Where is the Proof that Obama is even Human?

Tex Shelters here, and I want to address the most important issue facing Americans. I am not talking about the war on Christmas that happens every summer when stores sell things like bathing suits, sunscreen and beach towels and completely ignores the blessed birth of Christ in the winter. No, I am talking about Obama’s status as a human on this planet.

The Donald, Mr. Trump, has clearly proven that Obama has no birth certificate, or at least he’s proved that making things up about the Dread Socialist Obama is a way to motivate the Republican base to support your possible run for the Republican nomination for President.  (link to poll)

Conservative comedian Nick DiPaolo, who hates the made up term birther but loves the made up term Obamacare, even questioned Obama’s education by asking for someone who went to law school with Obama to come forward and prove the President attended school. (Click here to see the paranoid DiPaolo’s “comedy”.)

Birth Certificate from http://www.hawaiireporter.com/abercrombies-failure-to-resolve-the-obama-birth-certificate-controversy/123

I hope that Mr. DiPaolo runs for president too since he is as wise and logical as The Donald, and he’s so edgy and confident in his stereotyping of those he disagrees with like other great Americans from Coulter, to Ayn Rand, to Limbaugh and Savage. Thus, I throw my hat into the ring of possible potential presidential candidates if everything goes my way as well. And I also demand proof of things from Obama.

First, I want to see a copy of Obama’s physical examinations to prove that he is human. The Constitution clearly states that you must be a human to be president, and I have yet to see proof that Obama is. Why won’t any of Obama’s supposed doctors come forward? Perhaps he’s not really a human?

Why hasn’t Michelle Obama come forward with proof Obama is really a man. How do we know that Obama didn’t have a sex change and was really a woman? What proof do we really have? Until I see a photo of Obama’s penis, I can’t believe Obama’s a man. Why won’t Obama come forward with his penis?

How do we know that Obama isn’t a mixture of alien and human DNA? Where are the tests that prove Obama’s DNA is fully human and not mixed in with the DNA from the 1947 alien autopsy in Roswell New Mexico? We won’t know until a full analysis of Obama’s DNA is completed.

Obama may be a hologram. How do we really know he’s not a projection from a science project Soviet Madman Stalin started in the 1950s and his projection is here to destroy us all? Until we get directors Michael Bay and James Cameron to investigate this possible special effect, we have no proof Obama’s NOT a hologram. Maybe the Trilateral Commission created this Holobamagram, or the Bilderberg Group.

Certainly we know that Obama went to a radical communist fascist black power Christian church for years, but is he really a Christian? Until Jesus Christ comes back and tells us that Obama is a Christian, we will never really know. Why won’t Jesus Christ come forward with the proof of Obama’s Christianity?

Obama could be a figment of our imagination or a mass delusion created by the fluoride in our water. There is no way to disprove this, and thus it could be true.

We need more proof about Obama, or we will keep making up things about Obama to discredit him or until it no longer haunts us to have a black president.

Tex Shelters for President, 2012, maybe.

Peace,
Tex Shelters

The Corporate Nanny State

Corporate Welfare Baby Suckling from http://ecohustler.co.uk/category/climate-change/

The cries of “End the nanny state!” can be heard from yachts, to mansions, to airport bathrooms around America. Where did people develop, or should I say “invent”, this idea that we live in a “nanny state”? I don’t have anyone coming to my home from the government to clean out my bathroom. Moreover, there is a paucity of day care in America, and isn’t that what nanny does, take care of kids?

Why use the term nanny? It’s because elitist Republicans want to label anything the government does to assist people in their time of need as elitist, and the term “nanny” invokes elitism. The term “nanny” also connotes anti-motherhood. If you can’t take care of your own children and you need a nanny, you are anti-family and anti-motherhood. Getting help from the government is bad in the eyes of simple-minded Republican voters, even those that depend on Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

Republicans promote the idea that they support families. However, they cut day care services http://crooksandliars.com/susie-madrak/childcare-budget-cuts-sending-working, head start, early childhood education, nutrition programs, and pre-natal health, because these programs are part of the nanny state. Funding pro-family programs are part of the nanny state because they might help families that Republicans some how support by cutting programs that assist families.

