Abort! Abort!

I've worked various election campaigns, and phone-banking is one of the most depressing, soul-grinding things you can do. Important, but sweet baby Jesus, you get to hear from all the losers, idiots and, worse, the one-issue voters.

Yes, they're out there. We could be emerging from the rubble of a GOP-led recession, the challenger could be saber-rattling for a third war in the Middle East and trying to set up robber barons for another Gilded Age, and you'd still have people on the phones listening to babbling lunatics explain how they could never vote for the Negro Abortionist.

Well, if there's people out there fixating on one subject, let's look at that subject for a moment, shall we?

(If you know anybody doing phone-banking in these waning days of the campaign, feel free to share this with them. You don't even need to give me credit for it. I'll be honest. It won't help: one-issue voters are not changing their minds, regardless of how many facts you run past them. But, well... at least you'll feel better.)

Barack Obama has been reliably pro-choice his entire career. This is not under dispute. But despite what many on the right like to claim, he is not a "radical abortionist."

While he did vote against bills to prevent "sex-selection" abortion and various bills which claimed to protect infants born alive due to failed abortions, but not due to some radical agenda. All were introduced by radical anti-abortionists, and all were so general that they could be twisted by political activists to begin the process of making all abortions illegal. Plus, the "failed abortion" acts were redundant even before they were written: Illinois law already protects an aborted fetus which turns out to be born alive.

But if you think that a vote for Romney is a "pro-life" vote, then, I'm sorry, but you're an idiot.

Because the truth of the matter is, nobody (probably not even Mitt Romney) knows what Romney's personal feelings are on abortion. Just looking at the evidence, his political advisers have determined that it would be best for his campaign if he was pro-life. But the people who know him give the impression that he isn't so much "pro-choice" as "uncaring." This isn't really a subject he feels like addressing.

But there's nothing here that qualifies as evidence. So, to determine the truth, we have to look at his record, and consider what Mitt Romney has actually done.

That, however, is also a mistake. Because the only conclusion to be drawn from history is that Mittens will say anything and do anything if he believes it is politically expedient.

In 1994, debating Teddy Kennedy, Romney said that he supported Roe vs Wade. Kennedy responded "I am pro-choice. My opponent is multiple choice," leading Romney to tell a heartwarming story of a close relative named Ann Keenan.

"I have my own beliefs, and those beliefs are very dear to me. One of them is that I do not impose my beliefs on other people. Many, many years ago, I had a dear, close family relative that was very close to me who passed away from an illegal abortion. It is since that time that my mother and my family have been committed to the belief that we can believe as we want, but we will not force our beliefs on others on that matter. And you will not see me wavering on that."

Look it up. While you do, keep in mind that one joke he made there, that he will "not impose (his) beliefs on other people." (It'll seem funnier later.)

In 2002, debating gubernatorial opponent Shannon O'Brien, he added "I will preserve and protect a woman's right to choose. I am not going to change our pro-choice laws in Massachusetts in any way. I am not going to make any changes which would make it more difficult for a woman to make that choice herself."

But in 2005, as governor, Romney vetoed a law which would ease access to emergency contraception. He explained through an Op-Ed in the Boston Globe, where he said he was "pro-life" and opposed any "judicial mandate" that dictated a nationwide abortion law, arguing instead that the issue should be left up to the states.

"I believe that abortion is the wrong choice except in cases of incest, rape, and to save the life of the mother," Romney wrote. "I believe that the states, through the democratic process, should determine their own abortion laws and not have them dictated by judicial mandate." Romney said he would uphold his campaign promise not to change Massachusetts' abortion laws, even though that campaign pledge was preceded by Romney's statement that he would "protect a woman's right to chose."

Then, during his first presidential bid in 2007, Romney explained that he had "changed my mind" on abortion while serving his one term as Massachusetts governor, and that "we should overturn Roe v. Wade and return these issues to the states." He also said he would be "delighted" to sign a bill as president that would outlaw abortion, if there "was such a consensus in this country that we said we don't want to have abortion in this country at all, period."

