The state Supreme Court Thursday ordered Governor Mark Sanford to accept $700 million in disputed stimulus money included in the state budget. [...] The writ was included in a 5-0 ruling in favor of school administrators and two South Carolina students who went up against Gov. Sanford in court. [...] The anti-bailout governor refused to take the cash even after legislators passed a budget requiring him to do so.
In response to the ruling, Sanford said the state has "a fundamentally flawed governmental structure that impedes and hurts progress in the state."
Fundamentally flawed!? As in "checks and balances" between the 3 branches of government? As in the same structure of the US Constitution?
He doesn't want to be governor, or president, he wants to be king!
Of pots, kettles and degrees of blackness John McSame would have done well to keep his mouth shut about Barack Obama not flying off to Iraq for a whirlwind shopping trip and some of the finest Kabuki Theater found outside Japan every time the wind blows. Well, it turns out that he has been remiss in a duty right here at home! Prior to last month's stroll through the Lower Ninth Ward, he had been to the Gulf Coast exactly once since the day Katrina made landfall. By contrast, Obama has visited the region five times. Mapquest says it is only 1089.87 miles between Washington DC and New Orleans, and it is not necessary for a visiting potentate to be escorted on a stroll by a full company of armed soldiers, three Blackhawk helicopters and two apache gunships to make sure the potentate stays safe. And by not monkeywrenching operations in a war zone six soldiers didn't get dead on any of the five trips that Obama has made to New Orleans. Not only has McShame been aWol in NOLA, he has failed to vote for reconstruction because it might saddle the future with debt, but the old hypocrite supports the occupation of Iraq - the single biggest expense and burden upon the backs of our grandchildren - without fail.
John McCain believes the current force structure and power vacuum persisting in many areas of the country demands a more robust counterinsurgency strategy. Iraqi and American forces must not only use force to clear areas occupied by insurgents but to stay and hold these areas to deny them as a base for insurgent forces and allow economic and political development to occur in a secure environment.
With all the upheaval and uncertainty in the music world, L.A. remains the center of the recording studio world. And we have here the best suppliers of equipment to the music and recording world. One of them is West L.A. Music. I've only spent personal money there, on a few fun things for me, but I've steered a lot of clients there over the years.
I'm also on their mailing list, and today I got a disturbing email from them:
News from West L.A. Music
We thought you would like to read this very inspiring speech by Gov. Mike Huckabee, on the importance of music and arts education. Please forward this to your friends and business associates who are interested in supporting music and the arts. Don Griffin, President, West L.A. Music, Inc.
How do you nurture something as elusive as creativity? You can't teach it the way you do state capitals and multiplication tables. You and I know how - by offering art and music to all of our students, all the way through school. So the secret weapons for becoming competitive and creative are art and music, our "weapons of mass instruction." Yet when school budgets are cut, too often it's art and music that end up on the chopping block. They say we can't afford to have them. I say we can't afford not to!
There's more. The email ends with a link to Huckabee's web site.
The 'speech' is a riff on Huckabee's position on education found here. And like a lot of his positions, it sounds good until you really look at it. And one of the telling points is here:
Without school arts programs, their gifts might remain "buried treasure," lost to them and all of us. Others will end up in jobs that may not be arts-related or make them feel especially important. But for them the opportunity to play guitar at church on Sunday . . . (my emphasis)
Right. At church. On Sunday. Before I criticize, I've played guitar at a church on many Sundays, so I have no beef with that. It's that Huckabee is a Dominionist, as Ellroon has written here before.
I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it’s a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that’s what we need to do — is to amend the Constitution so it’s in God’s standards rather than try to change God’s standards so it lines up with some contemporary view of how we treat each other and how we treat the family.
What if your God isn't Mike's? Too bad. That that speech isn't enough to send real conservatives running for the door . . . oh wait, many of them have.
He also is a 2nd Amendment absolutist who strangely felt compelled to support Wayne Dumond:
As governor of Arkansas, Mike Huckabee aggressively pushed for the early release of a convicted rapist despite being warned by numerous other women that the convict had sexually assaulted them or their family members, and would likely strike again. The convict went on to rape and murder at least one other woman.