What about assistance to the disabled? I thought health care workers, nurses, and their assistants helped the disabled and a myriad of other professionals. No nannies though. Nannies are off helping lazy mothers who can’t work forty hours a week, take care of their children, and cook for their husbands while servicing other needs all at the same time. No, the disabled don’t use nannies.

Republicans who reject the “nanny state” would cut all programs for the disabled, including Sarah Palin’s down syndrome child, if they could. Would they take care away from Ronald Reagan if he was still alive in a stupor from his Alzheimers? Is it just the disabled poor they hate, because they can’t afford to pay for their desperately needed care?

Dean Baker writes that we live in a Conservative Nanny state that protects the interests of the wealthy.

“The reality is that conservatives have been quite actively using the power the government to shape market outcomes in ways that redistribute income upward. However, conservatives have been clever enough to not own up to their role in this process, pretending all along that everything is just the natural working of the market. And, progressives have been foolish enough to go along with this view.”
http://www.conservativenannystate.org/cnswebbook.pdf

He accurately states that there is nothing “natural” in the way the markets have been organized and that they have been manipulated by moneyed interests for years.

“Political debates in the United States are routinely framed as a battle between conservatives who favor market outcomes, whatever they may be, against liberals who prefer government intervention to ensure that families have decent standards-of-living. This description of the two poles is inaccurate; both conservatives and liberals want government intervention. The difference between them is the goal of government intervention, and the fact that conservatives are smart enough to conceal their dependence on the government.”

The truth is that corporations and their conservative shills in Congress love government intervention to open markets overseas, push back against local pollution standards and grant money for research and land to the Fortune 500.

Baker describes how the corporate nanny state drives down wages and pushes wealth upwards. Corporations are in favor of tort reform so they can shirk the responsibility for the deregulation of the food, workplace, and product safety they have pushed through Congress. As long as the government is working on behalf of corporations, they and their allies in Congress are fine with big government. But when the government spends money to help protect the public from economic downturns (thus reducing the pool of low wage workers), Congress, chief among them Republicans, can’t abide big government. For the Tea Party members of my audience, let me clarify the Republicans attitude: big government corporate welfare, “good”; big government help for workers, the disabled, the needy, “bad”.

So while the Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats work to dismantle the social safety net by framing all help to non-billionaires as “the nanny state”, they do nothing to address the billions of dollars given to corporations and the tax evasion of these same companies.

Thanks to Economist Dean Baker for his clear and concise writing on this issue.

Go to U.S. Uncut to take action against corporate thievery:
http://usuncut.org/

Peace,
Tex Shelters

How Republicans “Win” Elections or Support the “Voter Shooter Law”

As the 2012 elections approach, the Republicans are pulling out time-tested strategies from past campaigns.

Republicans have their corporate alliances and religiously fundamental base that is far to the right of most Americans that they must hide their true agenda behind patriotism and sloganeering in order to win elections. If elections were free and fair, democratic and open to more participation, there would be fewer Republicans in Congress and state legislatures. Thus, instead of promoting their anti-labor, anti-environment, anti-regulatory, anti-troop, anti-senior, anti-education, and pro-billionaire agenda, they must rely on manipulation, emotion and trickery to win in many Congressional districts. Here’s how they do it.

Republican Victory Pyramid from http://www.sodahead.com/

1. Fear Mongering

Fear is a good alternative when the facts aren’t on your side. Republicans have created a vocabulary of fear in order to cow the populous into supporting them. So when they are trying to promote tax cuts for their billionaire friends and cuts to Medicaid, education programs for children such as head start, and cut to Social Security, they make sure to call all health programs for the lower classes “socialized medicine” and put the focus on those lazy teachers while they cut these programs.  When Republicans want to defend the outrageous wars, they bring up the fear of “them terrorists” no matter how safe we are at any moment. If they want to discredit a candidate, Republicans with often ignore their opponents actual stance on the issues or his or her record against them in a truthful way. They call them “liberals” or “far left of American values” or “weak on defense” or they tell their base and the populous that the Democrat (or moderate Republican) wants to “take your gun away” or “supports the killing of babies” or supports “death panels”, none of which is true. They invoke the fear of immigrants by pointing to the Democrats support of immigration, even if it is legal immigration using a process that Reagan supported in the past. They paint opponents with all the labels that enhance fear and hope that something sticks.

