News & Articles

Ah, ‘tis the season for family, friends, eggnog, chipmunks singing Christmas carols – and all-out, no-mercy, blow-’em-all-to-hell WAR.

Not war like in Afghanistan. No, no – this is the far-right’s God-awful “War on the War on Christmas.” In this season of Peace on Earth, these delusional hucksters are fomenting hatred of… well, of whom? Blasphemist-liberal-Democrat-atheist-humanists, they shout – those heathens who actually go around saying “Happy Holidays,” rather than “Merry Christmas,” as Jesus taught us to say. Or was it Constantine the Great in the Fourth Century who came up with that?

Never mind, the rightists’ point is that diabolical lefties – ie, Marxists – are out to ban Christmas entirely. No less of a heroic defender of the faith than Sarah Palin has even written a thin book about this devious plot, revealing that “Happy Holidays” is merely “The tip of the spear in a larger battle to… make true religious freedom a thing of America’s past.” Luckily, note the Merry Christmas crusaders, such bright lights as Gov. Rick Perry of Texas are pushing state laws to by-pass the silly US Constitution and allow Christian icons and ceremonies into our schools. “A crèche in every public space,” is their cry, “a cross on every city hall.” To hell with Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, the winter solstice, etcetera – this is war!

No, this is hokem, hoodoo, camel dung. It’s also insulting that they would attempt to create a fictional piece of religious discrimination, whine that they are a repressed minority, and equate it with war. First, Jews, Muslims, and others don’t get to brand public spaces as their religious property. Second, about three-fourths of Americans are Christian, so drop the martyr pose. And third, war really is hell, with blood, lifelong trauma, and death – so stop pretending you’re in one.

“’War on War on Christmas’ led this year by Gen. Palin,” Austin American Statesman,”


Who came up with the idea of Obamacare?

A “message of the week” is handed out, talking points (including “lines of attack”) are distributed, “social media tactics” are taught, new messaging tools like “digital fliers” are deployed, “opinion articles” are pre-written, and a 17-page “playbook” lays out the strategy.
All this (and much more) is part of an all-out, centralized, military-style assault that House Republicans are making in a desperate attempt to kill Obamacare – with their larger mission being to crush the idea that every American deserves good quality health care. The campaign is being directed through Speaker John Boehner’s office, with all 231 GOP members expected to take marching orders, penetrate every media market, and stir up as much negative noise as possible to sabotage Obama’s Affordable Care Act.
Most members of this anti-care brigade, however, seem blissfully unaware of an explosive irony in their furious assault on the Obamacare: It was their idea!
While Democrats long advocated that universal health care should be achieved by simply extending Medicare to everyone, Republicans always countered that coverage should be run through insurance corporations, with a requirement that younger and healthier people buy into it. Richard Nixon proposed this concept in 1974. Then, in 1989, the Heritage Foundation (a Republican-allied think tank) basically proposed the full privatized system embodied in the ACA, including the “individual mandate” that everyone buy an insurance policy. Such far-right GOP congress critters as Sen. Orin Hatch and Newt Gingrich became leading champions of this scheme – the very one that they and fellow Republicans are now trying to demonize and slay.
The deeper irony is that, should the GOP succeed, Democrats can then return to the much simpler, more sensible plan of Medicaid for all.
“G.O.P. Maps Out Waves of Attacks Over Health Law,” www.nytimes.com, November 20, 2013.
“Nixon Proposed Today’s Affordable Care Act,” www.alternet.org, October 27, 2013.

Congressional victims of alcoholism… and hypocrisyitis

Right-wing political operatives deserve credit for their impressive inventiveness.
In particular, they have created the “Rob Defense” for public officials who get caught engaging in bad personal behavior, such as sexual misconduct, snorting cocaine, and bribery. When nabbed in an act of naughtiness, the standard defense thrown out by politicians of all stripes has been to blame “stress of overwork” and to apologize to “anyone who is offended” by their grossly-offensive action.
But that excuse is overused, so advisors to right-wing bad boys have invented a new defense: Just claim to have been “in a drunken stupor” at the time. So, see, it really wasn’t their fault – blame the booze! The Rob Defense is named for Rob Ford, the almost-comically offensive mayor of Toronto, who keeps explaining that his crack cocaine use, abusive rages, and other antics only happen when he’s sozzled, totally blotto.
Recently, though, a tea party congress critter from Florida added a clever refinement to The Rob. Arrested in November for buying cocaine in Washington, Rep. Trey Radel dolefully confided in a press release that, “I struggle with the disease of alcoholism.” That’s a shrewd touch, for you get extra public sympathy if you’re a victim of disease?
But let’s note that Trey also suffers from another disease he didn’t mention: Political Hypocrisyitis. Barely a month earlier, Radel had joined his Republican colleagues to bash poor people by voting to require mandatory drug tests for all welfare recipients. Did alcoholism make him do that, too?
The poverty program pays under $200 a month for a family of four, while Radel draws more than $14,000 a month from us taxpayers. If Congress really wants to kick drug abusers off the public dole, its best odds of finding some would be to start testing its own members.
“Cokehead congressmen show need to test lawmakers for drugs,” Austin American Statesman,” November 23, 2013.