His tax plan is insane. Even The Economist, hardly a hot-bed of liberal thought, thinks so:
Mr Huckabee's tax plan is as radical as it is ill-thought out. To achieve a populist goal—abolishing income tax—he proposes a federal sales tax. To make up for lost revenue, it would have to be a stiff one, and levied on practically everything. Mr Huckabee says a rate of 23% would suffice, but this is a sleight of hand. Calculated the way sales taxes usually are, the rate would have to be at least 30% and possibly much higher. This would be horribly regressive. Mr Huckabee says he can solve that problem by giving monthly rebate cheques to those who need them. But to track Americans' income month by month would require a bureaucracy nearly as intrusive as the one Mr Huckabee hopes to abolish by repealing the income tax. The plan is a non-starter.
And he lies about his own tax record in Arkansas, according to Fact Check:
The former Arkansas governor is fond of saying – in debates, on his Web site and in that Nov. 18 Fox News interview – that he cut taxes "almost 94 times in my state." (On his site, he rounds up to "nearly 100 times," adding that he saved "the people of Arkansas almost $380 million.")
That turns out to be far from the whole story. The Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration found that 90 tax cuts were enacted in legislative sessions from 1997 through 2005, while Huckabee was governor, and those cuts reduced tax revenues by $378 million. But Huckabee fails to mention the 21 tax increases that occurred under his watch and that raised revenues by substantially more. The total net tax increase under Huckabee's tenure was an estimated $505.1 million, says the Department of Finance and Administration's Whitney McLaughlin, adding that the figure has been adjusted for inflation.
Huckabee is a nice guy who believes in his own religiosity, and has crackpot ideas about governance. And while I applaud his ideas about the arts, a Huckabee Presidency would do nothing about them. Why? Because Arts have been on the Right-wing hit list since Nixon, and the Reagan admnistration finished off any hint of support for Arts in schools nationwide.
West L.A. Music has run ads for years showing some celebrity musician shopping their store: "Here's West L.A. Salesperson with (insert name here)." I wonder how many of them might be Huckabee supporters. Let's see:
Snoop Dog? Nah.
Tom "Rage Agains The Machine" Morello? Not likely.
I think the radical view is to say that we’re going to change the definition of marriage so that it can mean two men, two women, a man and three women, a man and a child, a man and animal. Again, once we change the definition, the door is open to change it again. I think the radical position is to make a change in what’s been historic.
In other world, your relationship is the equivalent of bestiality.
Personal beliefs are fine, and I don't criticize anyone's faith. But I do criticize this, taken straight from Huckabee's web site:
My faith is my life - it defines me. My faith doesn't influence my decisions, it drives them.
That's really great, Mike. Thing is, the Constitution says in Article 6:
[N]o religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.
And Thomas Jefferson, principle architect of the Constitution said:
Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his god, [the people, in the 1st Amendment,] declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state.
Bottom line, this is enough to disqualify you from being considered as a President. Factored in with your Right-wing ideas and agenda, it makes you clearly outside the mainstream of this country.
In New Hampshire this morning on the teevee, John McCain was climbing into GWBush's pants pockets for warmth as he again embraced the wonderful Iraq war and recent surge. From GottaLaff's notes at Cliff Shecter's place:
On Bush: I criticize him but we haven't had another attack since 9/11. "He unites us."
On Iraq and his 100-year remark: "If Americans aren't dying" it's fine to stay in Iraq. "It's not American presence, it's American casualties" that bother Americans. Tim: So permanent bases are acceptable? McP: "If necessary." Re, the surge: "I was right."
On voting to authorize the war: Hussein was still a threat, U.S. planes were shot at every day [here's why]. "It wasn't whether we went in, my friend, it was how it was handled." I'd still go in. "The 'war', the mission was not a mistake. The handling was a mistake."
Yet according to CNN:
Iraq emerged as the single biggest issue of concern to GOP primary voters, with 29 percent identifying it as such. It was followed by the economy (13 percent); health care (9 percent); foreign policy (6 percent); and immigration (5 percent).
So how's that working for you, Sen. McCain?
The entire right wing of the Republican Party tore American politics apart starting in '94 with the Gingrich-driven "Contract for America". The dislike of the Republicans and fearless leader GWBush has risen to epic proportions as the party has steered itself ever rightward toward endless war and totalitarianism. Sensible people, when clearly lost, would attempt to find a way back to the center, if for no other craven reason than to attract more voters.