The questioning of Obama’s citizenship and the accusations of his Muslim past tap into a fear of the strangers, the foreigner and the prevalent Islamophobia running rampant in this nation and can amp up Republican participation. The fact that these fabrications are even considered valid are a win for the Republicans for they caste doubts on Obama, and that will help the party of true Americans, the Republicans.

2. Nationalistic Language

Republicans are good at using meaningless and politically irrelevant phrases like “motherhood”, “apple pie” and “baseball” when promoting their candidates and smearing the Democrats. Flag waving and “flag pins” are important to Republicans, or at least they use these symbols to get elected. Remember when the President got caught NOT wearing a flag pin.  (link)

What this has to do with policy is irrelevant to some Republicans. “Hey, he blew up a high school and killed twelve kids, but he was wearing a flag pin when he did it.” Maybe if Doctor Tiller, the assassinated doctor who provided legal abortions, was wearing a flag pin, he would have been spared.

Remember all the talk of “support our troops” back in the 2004 elections and beyond. That was when Bush was sending troops off to a fabricated war, not giving them adequate body armor, and cutting mental heath programs for our soldiers. “Support our troops” was and is nothing but an election slogan, and the Republicans do little to protect the troops except put bumper stickers on their cars. (How Bush failed to support our troops)  (How McCain voted NOT to support troops)

Voters are easily manipulated by nationalistic symbolism and the Republicans count on it to win elections. It is a more subtle form of McCarthyism that still evokes emotion and gets conservatives to the polls. This nationalistic language also excludes discussions of the issues, and that plays right into the hands of Republicans. If Republicans can avoid discussing war deaths, spending, and collateral damage (new-speak for civilian casualties), corporate tax evasion that they support, their gifts of land, airwaves and other national resources to wealthy corporations, their environmental record, their callousness toward the poor, their cuts to education and other issues that directly impact the people, they have a chance to win elections. If the elections were about issues, Republicans would have a harder time winning. So they make it about patriotism and fear.

3. Voter Cleansing

Cleaning out voting roles of undesirable voters like happen in Florida in 2000 is another Republican technique to ensure election victory. Democrats who want to blame Nader for the lost 2000 elections need to reexamine the facts about how the state officials, Republicans, pushed for a purging of the voter roles to reduce Democratic participation. Keep blaming Nader’s third party bid and ignore the Republican stealing of the elections at your own peril. For a detailed and well-documented account of the Florida election thievery, read Greg Palast’s “The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.”  The latest case of vote stealing appears to be Wisconsin, where thousands of votes for Governor Walker’s candidate for the Wisconsin Supreme Court suddenly appeared out of the air and were supposedly “lost”. http://fucorporatemedia.com/news/30048

4. Reduce elections roles—block registration drives

The recent Kansas law pushed through and signed by a Republican governor forces people to bring a birth certificate to register to vote.

“Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback signed a bill yesterday that will require people registering to vote to present  birth certificate or passport to prove citizenship when registering to vote for the first time. MSNBC commentator Rachel Maddow said last night that Kansas has become the “gold standard in making it almost impossible to register to vote.””
(link)

Community based voter registration drives will come to a halt in Kansas and other states that pass similar restrictions on registration. This is a clear attempt to reduce Democratic participation, and participation in general, in elections in Kansas.

How many people have their birth certificate on hand when they go to register to vote? Why do Republicans, who supposedly hate government intrusion into their lives, want to create intrusive laws that block voting? It’s because the fewer people that vote, the more likely Republicans are to win.

Attempts by Democrats to expand voting through same day registration and registering when you register your car or get a driver’s license have continuously been blocked by Republicans. (link 1) (link 2)  Republicans have even pushed bills to stop students from voting in college towns across America. And college students are more like to vote Democratic. (click to learn more)  The more Republicans can restrict voting, the better off they will be in the 2012 elections and beyond.

While those measures are a good start, we need to really limit the voting in the states, and here’s how.

1. Require voters to bring a gun to the polls. Much like the requirement to bring ID, a gun is the only way to prove you are American enough to vote. I call it the Voter Shooter law of 2011.