(He even had a cute little explanation, about how Reagan and both Bushes had started out pro-choice, and changed to become pro-life. Like so many of Romney's stories, it was a lie. But even though he was called out on it, he used it again a few years later.) Still with me?

From 2005 to 2011, Romney consistently said that he was "pro-life" and believes abortion should be legal only in the case "of rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother." That may be the longest stretch he ever went without reversing himself.

During the Republican primary last year, Romney expanded that view to explain how he believed he should cut all federal funding for Planned Parenthood, reverse Roe v. Wade "because it is bad law and bad medicine," and end funding for any international aid program that "promotes or performs abortions on women around the world."

But remember: he won't force his beliefs on other people.

He wrote it out for us in a National Review Op-Ed in June 2011. "If I have the opportunity to serve as our nation's next president, I commit to doing everything in my power to cultivate, promote, and support a culture of life in America." Apparently, one of his advisers thought he needed to take a hard right tack.

Having said repeatedly that abortion laws should be left up to the states, in October 2011 he went on Fox "News" and told Mike Huckabee that he "absolutely" supports a Constitutional amendment banning abortion.

But now, less than two months after accepting the GOP nomination, Romney is casually trying to amble back toward the center on his abortion stance, telling the Des Moines Register last month that he would not make abortion legislation part of his agenda. "There's no legislation with regards to abortion that I'm familiar with that would become part of my agenda." (It comes about 14 minutes into the audio of the interview.)

Funny, because in his National Review Op-Ed, he named three specific pieces of legislation he supported: "I support the Hyde Amendment, which broadly bars the use of federal funds for abortions... I will reinstate the Mexico City Policy (to bar foreign aid from abortion providers)... I will advocate for and support a Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act to protect unborn children..."

But hell, his friends, family and coworkers are just as confused about Romney's position as Romney is. After he spoke to the Des Moines Register, Romney's spokesperson, Andrea Saul was quick to contradict her candidate, saying "Mitt Romney is proudly pro-life and will be a pro-life president."

On the other hand, his sister Jane, back in August (you remember August, right? Her brother was "severely conservative" back then...), said that any fear that Romney would restrict abortion was "conjured," and that "it's not his focus."

At a "Women for Mitt" event held in conjunction with the Republican National Convention in Tampa, she said "He's not going to be touching any of that...  Mitt's much more in the middle" than even the GOP platform (which supports several anti-abortion initiatives and a "Right to Life" amendment with no exceptions for rape or incest).

Romney's surrogate, former Senator Norm Coleman, seems to agree with Jane, saying in Ohio last week, "President Bush was president for eight years, Roe v. Wade wasn't reversed. He had two Supreme Court picks, Roe v. Wade wasn't reversed. It's not going to be reversed."

And then we have that last debate with Obama, where Romney went even further left, saying Obama was "totally wrong" about him wanting to shut down Planned Parenthood.

Of course, he was also trying to blame gun violence on single mothers (presumably women who had escaped his binders), so perhaps he was just having an off night.

It's funny, isn't it? Romney's positions on abortion seem to change whenever there's an election nearby, and what position would be most popular with the people voting in that election. That's kind of weird. You have to wonder - is he a vacillating bag of douche, or a cynical, calculating fucknozzle?

Personally, I vote for the second one.

Let it be a sign unto you. . .

Living right on the Atlantic coast in Florida, I often see and hear blimps cruising the shoreline at low altitude.  It was a a beautiful day yesterday and I spent the balmy afternoon reading and listening to music on my boat and perhaps I would have seen the Romney Blimp ( technically a hot air dirigible) had it made the trip up the coast from Miami, just over a hundred miles south of here.

It didn't, because as WPLG TV reports, it was forced down by high winds, crashed and went limp in a field near Davie, FL.  In other words the winds of  reality outweighed the artificially created hot air holding it aloft.

