alaska.
Tea Party Joe’s enthusiastic endorsement by multi-millionaire Sarah Palin probably didn’t help him much with Alaskans – she’s not well-liked in the Great White North anymore. On top of that, the hits just keep coming that he has a bundle of regressive views on Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance, which basically amount to telling the serfs to “suck it” while doling out tax cuts for the well-heeled heels. Not good. Then there are the recent embarrassing revelations that his wife collected evil unemployment benefits, his refusal to answer questions about his past hypocrisies, and a write-in challenge from Preferred Establishment Republican and sitting senator Lisa Murkowski, and you have Joe melting faster than a Bering Sea glacier in an Al Gore film.
Coast: It may be a squeaker but Sitka Mayor Scott McAdams, who has risen to within six points of Miller, will pull out this upset victory in what once was a Deep Red State.
Toast: Mark Kirk, GOP candidate for US Senate from Illinois.
Just because I can’t resist the rhyme, let me say Kirk is a jerk, but it’s true. Aside from inflating his US Navy service beyond recognition, he’s had a whole FUBAR political career as a Congressman. He’s not a Teabagger, he’s a spoiled little pain-in-the-ass from a suburban district of Chicago who apparently has never taken the time to understand what the big metropolitan neighbors his constituents depend on need and then wonders why things aren’t working better. He’s also not great at discerning what’s important to downstate farmers and blue-collar workers with whom he feels no affinity or compassion. He’s a vacant tax-cut-crazy political dilettante who votes as instructed by the GOP Elite. It’ll be a relief to wave ‘bon voyage’ to this political parasite. His Dem opponent is no prize, but it’s hard to imagine how he could be worse than Kirk.
Coast: Alexi Giannoulias, but only by a couple of points.
Toast: Michael Bennet, Democratic Senator from Colorado.
Sorry to say, but Bennet has run a soft, inchoate campaign against Tea Party goofball Ken Buck, and it’s showing. Meanwhile, Republican Ken has been Strong and Wrong, which sells well in the Rocky Mountain State, and even told the Birthers to stop asking him stupid questions in public, all of which resembles manliness to those deprived of oxygen in high altitudes. Colorado is a mixed bag with progressive enclaves such as Denver, Aspen and Telluride, but then there’s uber-Christopublican Colorado Springs and the Pine-Tree Yahoos and Desk-Set Mountain Men and SUV Cowboys who inhabit the rest of the place. They’re all for Buck and Bennet just doesn’t have the testicular appeal to overcome it.
Coast: Ken Buck, by a thread-narrow margin.
Toast: Linda McMahon, GOP candidate for US Senate from Connecticut.
Linda is, for lack of a better term, a knuckle-dragging dimwit who hilariously thinks she’s worked in the ‘real world’ because she ran a pro wrestling organization. She’s as phony as a Ric Flair knee-drop. Joe Lieberman notwithstanding, CT’s a Blue State and AG Richard Blumenthal is still popular despite artificially-enhancing his Marine Corps war record.
Coast: Blumenthal in a walk.
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
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October 1, 2010
The Tattlesnake – Toast and Coast Edition
“Lie to me once, shame on you; lie to me twice, shame on me for believing you; lie to me three times – hey, you’re a Republican!”
– Yank Bunger, Ph.D
Who’s Not Ready For Prime Time and who is in some upcoming races, as determined by a dart throw and a peek into the dank tea leaves at the bottom of the barrel. Those seeking alphabetical order will be struck by its absence.
Burnt Toast: Christine O’Donnell, GOP candidate for US Senate from Delaware.
Along with her Jabberwocky bleatings about witchcraft, satanic picnics, evolution, masturbation, and her other hobbies, the Lawd’s Chipmunk Girl has now been found to be brazenly fabricating her educational history. Turns out she didn’t attend Oxford, she didn’t get a degree from Claremont University, and she falsified her record concerning the time of her graduation from Farleigh Dickinson U. Seems she won’t lie to the Nazis to save another human being, but all else is fair game. If this Media Hound had any capacity for embarrassment, she would have dropped out of the race already, but she hasn’t, so she won’t – and she’s shamelessly blaming it all on God for wanting her to stay in the race.
Amusing Sidenote (sort of): Why don’t these Christopublicans like O-Don and Junior Bush ever take the hint? Maybe the Almighty is telling them to run to teach them a lesson in humility (and comedy) they sorely need.
Big Coast: Democrat Chris Coons, who’s no doubt up by a bazillion points in the polls by now, or will be by election day.
Toast:Carl Paladino, GOP candidate for Governor of New York
Scraping up the dregs of the Tea Party teapot, we find Mr. Kiss-My-Ring Carlo, a true Republican family values man who loves family values so much he extended them to a woman to whom he wasn’t married who then had a child a decade ago. Papa P. (for ‘Pot’) is now accusing his opponent, Andrew Cuomo, of conducting extramarital affairs without the wimpy liberal niceties of evidence. Oh, and he’s been physically threatening reporters, too, for asking him to prove his wild charges. Already popular among his friends for sending them emails featuring racist images and bestiality porn, Paladino will no doubt nail down the vote of blacks, women and equestrians, but will the men support him?
Amusing Factoid: Carl says he enjoys being nasty. No shit, Carl?
Coast: Landslide thy name is Cuomo.
Toast: Meg Whitman, GOP candidate for Governor of California
In a state that’s already burned out on Republicans, the revelations Thursday that Megma lied when she said she received no notification from Social Security warning her that her former maid’s SS number was false pours the last coat of KY Jelly on the wealthy ex-eBay CEO’s long greased slide.