2. All registered women in every state must go through a medical background check before being allowed to vote. Extensive checks into women’s backgrounds will be done for Lady Liberty, the flag, and to protect the nation. Women who have had an abortion or used contraception will be banned from voting.  Abortion providers will have to enter all present and past patients who terminated a pregnancy into a database used to eliminate these women from the voting roles. All pharmacies will do the same with women who buy contraception.

3. Charge neighborhoods with the hiring of employees, the buying of voting machines, and rent in order to have polling places in their neighborhood. That should keep voting down to only those that contribute enough to society to deserve a vote. However, we will not have a poll tax, for that is un-American.

4. Legacy voting—ban all people whose parents weren’t born in the United States, or whose parents never voted, from voting. We know that legacies in universities help keep out the riff-raff, and this will keep voting down to the deserving people.

5. Ban those that waste their votes on third parties from voting. Why should we pay for those losers to vote, and why should we support loser parties when the Democrats and Republicans have made it next to impossible for these parties to have a chance in the first place. Take a hint Greens and Libertarians, and you lesser third parties, and get lost.

6. Proxy voting—allow people to pay others to vote for them and also use their votes for the candidate of their choice. Hey Democrats, it would increase the numbers of voters and create much need temporary jobs. It worked well when we could hire people to go to war for us, so why not hire people to vote for us?

7. Unemployment as a disqualification for voting. Remember the good old days when being in debt was a crime, and the current state when many of those who have committed a crime can’t vote? Put that together and you can ban the unemployed from voting.

8. Ban the homeless from voting. Wait, we already do that because they need an address to vote. Yee haw, Democracy!

Carry forth America, and make voting fair and free for me and mine like the good Republicans work to do every day. It’s the only way to defend America from terrorists, criminals, drug users, and the unclean and ensure freedom.

Learn about your candidates here:
http://www.votesmart.org/

Advocate for clean elections and other democratic actions here:
http://www.citizen.org/Page.aspx?pid=183

Sign a petition to end corporate personhood:
http://democracyisforpeople.org/

and amend the Constitution to end corporate personhood:
http://movetoamend.org/motion-amend

Peace,
Tex Shelters

Representative Raul Grijalva: A Congressman that Stands with Us

In at time when many Democrats are supporting legislation in the corporate interest while eschewing investment in jobs programs and ignoring the continued foreclosure crisis, few representatives demonstrate compassion and understanding of majority of America. Raul Grijalva of Southern Arizona is one of those representatives.

Representative Grijalva was born and raised in Tucson, Arizona. He has been a local politician since the 1974 when he was elected to the Tucson school board. From 1989 to 2002 he worked on the Tucson City Board of Supervisors. His work on the Board of Supervisors was essential in the development of the El Pueblo and El Rio neighborhood centers in Tucson. These centers have programs for seniors, childcare, house libraries and learning centers as well as health clinics and recreation facilities for adults and youth.

In 2002, Representative Grijalva was elected to the House of Representatives from District 7. His district includes South Tucson, Nogales, and west to Yuma. It abuts the 8th Congressional district of Gabrielle Giffords, one of Rep. Grijalva’s closest colleagues in Congress.

Representative Grijalva is truly representative of his community, defending the rights of Mexican-Americans, immigrants, promoting health care and being an advocate for the environment. He was at the top of President Obama’s list to run the interior department for his knowledge and support of the environment.

Photo from http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1010/43362.html

Raul Grijalva, Representative in Arizona, is working with Keith Ellison, Representative from Minnesota, on a progressive budget. Rep. Ellison and Grijalva co-chair the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

Ellison and Grijalva said their plan…will adhere to the following five goals:

• Eliminate the deficits and potentially creates a surplus thereafter.
• Put America back to work with a “Make it in America” jobs program
• Protect the social safety net.
• End the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
• Be FAIR (Fixing America’s Inequality Responsibly)

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0411/52617.html

Point one and two could get bi-partisan support if there wasn’t antipathy toward any idea from the opposing party, regardless of the content of the idea. Moreover, there are now Republicans that lean libertarian (more than Ron Paul) that believe the Iraq and Afghan wars should wind down.   However, protecting the social safety net and fixing America’s inequality are two goals most in Congress are ignoring. Those goals are essential to turning around our economy and protecting our nation.