There's something amusingly Ozymandian about the smiling image of Willard Mitt Romney looking out from the wreckage of a collapsed airship; something so appealingly metaphorical and  prophetic.  Please, God -- let it be a sign.

Really, David Gregory?

So, I thought I'd email "Meet the Press" today.

So, let me get this straight. You had Ralph Reed on, to impugn the honesty of Barack Obama.

First, it might have been nice if you'd disclosed that he was working for Mitt Romney. That might have been a basic level of truth that you could have established at the beginning. Just a thought.

Second... Ralph Reed? Seriously? Didn't he work with Jack Abramoff to steal from Native Americans in at least two states: the Choctaw in Alabama and the Tigua in El Paso, Texas? (I believe his entire résumé was an email to Abramoff reading "Hey, now that I’m done with electoral politics, I need to start humping in corporate accounts! I’m counting on you to help me with some contacts.")

You have a thief and a liar on to discuss the honesty of the President of the United States? Without talking about HIS background, or about the fact that he is now working for the Romney campaign? Did you miss a few classes when you were getting that journalism degree?

I'm just curious.

Sadly, I didn't have the emails for either David Gregory or his executive producer Betsy Fischer Martin, or I'd have gone straight to the source.

Remember, folks. This is what the GOP likes to call the "liberal media." Go figure.

Inside Romney's Head: The Dead Zone

According to Mitt Romney, I'm a freeloader with a victim mentality. I'm not alone; forty-seven percent of Americans, Obama supporters every one, are as trifling as I am.

Addressing guests at a private fundraiser earlier this year, Romney declared:

There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what…These are people who pay no income tax. (Secret Video--Mother Jones)

As an Obama supporter, I think that Romney may be talking about me. I need to stop paying income tax and demand that the government hand over my entitlement. You should too, if you're an Obama supporter. According to Romney, Obama supporters in addition to being trifling, lazy folks with a victim mentality, have developed a notion that "...the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it."

Now, where would any of us get such a notion? Well, I'll be darned! Maybe it's from those socialist Founding Fathers.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,"--The Declaration of Independence (emphasis added)

Interesting concept that the purpose of government--the reason that "governments are instituted"-- is to ensure access to those unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest that health care, food and housing are encompassed in life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and that it is an appropriate goal for governments to implement laws and policies to further the goal of securing these basic rights for all of its citizens. 

A good friend offered the following observation that further illuminates the purpose of government under those founding documents that Romney and the conservative right purport to follow:  Look also at the words that appear in the Preamble to the Constitution. We, United, union, common, general, ourselves, our. "Us" is our thesis. Not an "I me mine" to be found.--S. Gordon 

Romney has refused to retreat from his disavowal of governmental responsibility to promote any efforts to mitigate financial inequity and economic injustice. Instead, as expected, Romney supporters have dragged out a 1998 video of President Obama in which Obama states:

The trick is figuring out how do we structure government systems that pool resources and hence facilitate some [wealth] redistribution -- because I actually believe in redistribution, at least at a certain level to make sure that everybody’s got a shot.--Barack Obama (Obama 1998 Loyola Speech)

Apparently, we are to be shocked by this statement and declare Obama a socialist. Oh the horror! President Obama thinks that it is important to ensure that every American has a shot at fulfilling the promise of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness noted in that most American of documents, The Declaration of Independence. Don't you? Or do you prefer the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few with little or no chance for the advancement of most?

It's about redistribution of opportunities. No one, least of all President Obama ever said that the plan is to take money from some to give it to others; the oft expressed paranoia of those who buy into Romney's vision of freeloading, do-nothing, Americans sitting around waiting for government handouts.

Redistribution of wealth is about providing grants for students to attend college, or low interest loans for small businesses. It is about providing food stamps to mothers and children who have insufficient funds to buy food.

A single parent of two who earns $10 per hour for 40 hours per week nets $1600 per month before taxes. Ten dollars per hour is more than minimum wage (federal minimum wage is $7.25) but it still isn't sufficient money for rent, childcare (if you are a working parent, you need childcare), food, health insurance, clothing, transportation, and food.

