Today as I was driving around getting stuff for the upcoming school week (teachers really do work long hours during the school year) I was listening to a rerun of “The Ed Schultz Show” on the radio.  Ed Schultz calls himself a “proud lefty” and, to me, he seems like a classic democrat from my youth who is unabashedly focused on pro working(person) issues.  Obviously, Shultz has an agenda.  Who doesn’t these days?  What is refreshing to me is how “up front” he is about it.  His theme is “where America  comes to talk” and, in contrast to the right wing “talkers” I’ve listened to (especially Rush Limbaugh – it’s all I can do to give Limbaugh a few minutes any more) Schultz welcomes “conservatives” to call his show and he actually lets them make their case – again, something I haven’t heard on shows like Limbaugh’s, or Glenn Becks, or the others – although I have to admit I just don’t listen to the “right” much anymore. 

Another thing that has drawn me to listen to Schultz when I can is that I’ve actually heard him criticize President Obama, although he clearly is an Obama supporter.  And, it’s true, from a “progressive” perspective I don’t believe there can be any doubt that President Obama is far superior to our previous president.  However, president Obama is NO LIBERAL from my perspective – and the people who are trying to paint him as such – in fact, as a socialist or communist or worse – are either disengenuous, ill-informed, or just plain lying.  Even the stimulus package – the one that ALL REPUBLICANS voted against, and then went back to their districts and started taking credit for the projects which were created, was tilted to the “right” with almost 50% of the bill providing tax cuts.  I guess the republicans didn’t like that because the tax cuts were aimed at the working class of America – people like this guy who was on Schultz’ show (a few days ago – the show I was listening to was a rerun from last week) claiming to be a conservative who drives a “route” and makes $40,000 per year.

This proved to be a very interesting conversation.  The caller (who, during the conversation, claimed he got a lot of his information from listening to Glenn Beck) had a list of seven reasons why Barack Obama is a socialist (I think that’s how he put it).  Essentially, the $40,000 per year driver was complaining that Obama’s liberal policies were ruining our country.  I’m trying to remember as much of the ensuing conversation as I can, because, to me, it showed the danger of these republican “talking heads” who are spewing deceit and inciting people I’ve heard  referred to as “low information voters.”  The guy on the phone with Schultz was very genuine, his fears were genuine, the problem was that he had no idea what he was talking about.  He had been listening to the likes of Beck, Limbaugh, and Fox “news” and taking what they say as the truth, without any attempt to verify what any of it.  It reminded me of a person I was very close to who I can no longer even bring myself to talk to – a person who, when I showed him evidence of something he heard on Limbaugh’s show as being false, he threw it on the ground in a rage making absurd claims about liberals.

The guy on the radio on Schultz’ show was doing essentially the same thing (of course, he couldn’t throw anything on the ground) and Schultz, showing great patience with him, debunked his “claims” one by one on an extended segment.  It was very interesting.  I don’t think I’ll remember all the names of the people he was talking about, but he was claiming that President Obama was surrounding himself with people who are Maoists, who are in cahoots with Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, and virtually every claim he made had an “ist” on the end of it.  It was after all of this that he admitted he was a devoted listener of Beck.  OK, like with my friend, I believe people can listen to whatever they want to listen to – but, this kind of crap being thrown around as “news” or reasoned opinion based on facts, HAS TO BE DEBUNKED.  Things are getting out of hand in this nation, because people like this truck driver should be the backbone of the democratic party.  It is people like him that President Obama is fighting for and yet they’re getting sucked into the right wing fear machine.

The first person this guy called a socialist in Obama’s “inner circle” was the person in charge of putting together the loan package which bailed out General Motors.  Somehow, the caller claimed he (I told you I wouldn’t remember the names) was not a capitalist.  Schultz pointed out (accurately) that the “bailout” was a loan which will be repaid and that the government intervention to save both Chrysler and GM saved countless thousands of American jobs and, correctly, pointed out that corporations borrowing money and then paying it back was part of our capitalist way of doing business in America.  What the caller couldn’t get his head around was why GM and Chrysler needed to be bailed out in the first place.  When Schultz pointed out how the Bush administration policies had led to a near collapse of our entire financial system and that the reason these companies had to borrow from the government was because there was no place else for them to borrow money at the time due to the reckless policies of the republicans who preceeded Obama the caller – as EVERY so-called “conservative” I ever talk to continued to BLAME the economic collapse on Obama’s liberal policies.