While studying at the University of Arizona, Representative Grijalva was a member of the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán, or MEChA.  Their website states that, “Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán (MEChA) is a student organization that promotes higher education, cultura, and historia. MEChA was founded on the principles of self-determination for the liberation of our people. We believe that political involvement and education is the avenue for change in our society.” (MECha page)
Many on the right want to take advantage of Grijalva’s past association with a group that is involved in workers’ struggles, helps educate Chicanos and Mexican Americans, and works to preserve Mexican culture in the states. They call Representative a “MECha boy” much like racist southerners have called African Americans “boy” as a way to belittle him. (Racist website here).

The vitriol and hate speech from the conservative Tea Party groups came to a head before the 2010 elections.  Grijalva’s office in Tucson was vandalized, as was Representative Gabrielle Gifford’s office, by frightened Republicans who know no other option than violence when those that disagree with them succeed.

Representative Grijalva represents the enemy for many Arizona Republicans who have become nationally know for passing racially charged laws like SB 1070. And while he has his detractors, those that he represents are more fervently behind him than other politicians in Arizona. Support page for Raul

Rep. Grijalva has a stellar record on Civil Rights, voting against the Patriot Act and in favor of Equal Rights for Gays and Lesbians including marriage rights. (link)

He also supports a woman’s right to choose and supports environmental protection laws.

For more about where Grijalva stands and has for a long time, see his page at OnTheIssues.

I sent some questions to Representative Grijalva and what follows are my questions and his responses. I leave it to you to interpret his responses.

1. What do you think of the Republican’s Budget?

Sadly — but not surprisingly — it looks a lot like the standard right-wing schemes that reward Wall Street while kicking more Americans out of the middle class. This budget punishes working families and puts more of our tax dollars in the pockets of the rich. Frankly, I think it’s a Republican Roadmap to Ruin. We know what happened during the 2000s, when Republicans failed to protect U.S. consumers, let Wall Street police itself and rigged the tax code in favor of a fortunate few. The Great Recession isn’t a coincidence — it’s cause and effect. This budget is part of that agenda. I support – and helped create – the progressive People’s Budget that’s been getting tremendous support from mainstream economists.

2. You wrote a letter against the bombing in Libya, or more correctly, asking Obama to explain this course of action. How would you approach Libya?

The U.S. was right to disengage from any combat presence. Military action on a third front is not something we can afford. I still have questions about what our strategy was in terms of starting a bombing campaign that had no end goal in sight. My approach would include a vigorous search for a country willing to take Gaddafi and then urging him to leave. He has lost legitimacy both locally and internationally and his exit is only a matter of time. Our role should be to find a constructive end game.

3. Republicans and even members of your own party said that your call for a boycott of the state over SB 1070 was wrong and ill timed. Do you have any regrets over that decision?

It was important to make sure the country understood the gravity of the situation, but I’ve said before that the way I initially pursued that goal was a strategic mistake. I believe the courts are the proper venue to determine the outcome of SB 1070, and I think everyone – whatever they feel about the bill – should support a process that will lead to a definitive ruling.

4. What do you think of the President’s performance so far?

Given the obstacles presented by this current House of Representatives, and the near-Depression he inherited, he’s done a good job. I wish the White House would be more vocal and assertive in defending and promoting policies that help working Americans. More forthright advocacy for the middle class could only help the president and the country.

5. What legislation and actions do you have planned in D.C. over the next year and a half?

I already mentioned the progressive budget, which I think is the best way to create jobs and create an economy that really works for the whole country. Life in the House minority can be tough, but I’m going to keep raising the issues of creating more solar power and infrastructure jobs in Arizona; making sure Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security aren’t damaged; education reform, especially changing the worst parts of No Child Left Behind; public lands protection; and sufficient oil drilling oversight, just to name some of the most important. The best I can do now is effectively promote good policies and see what catches on.