As a country are we really so heartless and stupid that we can't understand that trickle down economics is a grand pie in the sky lie perpetuated by the haves to insure that the have-nots waste their time worrying about nonexistent threats of impending socialism and don't notice class inequities?

Mitt Romney has made it clear as to what he thinks of nearly half of all Americans. In his own words: "[M]y job is is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives." (Secret Video...)

In November, we have a chance to tell Mitt Romney what we think of him. What will that message be? Will we support his view that nearly half of Americans are shiftless, unwilling to work freeloaders, waiting on a government handout? Or will we take a look at ourselves, our family members, and our neighbors and recognize that demanding that all of us have fair and meaningful access to the opportunities that this nation provides is the rightful purpose of government? The answer is up to us, the governed.

Note: Romney stated that he wished that the entire video had been released to place his remarks in context. Mother Jones has obliged. Someone should have reminded Romney of the adage, "careful what you wish for." Link to the entire video.

Those people

You're going to hear a lot about it today and I have to admit, there's a smile on my face this morning.  It's not because I put a lot of store in some stupid remark that may or may not be a window into the true mind of Mitt, but because I've been hoping all along that the sheer arrogance evidenced by the ballooning buffoonery of the Swaggering Right would be their downfall.  After all, it's damned hard to step carefully when you're goose-stepping. Looks like Mitt has done just that -- stepped right in it.

"There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent on government, who believe that   they are victims, who believe that government has the responsibility to care for them. Who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing."

 Said Willard M. Romney, thinking he was still in an age when you could say things and the words would just fade away.

Romney was, of course flattering his audience as politicians always do; flattering people who like to think of themselves as special because they make or have or have inherited a good deal of money - or people who certainly would be rich if it weren't for all those freeloaders and Democrats. Build up their self-esteem,and a  good way to keep up that head of steam is to look down on others. And so Mitt reminded them that his job is not to worry about those people, which is a sideways way to say his job as president would be to worry about these people, his wealthy constituents. Remind them that Obama supporters are just looking for an excuse to pick their pockets.

And should any be troubled by Marley's chains rattling in the background, Mitt is there to remind them that those people don't rate sympathy because they all think of themselves as victims, because they depend on the largesse of the large-assed assembled patricians.  Don't worry about those people. His concern is with the 5% the 10% who are thoughtful, not the ignorant under $250K a year rabble with all their cooties.

Those 47% of course don't really live tax free of course.  28% do pay payroll taxes and we're not talking about Social Security and Medicare -- and nearly everyone pays real estate taxes directly or indirectly and we all pay sales taxes. About 17% just don't make enough money or are elderly and dependent -- those whose jobs went to India perhaps or those devastated by huge medical bills, but although there are millions of different stories, it's good to know that Mitt thinks the President's job is not to worry about them.  Let them worry about themselves.  The real problem for a president according to people like Mitt is that he and his audience have to pay taxes.  America is about us.  The business of their president is asset retention and Mitt is here to tell them he's their man -- one of these people.

Off to the see the Liz

The Wonderful Magical Apology tour Is waiting to take you away over at Fox News.

"I will not and I will never apologize for America. I don't apologize for America, because I believe in America."
-  Mitt Romney -

"You know, after he went over there and apologized to them, I can't vote for that guy"

-heard everywhere and every day- 

Associated Press Fact Check would beg to differ and the Washington Post agrees that this Wagnerian cycle of Obama's Apology Tour, like Ryan's 'under three hour' marathon time -- a lie.

With the November Elections close at hand, one might expect to be hearing some concrete plans about what the Republicans might actually do about the economy and since we are not hearing some concrete plans about what to do that differ from the deed that got us into this mess, we might rightly expect that, as with Nixon's infamous "secret plan to win the war" the plan consists of  clinging white knuckled to the same course that ran us off the cliff and swept the GOP out of power.  The plan is to keep the lies coming, keep them consistent enough, outrageous enough and nasty enough to satisfy the Josef Goebbels system requirements.  Hey, it works and it got Tricky Dick re-elected.

