For the past couple of years I’ve been kind of alternating my rants between my disdain for the republican leadership and their collusion with corporate interests (some of whom are finally being exposed – like the Koch brothers) which have little to NO concern for the “least among us” and the democrats who seem to be almost paralyzed in their role as the opposition party whom those of us calling ourselves LIBERALS (progressives when we’re cowering from the right wing spin machine) MUST depend on as we attempt to prevent republicans from achieving their “permanent republican majority.”  Wow, I’ve got to stop and take a breath – that was a mouthful!  I have no problem attacking the republican leaders for their BLATANT hypocrisy – which is above and beyond the arrogant stage – while feeling a bit reserved about going after democrats for their cowardice in the face of one of the most important times in America’s history – lest someone might read this “blog” and misinterpret my critcism of President Obama or the democratic party he leads.

The republicans seem to be an endless stream of “material” as far as writing about why they should NEVER be returned to a position of authority under their present make-up.  I’ve stated many times here that I’m a long time independent and there have been many occasions where I voted for republicans.  But, that won’t be happening again any time soon.  First of all, the memory of the Bush/Cheney administration – or should I say the nightmare of – hasn’t worn off.  It will probably NEVER wear off.  There’s NO WAY I could ever condone the tax cutting which cut a huge hole in our deficit, the illegal wars – and the lying that got us entrenched there – that, to me, is UNFORGIVABLE, the torture – which they actually BRAGGED about – as if it did any good at all (and for any “right” winger reading this site, don’t bother trying to convince me it did – I’ve read accounts of the official interrogators who have claimed over and over again that all “actionable” intelligence gained after 9/11 came from traditional methods – the torturing was counter productive – not to mention it was acts of WAR CRIMES), Dick Cheney “outing” an under cover CIA agent – in my mind, an act of treason (plus Cheney shot his friend in the face while DRUNK and hid from the cops for 24 hours until he sobered up), and for those of you with short memories – not only did the Bush administration bludgeon our economy and encourage the risky behavior of Wall Street which caused the “Great Recession” but they were the culprits who instigated the BAILOUTS for the bankers who ripped us off. 

That would seem to be enough to turn any good American away from republicans, but there’s more.  The Bush administration was the administration which pushed for deregulation on steroids, and where there wasn’t deregulation there was a purposeful IGNORING of what regulations remained (leading to the West Virginia mining disaster and the Gulf of Mexico oil spill).  Bush signed a record number of “signing statements” arrogantly demonstrating that he was “the decider.”  To hell with the rest of us.  Yes, there’s more.  Bush/Cheney/Rove/Ashcroft/Gonzales/Addington/Bybee/Yoo and others PURPOSEFULLY undermined our justice department – attempting to turn it into a partisan wing of the republican party – complete with loyalty oaths from prospective new hires when they were applying for jobs.  That should be enough to scare you away from these people – and, by the way, present day republicans are again preaching the “Bush doctrine” if you listen closely enough – they just leave his name out of the conversation.  (I predicted over a year ago that the republican nominee in 2012 could be Jeb Bush – and I’m not ready to “back down” just yet)  I haven’t even talked about the illegal wiretapping – which is a BLATANT intrusion of our 4th amendment right to privacy, the attempted hijacking of habeous corpus (if you don’t know what that means, you really should look it up – that’s a “biggee”), the indefinite “prison” at GITMO, Abu Ghraib, the refusals to answer subpoenas to congress, etc. etc. – I think (at least hope) you get my point.

That’s just the previous bunch.  The present bunch is WORSE!  God help John McCain for saddling the rest of us with Sarah Palin.  McCain has proven to be such an opportunistic nitwit that it wouldn’t surprise me if someone told me he’s on the Sarah Palin “bandwagon” – despite the FACT she RUINED his chances in the last election (although his lack of intellect played a large part in his defeat as well – remember “The fundamentals of our economy remain strong” – or his top economic advisor calling the American people “whiners” for complaining about the economy?)  Back to Palin – this woman is dangerous.  I suppose if I had the opportunity to cash in on my fame I would do the same thing as her regarding “getting rich,” but she’s shown herself to be the PERFECT Pawn for the POWERBROKERS behind this republican ASSAULT on the American public.

How could that be, you might ask?  Well, Palin is uninformed enough and ambitious enough to not only say whatever people like Murdoch or the Koch brothers or Armey or whoever is behind this “tea party” movement asks her to say but she is also dishonest enough to start believing the FACT that she said “it” must make it true.  Therefore, you get someone who is spouting vile rhetoric in a manner which appeals to the uninformed “populists” out there (OK, Lars – you can accuse me of being an “elitist” again if it makes you feel better).  The result is a thoughtless block of voters who are shouting things like “kill him” in reference to our President, or “death panels” in reference to health care reform (which didn’t go nearly far enough due to people like Palin), or even questioning if our President is even a U.S. Citizen – all the while waving an American flag, as if that means they are patriots.  These people have been purposefully attempting to bring down President Obama’s agenda – remember he garnered 53% of the vote in the last election – Palin and “crew” want to “take their country back” from the MAJORITY who voted for Obama in the first place – how does that make any sense at all.