Grijalva’s Congressional Page
http://grijalva.house.gov/

Progressive Budget from the Progressive Caucus press release
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ok9qtZUe19g

Grijalva on Facebook
http://www.facebook.com/GrijalvaForCongress?ref=ts
http://www.facebook.com/Rep.Grijalva?ref=ts&sk=wall

Bios:
http://grijalva.house.gov/index.cfm?sectionid=87&sectiontree=2,87
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raul_Grijalva

Special thanks to Representative Grijalva and his communications director for their time and hard work.

Peace,
Tex Shelters

Showdown on the Budget Just a Stop Gap Distraction

Photo from http://blog.reidreport.com/2011/04/congress-white-house-reach-budget-deal-avert-shut-down/

There’s shrinking opportunity in America, according to Joseph Stiglitz.

In an interview on Democracy Now, Stiglitz states,
“If people were gaining rewards for contributing to our society…then you can say…those who contribute more should get more…but what we saw in that crisis was that …people got mega bonuses while their companies were making mega losses.” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZC1HVRz450

“We lower the tax rates on speculators” and workers pay the same rate.

Cutting back on health care for the poor and elderly but not doing anything about health care costs as the current budget compromise does means future rationing. This budget bill does nothing to address the costs it just makes health care cuts on the nations most vulnerable populations.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8s1p7NdHm0&NR=1

There is also nothing in the this compromise to address employment. We can reduce spending all we want, but that will not bring back the jobs we have lost. Quite the contrary.

According to Dean Baker, Co-director, Center for Economic and Policy Research, “Well, according the analysis from Moody’s and Goldman Sachs, the Republicans’ full target for reduced spending would cost around 700,000 jobs. There is a device rarely used in policy circles, called arithmetic, that tells us that cuts of two-thirds this size should cost around 500,000 jobs. I’m sure the half million people who will lose their jobs because of this deal are celebrating now.” http://www.politico.com/arena/archive/is-arizonas-fat-fee-fair.html The recession riddled state of Ohio will face job loses of over 51,000 due to this budget. http://www.the-daily-record.com/news/article/5014618

So, just at a time when the unemployment rate was making a slight downturn, Republicans force acquiescence out of Congressional Democrats that will cost us 500,000 jobs. There goes the recovery of 2011. If our economy is based on consumer spending and taxes from that spending and earning, then we are in for a double dip recession with these new job losses. State revenues from sales taxes will slump, income tax revenue will evaporate and there will be an influx of payouts to the newly unemployed. In the meantime, billionaires can hoard their cash and U.S. defense contractors can continue to get rich creating weapons we don’t need for wars that don’t defend us.

So while the millionaires and billionaires keep their tax cuts, the working classes have their jobs cuts. That is the Republican vision of America, and Obama and Congressional Democrats appear powerless to do anything or unwilling to take a stand for his constituents.

What will be lost in the next stopgap budget? As the Republicans move their demands closer and closer to the elimination of Medicaid and Medicare and further cuts in education funding, Pell grants and early childhood education programs, will the Democrats take a stand for us? Some will, like Tucson’s Raul Grijalva, many won’t.

There is another deadline in a week; this was only a stopgap for seven days. Then what? What else will the Republicans blackmail the American people with? What treasured program for Americans, like Planned Parenthood, with be threatened? What will bully Boehner do to get the President to heal? And what about the big battle over next years budget that is looming? Will the debt ceiling be raised, will corporations and billionaires be asked to pay their fair share, will necessary cuts be made to military spending and other corporate welfare programs, or will Congress and the White House take the historical tack of gutting Medicaid and Medicare to save perhaps Obama’s one remaining legacy, his health care plan?

You can bet it will be another “compromise” that won’t touch tax rates, especially for those that don’t need lower taxes, and more cuts to programs for the lower classes, programs we all pay for with our tax dollars.

Paul Krugman summarizes the position Obama has ended in, “Maybe that terrible deal, in which Republicans ended up getting more than their opening bid, was the best he could achieve — although it looks from here as if the president’s idea of how to bargain is to start by negotiating with himself, making pre-emptive concessions, then pursue a second round of negotiation with the G.O.P., leading to further concessions. I wish you better in the next round Mr. President.

Peace,
Tex Shelters

The Four Horsemen of the Budgetopolypse: If Republicans Were Planning your Household Budget

Representative Paul Ryan has come forth with the Republican budget plan for 2012.