Yes, indeed -- we all know the debt is enormous and we're told all day and all night that it's all because of  Obama's  never specified 'Policies.'  You know, those policies that have more people on welfare than ever, according to the river of e-mail I get every morning and  which isn't any more true than that he eliminated the  Democratic 'work for welfare' program or tried to keep military voters out of the polls or that "he went over there and apologized to them."  Yes, yes, "the government keeps printing money."  They keep saying it, but then the bills need to be paid and there's no new money coming in thanks to the cuts.  But remember -- for the most part those bills were run up by the President Who Never Existed: George W. Bush who actually told us the bills would pay themselves - by magic. Now why is it you haven't heard Bush quoted or mentioned for quite some time now?  Haven't heard him speechifying for Mitt, now have you?  Bush who?

The most expensive war in American history, the GWB prescription drug plan, the biggest, most expensive agency we've ever had and the large cuts to revenue which for 30 years have been promised as the magic fertilizer from which prosperity grows, haven't grown anything but the noxious Kudzu of debt and never actually were supposed to, since as Co-President Dick Cheney smilingly said "Debt Doesn't Matter."  No, it's true, no new private sector jobs were created during the Bush frat party years, the government ballooned in size and expense and so did the debt and we didn't hear a God damned peep out of Chicken Little who's clucking himself half to death at the moment.  We heard a lot of Liberal bashing though, didn't we?  And the Liberals were right though, weren't they? 

But we're not hearing it, we're hearing about birth certificates, death panels, radical Socialism and magical, mystical apology tours to 'over there' where he apologized to them.  And of course the US has never done anything it needs to apologize for, being the magically mystically greatest country since God created the Earth 5773 years ago today. The Slave auctions to Wounded knee to My Lai, we've always been angels and heroes in our own hermetic consciousness.

You're not hearing that the facts make liars out of the Fox and its friends, that 90% marginal tax rates once presided over prosperity and full employment and diminishing debt, that slashing the top bracket funnels money into the market and real estate and hedge funds and inflated bubbles which bring on busts and recessions. You're not hearing that we're paying less taxes than ever and still after decades it hasn't showed a hint of paying off.

Hell, you're not hearing anything but lies or breathing any thing but the smoke of desperation.  That Colored boy - now he's gone and abandoned Czechoslovakia, that empty suit, Commie tyrant Muslim from Africa! whines Fox News.  That smell? It's the smoke and the stink of desperation. The collapse, the bailouts -- all that began under Bush and the current candidates loved it -- and Czechoslovakia went out of existence 10 years ago before you ever heard of Mr. Obama and his apology tour over there.

So keep believing, as Liz the Wiz Cheney tells us on Fox, how he went over there and apologized to them even though he didn't, because it's all you've got if you're a Romney supporter. It's all you've got. Keep joking about how he's not an American like fancy pants Willard because the smoke would be blown away if you had any memory and were willing to use it. The curtain of slander would be torn asunder and all you'd see is the few dozen wizards burning up millions and millions  trying to make themselves very, very much richer at the expense of your future.

" The president himself has got a terrible record on national security, and it’s clearly something that Gov. Romney ought rightly to be pushing” 

Continued the Liz, as the Fox folk danced down the yellow brick road away from the fact that Al Qaeda is in tatters and the 9/11 planners including Osama are dead and there have been no more attacks on our soil.  Yes, and I'm sure he will be pushing it while bashing the health care plan he wrote and extolling all those empty shibboleths like smaller government and all that religious claptrap about morals and birth control.  What the hell else can these people do when the facts, if facts be remembered, would cast them all into the pit?

Logic 101

Let's say it's because the truth hurts, but I really hate to be taken for stupid by people who don't know me from Adam. I would at least prefer to be given the opportunity to say or do something to prove it.