That’s where I had to give Schults a lot more credit than what I could have had in the same situation.  The caller simply identified the FACT that he was ILL INFORMED by blaming Obama for circumstances which were IN PLACE when Obama took office.  I listen to this CRAP all the time – and, from people who I somehow think should know better, some of them teachers – where they are simply listening to Beck, Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reilly, Savage, Rove, and many others (in Portland there’s a guy called “Lars Larson” who’s of the same ilk).  And, despite the FACT that this caller (and my former acquaintance) should know better as educated adults, I don’t blame them.  To me these “say for pay” talkers are willing to do anything for the money they’re making (and, the estimates are huge with people like Limbaugh and Beck).   I don’t want to call them traitors, but they’re spewing lies for money, but as with all liars – after a point in time they start to believe their own lies are true.  They get so used to lying it just becomes a way of life.  They then fall into the category of pathological liars.  Somehow in American society we are allowing this phenomenon to exist – the right wing has garnered a stranglehold on the “liberal media” and, even the democrats seem to want to take them on with “kid gloves.”  What’s really alarming about this is that these “talkers” are minions of large corporations and now that the supreme court has enabled the corporations to dominate our political process through “Citizen’s United” we’re going to hear a lot more $40,000 truck drivers who listen to the radio while they drive around 50-60 hours per week and 90+% of what they hear is “right wing talkers” regurgitating the lies of Beck, Limbaugh, etc. – and, all the while believing in their hearts that they are being good informed citizens.

I give Schultz credit for having the discussion with guys like this, but not that many are going to call and too many will never hear anything except the deceivers and incitors on the “right.”  Just mentioning “Citizen’s United” reminds me of how dishonest EVERYTHING that comes from the “right” is.  You would think “Citizen’s United” would be about a bunch of “citizens” uniting to fight something.  So, how does it come out of the court giving corporations unlimited access to our political process?  And, keep in mind, most of these corporations are either foreign owned or are multi-national.  This from the political party which is clamoring about illegal immigrants.  Which is worse, a few illegal aliens picking fruit in America or Corporations based in China, the middle east, Russia, or elsewhere outside the boundaries of America controlling our elections through massive spending?  When the republicans put a name on something, you can almost bet their true agenda is almost completely opposite.

Here’s another one – which was involved in a local ballot measure recently in Oregon.  The ballot measure was intended to raise the corporate minimum tax in Oregon (the 49th lowest in the nation) from $10 per year (yeah, you heard that right $10) to the 46th lowest in the nation at $150.  Additionally, Oregon’s legislature wanted to raise income taxes on people earning $250,000 or more (I believe it was something like 1 0r 2%).  Well, republicans hate anything that includes raising taxes – even though this increase saved basic services to thousands of needy Oregonians – so in comes “Freedom Watch.”  This is a lobbying firm which is led by none other than Dick Armey the former majority leader of the House during the “Contract for (should read “on”) America in the 1990’s – led by Newt Gingrich.  This was the bunch, including Armey, who impeached President Clinton for having an affair, then had to resign from Congress when their affairs became public.  Anyway, “Freedom Watch” seems to show up in places where the rich people of this nation need protection against any kind of sensible taxation policy which would stem the incredible GREED cycle we’ve been in since the eighties.  Who’s “freedom” are they watching?  Well, you don’t have to check them out very far to find out they’re watching the “freedom” of large corporations in America.  I guess the question becomes, how much more freedom do the corporations in this nation need?  There seems to be no limits to the amount of PROFIT these companies seem to think they’re entitled to – all the while doing everything they can to keep guys like the one who called Schultz show thinking that the democrats are “communists” or “socialists” so that they can increase executive salaries, reduce workers wages and benefits, and show more profit for their stockholders.

In America today, according to what people like the guy calling Schultz’ show say, working people have been tricked into thinking shareholders are more important than workers.  The end result is that we are getting close to the point where we don’t make anything (except of course weapons) and even our elections are going to be at the mercy of foreigners.  Somehow “we the people” have to get the message through to these Americans who are buying this Beck, Limbaugh, and the rest’s “coolaid” that the future of this nation really is at stake.  It’s just that they have been duped into thinking the idea that most of America’s wealth being funneled to the top is good for them.  It’s hard for me to understand how any educated American could fall for that – how the republicans managed to get so many people thinking that we are a “each man/woman for him/herself” society.  I really don’t understand how so many Americans can just accept that President Obama caused all the problems we’re now facing when it’s just over a year since George W Bush was telling us that the taxpayers had to put up $700 BILLION for Wall Street because the economy was collapsing.  I keep asking myself;  how can people like the guy who called today blame the deficit on Obama when it was thrust on him by the Bush administration who didn’t even count the war spending as part of the budget?  How can they blame the lack of jobs on Obama when we were losing jobs at a rate of almost a MILLION per month when he took office?  Then I get back to that explanation I keep hearing, and that is Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck are appealing to low information voters for their support, and evidently there are millions of them in America!