Imagine you had an extended family household with Granny, kids, mother, father, teens, a dog, a cat and so forth. You have compiled some debt and you need to cut back. Along come the four housemen of the budgetopolypse riding in their renaissance swordsmen garb, to help you out.

The Republicans' "Path to Prosperity" budget

From Politico http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0411/52557.html

Riding over petunias as in the front yard, they dismount and proclaim the budget as follows:

Paul Ryan (reaching into his Italian doublet for his budgetary scroll and reading): I proclaim that we will cut your costs by over $6 trillion in ten years.

John Boehner: Here, here brother Ryan!

Eric Cantor and Rand Paul (raising full length gloved hands): Hazzah!

They burst into the family Schwartman’s house to examine the family’s expenses.

Ryan (pointing at the slumped over, sleeping figure in the rocking chair): First, we must put this slagard to work. Your grandmother is not old enough to retire and she can still stand, with a walker. And those pain killers for her eighty years of labor and hard work, they will no longer be covered under Medicaid.

Cantor, Paul and Boehner in unison while waving their swords in the air: We must cut, cut!

Cantor, hand to ear: Hark, I hear a cry from the aft chamber. (He rushes off and reappears holding a baby with two hands, shoving him at the parents) And how do you expect to pay for THIS!

(The parents start to cry)

Cantor, sneering: You shouldn’t have had a baby if you can’t afford one.

Paul: They can’t, brother Cantor. We must cut this out of their budget! Remember, debt is a sin, and we must rid ourselves of the unnecessary expenses, such as babies.

Ryan, lifting a cover off a basket to reveal a half chewed loaf of hard bread: What is THIS?! You are holding back from your overlords who own the title on this hovel you call a (air quotes, sneering) “hooooooome”. We must confiscate this for the overlords for they pay too much in taxes, unlike you lazy welfare serfs. (Ryan takes a bite and puts the bread somewhere in his doublet.) Sheriff Koch of Nutty-sham will hear about this!

Father: But kind sirs, I voted for you and your Republi-clan, can you not take pity on my family. It was the Koch brothers who moved my job overseas and now I have no work. I rely on you feudal lords for help. Don’t cut that.

Boehner to Paul who has quill in hand: Good idea, cut unemployment insurance back, better yet, give his states’ feudal rulers the money to dole out to his supporters as he wishes. Check with Sheriff Koch of Nutty-sham first. (To Cantor) Now off with you, and take that baby to the convent on your way out.

(Cantor exits with baby)

Ryan, looking at a ledger, to the parents: It says here that you have a daughter of birthing age, bring her forth!
(The mother, shaking, presents the daughter. Paul goes into the daughter’s room to look around.)

Ryan: It says here that your daughter, Hygenia, failed to make advancements on her latest standardized, McGraw-Hill approved assessments. (looking at the parents). We can no longer keep teaching her at the state’s expense. She is a burden we can’t afford.

Paul, from off stage in the daughter’s chamber: Aha! (rushing out). What have we here (holding up a condom accusingly), cellophane wrapped drugs or something? (he shoves it in Hygenia’s face).

Hygenia: That’s a condom you git.

Ryan: Don’t talk back to your betters you foul-mouthed wench! (To Paul). Yes, it’s a condom, you know what we must do now.

Boehner, reading from a legal pad: Article 1984 of the reproductive code states that no white woman shall use prophylaxis or other form of reproductive control, lest she be punished with forced birthing or other appropriate measures.

Hygenia, defiantly: But the overlords don’t want me to have an abortion; I have to protect myself. What, you want me to be, a nun?

Ryan (quickly): Good idea, off to the nunnery with you!

(Paul takes Hygenia off stage).

Mother (pleading): But what does birth control have to do with the budget?

Ryan (in snotty tone): We can’t waste money on the unwashed poor babies, can we? And the thousands of dollars spent for the death camps for children called Planned Parenthood, that won’t do. Why should we help the poor and undeserving plan their families for their own selfish convenience?

Boehner: I notice you have no pictures of Jesus, our savior, on your walls. You must be socialists. (Making a note on his pad) Assess a religious tax on the home of the Schwartzmans for not taking Jesus as their savior.