So they tried to take me for a fool last night. When my Caller ID screen flashed "Opinion Poll"  I was suspicious.  It didn't say something like Zogby or any name I would recognize, so I paused the TV and picked it up hoping to have an opportunity to express my displeasure at the illegally late hour.  I soon detected that "David" from the "polling company" was actually a computer. Didn't take any Holmesian deduction really.  If the Voice on the phone does not stumble or pause at my assertions as to his oedipal relationships it's likely that old Dave is a new Dell.

But I went along, hoping to have my shot, answering that yes, I was going to vote, yes I was certain I was going to vote, am a registered Democrat and no I wasn't going to risk divine retribution by voting for some tin horn torturer  like Allen "deport the commies" West,  but noticing that the questions all compared the Republican Party with the "Democrat" Party, I began to lose patience.

You probably aren't old enough to remember how easy it was to determine political polarity by noting how the speaker pronounced Vietnam. It rhymed with Pete Ham if you were for the glorious crusade to protect American freedom.  Curiously, the same dialect discrimination obtained with our invasion of Iraq.  If it was Eye-wrack, you were for it.  But these chuckleheads can't bring themselves to acknowledge the Democratic Party by saying it right and they're too smugly stupid to notice that I might notice. They always and steadfastly and in the face of cannon fire, call it the 'Democrat' Party. 

But I digress. One might expect a careless listener of some intelligence to miss this point, but when Digital Dave asked whether my preference might lie with the Republican plan to create jobs, build prosperity and bring on a new dawn of American world domination in Jesus' name amen, by getting rid of crippling business regulation and those unnecessarily Marxist corporate taxes --- or whether I might somehow, perhaps accidentally, make the thoughtless mistake of  destroying the fabric of the space-time continuum by letting the top bracket rise to the point where Ronald Reagan shocked us by lowering it -- and voting for the Democrat agenda?

So would you vote for peace and prosperity or for disaster?

Somewhere in a primary school class where they teach basic reasoning skills; ( they do do that, don't they?) or somewhere in the beginning pages of Logic for Dummies, there must be mention of forced choice questions. No, I don't have advanced degrees and my Greek doesn't exist. My first grade teacher thought I was not first grade material and I only had three years of calculus in College, but really.  If this reeks of stupid even to me, is this the best these bozos can do?

 Somewhere in Hell, just south of the place reserved for cannibals and mass murderers there's a parking spot with a nice tin sign that reads:  THIS SPOT RESERVED FOR THE TREASONOUS BASTARDS AT ELKHURST COMMUNICATIONS.

PS:

 I posted this to Human Voices last week and although I sent an extremely and obnoxiously aggressive e-mail and a complaint to the FCC, they keep calling me and calling me and of course they'll keep doing it and no government agency will ever do anything to stop the lies or the intrusion. The bastards. 

Why Does The GOP Love Mitt Romney?

I've been trying to figure out why the Republican party nominated Mitt Romney as their candidate for president. They spent 2004 castigating John Kerry as a "flip-flopper," but now they want to elect someone who has literally reversed himself on every single issue.



But then it hit me. There's no way that they couldn't love Mittens. He's one of them.

The right wing has spent years trying to claim how much they dislike the "liberal elite," so it's somewhat ironic that their 2012 presidential candidate is a Harvard lawyer and multi-millionaire with four houses and a freaking elevator for his cars. But it's understandable, because, just like Mitt, the GOP has managed to reverse themselves on almost every policy they ever supported.

Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves; admittedly, he left the Republican party (like any reasonable person would), but he did it. In fact, the party was founded six years before the Civil War by anti-slavery activists and "modernists." Despite having that history to act as guide and beacon for their moral compass, the GOP has opened their arms and embraced every bigoted pinhead out there.

Those of us who wander the dark side of the Internet are treated to a daily flood of images of Obama as a monkey or an African witchdoctor, watermelons grown on the White House lawn, variations on "can we still call it the White House?" and every other racist stereotype they can dredge up.

Do you want to see how ugly it can get out there? Turn Safesearch off and google "Obama nigger." (But trust me, that's not a nice place to spend any amount of time.)