If President Obama’s agenda was so bad, you would think the republicans would have backed away and let it be enacted so that the results would prove their point.  The reality: they’re scared to death that a BLACK president will succeed, opening the doors to more people of color and possibly women holding the office of president in the future.  They liked the ALL WHITE boys club that has been in effect since the inception of this nation, but as Bob Dylan once said, “The times, they are a changin.”  Not only has Palin shown her racist nature, but people like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, and I could go on and on with leading republicans – they’ve all shown little interest in being subtle about their racist attitudes.  And, then they hoist candidates on us like Rand Paul – who objects to the 14th amendment’s equal protection clause, evidently wanting to go back to the “separate but equal” days, Sharron Angle who wants to eliminate Social Security, Medicare, unemployment INSURANCE, and who knows what else – the lady is an IDIOT, there’s Joe Miller in Alaska who might be a topper to Angle, and then this lady in Delaware – Christine O’Donnell – who would impose her Christian values (hey, I’m OK with her having them – I’ve got my own Christian values – just don’t impose them on others) on the rest of us – including an interesting commentary on masturbation.  All I’ve got to say about that is once you’ve publicy put out your position on masturbation you should probably think about another profession besides politics.  Somehow, I have to believe the people of Delaware recognize the importance of this election enough to make sure this woman isn’t in Washington DC pushing anit-masturbation laws for the next 6 years.  I can hear all the jokes now, and I’m already sick of them.

I could go on and on about republicans, but lets get back to the democrats.  Considering the weird people the republicans have put in front of the voters you would think this is going to be a “cakewalk” for the democrats.  However, they have been so UNINSPIRING that there is a real possibility the voters who put Obama in office will stay home from the election.  All the polls suggest that republicans are by far the most “likely” of the voters.  This in a country where there is no risk to voting – such as in Afganistan where you could be killed or maimed if you voted at some of the polling places (and, sadly and interestingly, people still voted in possibly greater numbers than Americans will).  I’ve been writing on this blog since almost the day Obama took the oath of office that voter TURNOFF could be a HUGE problem in the mid term election.  They didn’t listen.  Rahm Emanuel, who’s thankfully QUITTING as President Obama’s chief of staff, called LIBERALS like me “f__king retards.”  At the time, I was disappointed that Obama didn’t FIRE him on the spot.  Emanuel’s attitude is EXACTLY what’s been wrong with Obama’s administration and the democrats in congress.  Combine Emanuel with Larry Summers and Tim Geithner and it wasn’t hard to predict “business as usual” from the earliest days of Obama’s 1st term (and, possibly last if he keeps these people around).  My disappointments with our President have been well chronicled on these pages – if interested view the archive (I can’t believe I’m almost up to 300 posts) – but the reality is that he’s MUCH PREFERABLE to republicans, and he’s actually shown signs of “coming around” of late – better late than never.

Of course, not only do we have to put up with the democrats in the Senate, but so did Obama.  However, I just can’t bring myself to approve rewarding republicans for OBSTRUCTING every part of Obama’s agenda by voting them back into the majority as the punishment to democrats for being too passive.  In fact, based on what’s happened over the past two years, republicans should be voted out of enough of a minority in the Senate to prevent them from being able to block ANYTHING.  However, that last comment not being likely, I’m hoping for a continued democratic majority in the Senate and then the democrats removing Harry Reid from his position as majority leader (should he defeat Angle – I can’t believe it’s even possible that she would be a U.S. Senator).  With Reid out, maybe the dems could gather the courage to change the rules and either modify the filibuster provision or eliminate it completely.  With the Citizens United decision hanging over their heads the democrats need to take decisive action or they may end up being the party that is an afterthought when, by all rights, that role should fall to the republicans. 

If you haven’t figured out yet that the republicans have gained control of both the media and the courts just think first of the Citizens United decision and then secondly, think about if you heard or read ANYTHING about the demonstration in Washington last weekend by “progressives” which drew arguably a comparable or greater audience to the Glenn Beck “tea” fest on the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech on the Washington Mall?  When Beck’s crew was there and during the weeks before, that’s all we heard about.  I had to look around, but I found a picture of the crowd last weekend and it appeared to me to be every bit as large as Beck’s crowd – and, I only point this out for two reasons.  Again, almost NO ONE reported on it and secondly, for all the LIBERALS out there thinking about staying home because the dems are going to lose, MAKE SURE YOU VOTE.  And, I get the disappointment with Obama and the democrats (again, check my archives for the details) but, let me be clear; When I cast my democratic vote, I’ll be voting AGAINST republicans, not for democrats! 

If you are concerned about republicans taking over congress again and you’re reading this post – please tell someone else to make sure they vote.  And, if they’re disappointed in democrats, ask them to hold their noses and vote against the republicans like I’m going to do – trust that there’s a groundswell of people like me who are going to keep pushing for more progressive democrats – starting at the top with Obama.  If you don’t want to talk about it – email this post or something like it, to people who are on the fence and might not vote without a little prodding.  It really is time we “take back America,” and we need to take it back from the greedy corporate “heads” who are bankrolling these unsuspecting “tea partiers” so that their corporations can continue the pillaging of the American taxpayer in collusion with the republican party.