Mr. Schwartzman: We will call on Obama-hood of D.C.Locksley. He will make you all pay for what you have done, the wars, the thievery from the hard working poor…

Boehner and Ryan, look at each other, pause, and start laughing loudly: Ha, ha, ha…

Ryan, still amused: Obama-hood? He won’t come to save you. He’s off collecting money from his merry men for reelection. (pointing at the Schwartzmans) He has no time for the likes of you!

Ryan, Pulling the faucet off the kitchen sink as he exits: You won’t be needing this any longer. Now back to work!!

The Schwartzmans make incredulous faces that say, “what work?”

Fade to black

Why were the deficits under our former President Bush not an issue for Republicans?

Representative Ryan’s editorial on the Republican budget
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703806304576242612172357504.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

The Republican budget would decrease the top tax bracket 29% from 35% to 25%. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/05/paul-ryan-budget-analysis-numbers_n_844946.html

Highlights of the GOP plan:
• Starting in 2022, new Medicare beneficiaries would choose a private health plan, and the federal government would subsidize the cost. Low-income recipients and those with greater health risks would get extra help. The approach is modeled after Medicare’s prescription drug program.

• Medicaid, the federal-state health program for the poor, would be turned into a block grant to states, just as welfare was in 1996, and cut by $750 billion over the decade. Similar changes would be made to the federal food stamps program, and housing programs for the poor would be transformed to emphasize work.

• Domestic programs would be reduced below 2008 levels for the next five years. That’s a lower threshold, for a longer period of time, than the cuts Obama proposed in February. What about inflation?

• Defense would be cut by $78 billion — $100 billion less than the cuts recommended by Defense Secretary Robert Gates.

•Federal workers would endure a five-year pay freeze, compared to Obama’s two-year freeze. The workforce would be reduced by 10% through attrition.

•New spending caps would be instituted, enforced by the threat of automatic, across-the-board cuts. This approach was used in the 1980s and ’90s to help reduce deficits.

“Americans truly face a monumental choice — a choice that can no longer be avoided,” the GOP budget says. “This generation’s defining moment has arrived.”

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2011-04-04-gop-budget_N.htm

There are other ways to address the budget, like raising taxes, eliminating offshore corporate status and other tax loopholes, and cutting into the military budget while ending the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But it’s not really about the budget is it; it’s about taking down the social safety net.

Ezra Klein on budget’s harm to elderly, disabled and the poor.
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/04/05-2

Peace,
Tex Shelters

Obama is NOT like Bush

No matter how many wars Obama supports, he is nothing like Bush.

No matter how many Wall Street insiders Obama has had on his economic team, Obama is NOT like Bush. (Bush had is Paulson and others, Obama had his Geithner, and other economic advisers from Wall Street) link

No matter how long Obama extends the Bush tax cuts for millionaires, he is NOTHING like Bush.

No matter how many excuses Obama makes for keeping Guantanamo open, he is NOTHING like Bush.

No matter how many times Obama signs an extension of the Patriot Act, he is NOTHING like Bush.

No matter how Obama supports the indefinite detentions of the Bush years, he is NOT like Bush at all.

No matter how many policies of George Bush that Obama continues, he is nothing like Bush.

No matter how many Obama apologists ignore how his policies are similar or the same to George Bush’s policies, he is nothing like Bush. Just thinking, hoping and praying that an Obama presidency is a completely new direction and change from the Bush politics and policies makes it true.

If you think Obama is like Bush to even the slightest degree like Bush because he continues Bush’s policies, wars, has failed to help the unemployed and address housing crisis, if you dare compare Obama to Bush, then you are being divisive.

Don’t you know that Bush went to Yale and Obama went to Harvard, and that has made all the difference.

Besides, Obama is taller, is better looking, and he is Black. He’s nothing like Bush.

Note: If you think I just wrote that Obama and Bush are the same, you have missed the point by generalizing from specific statements. Read it again.

New Link: Obama hires the CEO of GE, a company that made over $14 billion dollars without paying taxes and asking for $3.2 billion return, to run his “Council on Job and Competitiveness.” This after GE has sent several thousand workers packing as he sent jobs overseas. Great hire President Obama. http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/03/30

Peace,
Tex Shelters