Have you heard the Republican position on unions lately? With all their assaults on collective bargain and worker's rights, it's sometimes hard to recall that the GOP once embraced unionization as an important step towards strengthening the middle class.

Back in the day when the Republican party still supported the ideals of the "common man" over the aspirations of the super-rich, they knew that only by organizing and acting in groups, could the poor gain any influence in negotiations with the wealthy.

Admittedly, they still know that: they just don't think it's a good idea any more.

As Reagan put it, "where free unions and collective bargaining are forbidden, freedom is lost." What, you don't believe me? Honest, he said it!


Despite their current efforts to do away with environmental protection and their mantra of "Drill, baby, drill!", the Republican Party used to consist of ardent conservationists like President Teddy Roosevelt, whose policies led to the creation of the National Park Service. And though they don't like to talk about him, Richard Nixon was a Republican, and he created the Environmental Protection Agency.

They've always been a little bit prudish. On October 28, 1919, a Republican-controlled Congress overrode the veto of President Woodrow Wilson (of the Progressive Party), and passed the Volstead Act, banning alcohol and bringing us Prohibition. Also, it was Edwin Meese, Attorney General for Ronald Reagan who created the Attorney General's Commission on Pornography, which succeeded in getting magazines such as Playboy and Penthouse removed from convenience store shelves.

Yet despite this continuing drumbeat of "family values," it's the traditionally "red" states that consume the most pornography; at their national conventions, strippers prefer Republicans, who outspend Democrats three to one. Republican Congressmen hold a solid lead over Democrats in number of sex scandals, as well.

The GOP likes to claim that they support the concept of smaller government, but if that's so, why does every Republican president increase the number of government employees, while every Democratic president reduces them?

This is not the Republican Party of your father. (Nor of mine, although he's most likely going to vote for them.) But overall, on issue after issue, the GOP shows why they support a hypocritical, lying gasbag who can't keep a consistent position as their candidate. He's what they aspire to be.

Romney/Ryan. Two of a kind.

The RNC Clown College has gavelled itself back into their usual unscripted incoherence again, and, to the surprise of nobody anywhere, Romney and Ryan are the nominees for God Emperor and Fisher King, and the Tampa strippers now go back to making subsistence wages.

There are actually many reasons why Mitt Romney would choose Paul Ryan for the VP spot, and only one of them involves the fact that Ryan's tax plan would have Romney paying less than one percent in taxes.

Ryan is like Mitt in many ways - he is also in the habit of making huge, sweeping statements about what he'll do, without giving any details about how he'll do them. For example, his vaunted plan to balance the budget? Well, what few details have been released have been described as "ludicrous and cruel."

But more than that, the details he isn't releasing are important. Forbes magazine, one of the most staunchly conservative of publications, point out that it isn't a plan, calling it "vacuously vague" and "all candy and no vegetables."

But he's very protective of that plan: back in April, when the president pointed out some flaws in it, Ryan went on the attack in a speech later that evening, saying "I seem to remember him saying that he was going to be a uniter, not a divider. Frankly this is one and the worst of his broken promises. We do not need a campaigner-in-chief, we need a commander-in-chief."

(Isn't that cute? "The president shouldn't attack me! Democrats can't fight back!" And then he gives a Bush quote but attributes it to Obama. And then he attacks Obama. You have to admire that level of hypocrisy.)

And in keeping with the Romney strategy, he doesn't just avoid criticism by never giving any detailed policies, he's more than happy to lie his ass off, just like Romney. His big speech at the RNC kept fact-checkers busy for days.

But remember, avoiding lies isn't a major priority of this campaign. It was Romney's advisor Neil Newhouse who said "We're not going to let our campaign be dictated by fact checkers."

Two men, defined only by their complete inability to tell the truth. They're made for each other.

How Best To Consider the Current Election Cycle?