Amusing Factoid: Meg’s husband’s name is Griff Harsh. No wonder she doesn’t use her married name in her political campaign – it’s too appropriate.
Coast: Jerry Brown, once and future Dem Gov.
Toast: Carly Fiorina, GOP candidate for US Senate from California.
With C.F.’s debate performances less than stirring, all sitting Dem Sen. Barbara Boxer has to do is keep reminding voters that multi-millionaire Carly, as CEO of Hewlett-Packard, cut 35,000 American jobs and sent them overseas. And leave us not forget her atrociously incompetent record in that position – so bad the H-P board bought out her contract and told her to take a walk.
Amusing Sidenote: You can bet at least one La-La-Lander will vote for Carly because they think she wrote and sang the song, “You’re So Vain.”
Coast: Welcome back, Babs, the Senate needs more like you.
Toast: Rand Paul, GOP candidate for US Senate from Kentucky.
Paul has bounced around on his positions so much he could be a tennis ball. Starting off as a staunch antiwar, pro-drug decriminalization Libertarian, he’s morphed into a desperate, soft-shoe racist, bug-eyed-nuts Teabagger with hidden GOP establishment trimmings. It’s what happens when you nominate an oafish country-club drunk whose Bircher-bitter political opinions are filtered through a martini shaker. His campaign, to his detriment, has been more Rand and less Paul, as in his father Ron.
Amusing Factoid: Dr. Paul is ‘board certified’ by a medical board that he apparently invented and that features his wife as one of its members. He also earns half his keep from Medicare patients, yet wants to get rid of social programs like Medicare – after he’s safely ensconced in the Washington millionaires club that is the GOP side of the Senate, of course.
Coast: It may be a squeaker, but KY AG Jack Conway will pull it out.
Toast: Sharron Angle, GOP Candidate for US Senate from Nevada.
After all of her anti-government fulminations against any social program that might help poor or middle-class folks keep their heads above water, Sharron with the two ‘RRs’ (for Raving Right?) has taken routine Republican hypocrisy to a new and higher angle by living off her husband’s government pension and taking advantage of his sumptuous government-paid health care benefits. She’s another demented ignorant Teabagger who doesn’t know what the hell she’s talking about on any subject and just makes things up to suit the moment. Fortunately, Nevadans have gradually become aware of this fact and Harry Reid is now leading by five points in the polls.
Amusing Factoid: How crazy do you have to be to go from thirty points ahead to five points behind to a guy who is disliked by 75 percent of the voters in your state? Sharron has blazed the trail for future Tea Party candidates in this regard.
Coast: The unlikable lamebrain Sen. Reid will prevail, maybe by as much as ten points in the vote.
Toast: Rahm Emanuel’s run for Mayor of Chicago
Although the too-tight Beltway Cocktail Party Media may not realize it, the charming (koff, koff) ferret-faced DLC hatchet man and soon-to-be-former Obama Chief of Staff is not roundly loved in most sections of the Windy City. In fact, one might say he is deeply loathed far and wide, except by a few leftovers of the old Daddy Daley Machine from whence this corporate-money monster grew. Following his flat-on-his-face failure for Obama, and Hizzoner’s son Richie Daley’s steep fall from grace as mayor, who would want Rahm to perform Richard the III by the lake? (The only part he’s really capable of playing.) Nope, he’s toast straight out of the gate.
Amusing Factoid: Rahm is not and never has been a liberal, progressive nor even much of a Democrat. He’s more of a ‘Fuck You’ Republicant who was a DINO because Republicans don’t get elected in Chicago.
Coast: Anyone not named ‘Rahm Emanuel.’
© 2010 RS Janes. LTSaloon.org.
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The Tattlesnake – Thank God They’re a Small Minority Edition
“It’s plain hokum. If you can’t convince ‘em, confuse ‘em. It’s an old political trick.”
– Harry S Truman
Your Tattlesnake has had running arguments with various Teabaggers and Tea Party sympathizers for many months now and they all share the same tactic: Should you ask a question they can’t answer or make a point they can’t refute, they start screaming at you or rudely talking over you, as if the volume of their voice can eradicate reality and reason. This leads not to debate, but confrontation, and that seems to be what they want.
Beyond that, exactly how do you ‘debate’ people who insist:
– There are no racists in the Tea Party movement;
– It’s Obama and not George W. Bush who started the TARP bailouts of the banks and Wall Street;
– The terrible economy is exclusively the fault of Obama and his liberal social programs;
– All of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s social programs were complete failures;
– Social Security, Medicare, the VA and the GI Bill were/are not liberal social programs;
– Obama has raised taxes for the poor and middle-class;
– Obama is a Muslim/socialist/communist (take your pick) plotting the downfall of the US backed by George Soros’ money (and Soros was a teenage Nazi, too, incidentally);
– Rupert Murdoch is completely different from Soros, since he’s a loyal, patriotic American (Murdoch is, of course, from Australia);
– Obama was not born in this country and the ‘liberal media’ is hiding the truth;
– Sarah Palin has been shunned by the ‘lamestream’ media, despite the millions she’s made from doting MSM coverage of her;
– God has personally chosen the Tea Party candidates and opposition candidates are all the pawns of Satan;
– The only economic system God approves of is free market capitalism (you can look it up — it’s in the Bible somewhere);
– Jesus endorsed the death penalty; it’s obvious because he – duh – allowed himself to die on the cross;
– Liberals, not big corporations, are sending American jobs overseas to Communist countries like China in a conspiracy to position China to take over the U.S.;
(more…)