I keep hearing that "no president has been re-elected since the 1950s with unemployment rates this high," or words to that effect, but I think a different pattern may well apply to the 2012 elections – 1936 and 1940.  People voted FDR back in even though the country was still suffering through the Great Depression and unemployment (though down from 1932-34's stunning over-20% figures) remained distressingly high.  They probably voted for FDR because they had memories extending back at least a bit more than, say, five minutes, and they understood that the Republicans had nothing to offer except soup lines and a return to the policies that had at least in part resulted in the Great Depression, which was a worldwide phenomenon, just as the economic distress today is global.  When you have la merde smeared all over your tie, you can't get away with telling everybody it's chocolate ice cream.  At least not for a while, anyway.

Current polls show clearly that a big majority of Americans (something like 67%) do NOT blame the president for the economy.  It is stupid to toss a president out on his ear solely because of how the economy is performing, unless you have rock-solid evidence that his policies are contributing to the problem.  Presidents' control over the economy is limited in spite of the claims they feel compelled to make when they're running for election, so the question is whether the current leader is doing the only things that can be done, given the circumstances.  In the present case, that pretty much means advocating intelligent policies since, of course, congressional cynics, liars and knaves have blocked most of what the president has tried to do.  They have disregarded just about every known ameliorative strategy since the advent of modern economics, for a reason it's hard to construe as anything other than the thoroughly despicable one of ensuring President Obama's failure.

But on the whole, what I'm suggesting is upbeat: we may be looking at an election in which millions of voters make their decision and carry it out more along the lines of the 1936 and 1940 cycles than anything we have seen recently.  That would make sense because the downturn we have been going through is widely acknowledged to be the worst economic trouble the country has suffered since the Depression itself.  Mitt Romney is a poster child for the sort of predatory capitalism that scares the hell out of a lot of working people.  He seems to me to be ideologically sympatico with the ultra-privileged Wall Streeters who caused our troubles in the first place.  What's not to not like about such a candidate?  The more people know about him, the less they're taken with, or taken in by, his usually genteel manner and always elegant appearance. 

There are some signs that the Obama campaign is a lot tougher than some previous Democratic ones: the Bain ads strike some people as mean (mostly whiny disingenuous Republicans and mush-mouthed otherpundits), but they're exactly the sort of thing successful candidates do: define opponents as something unflattering before they know what hit them, and then it's too late for them to define themselves. 

Besides, the heart of the matter with regard to Romney's tenure at Bain isn't SEC forms or anything like that, it's the fact that the man wants to take credit for the experience he had with that firm, but only selectively.  And why is he doing that?  Well, because, like all market mythologists, he's eager to acknowledge all the good stuff a person can say about capitalist enterprise, and determined to disavow any connection with the not-so-good stuff.  These guys treat capitalist economics like a god, and of course that means you give "god" all the credit for positive outcomes, and lay the blame at somebody else's door for negative or disturbing events.  The deeper implication of the above is that the GOP isn't in the least concerned to face up to reality: as usual, they're selling snake-oil as a cure for serious ills and mocking their detractors because those detractors won't extend full faith and credit to their preposterous quack prescriptions for nirvana.

All that said, I might as well admit that every election these days seems to be a referendum on just how uninformed we are as a nation, so all we can do is donate some dino dinars or cephalodupois sterling (or that human-made green paper everybody swears by in this degenerate geological epoch), help out physically if possible, and keep whatever kind of digits we have crossed. 

Finally, keeping abreast of the voter-disenfranchisement efforts being carried out all across the country also seems vital: if the devious right-wing faction in various states get their way, they will outright steal this election, disenfranchising potentially hundreds of thousands or even millions of overwhelmingly Democratic voters on the pretense of preventing "voter fraud," which phenomenon is beyond sane doubt almost non-existent in America.  What's being attempted now, I believe, goes far beyond any ordinary attempt to confuse and abuse the electoral process and the voting public: I view it is a sinister attempt at taking down the entire system of representation by specifically preventing massive amounts of voters in one political party from voting.  A viable republic cannot allow that to happen.