Yet the party, represented by sensible, serious, and well-liked McCain, still rushes to embrace the iceberg that has crippled their Titanic. To continue that nautical metaphor (sorry to poach your domain, Sailor!), I hope they're prepared to go down with the ship.
[...] Mr. Huckabee had a rough time yesterday at the hands of the media when he announced he was canceling a negative ad against Mitt Romney and then showed the ad to the assembled reporters, who burst out laughing. Today, he turned the tables. He noted that the mainstream media might be “filing a bad story” right now, and if the bloggers were relying on the same wireless system at the hotel, they might be “clogging up the lines” and preventing them from filing.
If that’s the case, “thank you,” he said. “You’re doing the Lord’s work.”
CRESTON, Iowa (AP) -- Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson says there's not a woman who should be president next year. ... Without saying Hillary Clinton's name, he said -- quote -- "There is no woman on the horizon that ought to be president next year, let's all agree on that."
Ah, but since there is only one woman running for American president this year, I think we can all guess who he is referring to.
Frankly, I'm not a fan of Clinton's...Irrespective of the provenance of her spauldings, they're sunk deeper into corporate pockets than some might suspect.
That being said, I have a large problem with gender barriers as they pertain to people's lives, and those who create and use them as a divisive stratagem.
When I was in Rock And Roll High School (Shoephone, holla!), the fastest way to get my negative attention was to disparage someone's abilities or potential career track because '...they were a girl '.
Land sakes did that cause a botheration, because Mama darkblack didn't raise little piglets...She worked her ass off for tie-sniffing chauvinists and bounced her nose against more than a few glass ceilings so that I could eat under a roof with the heat on.
Accordingly, women will never be less than an equal to me then, now, and forevermore.
So what's the deal, Thompson? You think little girlies ought to mind their place and their man?
Two words, Flipper...One rhymes with 'truck', and the other is you.
Doesn't it mine a richer vein of irony that one 'leading candidate' endorses a failed foreign policy as a stratagem to outflank his opponent who holds no real foreign policy ideas, merely because he cannot steal the threadbare credibility that the other's religious faith gives him among a minor segment of the voting population...And thus, he must adopt a stance that has garnered collapsing respect at home and even less credibility abroad, merely to provide 'contrast' for the credulous voters.
How sublimely unclever. One gets the sense that if sufficiently provoked through fear or greed that these empty vessels might say and do anything that could filch them the slim advantage necessary to eke out their brittle triumph over the other punchinellos in the right-wing electoral circus.
And all for naught, I suspect...the final raid on the henhouse of international goodwill by the glassy-eyed predators of profit that has climaxed in this decade is drawing to a close, with pardons and protections to come for all the participants as a last defiant act before the taxi to the terminal zone arrives.
Now, these unfortunate tidings might portend (to the cogent among us) an increased need for, if not outright benevolence, then at minimum a effort at comity of nations formed from the rest of the world towards America while the Great Repair commences...Yet these inconvenient realities are discarded out of hand by happy-faced gladhanders in order to maintain some fiction for the jingo-jangling yahoos that the beloved assymetrical hegemony of the last two decades might continue apace, with no commercial breaks.
What a sharp surprise awaits...Nothing like the smell of fresh-baked humble pie in the morning of America, eh, Aunt Bee?
The current Right-wing position vis-a-vis the crop of Presidential wannabees is that they need another Reagan. Because he was so, you know, big and tough and strong and the Daddy some of them never had.
The continual deification of this flawed man amazes me. While I'm sure he was a nice Daddy (not sure what Patti Davis thinks about this), he was a simple-minded man who saw things as pretty black and white. And while that may be a good trait for a school crossing guard, a President needs more nuanced thinking.
Young Ezra Klein has a pretty good take on this topic:
You can't denigrate Reagan because he no longer exists. There's only Robo-Reagan, the better, stronger, faster, more conservative president that the Right has retroactively constructed and forced into the history books. But Reagan's flaws and shortcomings weren't necessarily his fault: You have to do something about immigration, and that will require some sort of earned amnesty for the 12 million undocumented immigrants living in the states. You can't outlaw abortion. You can't outlaw tax increases, of which Reagan passed many. You can't gut Social Security, which he tried, and failed, to do. Hardline conservatism just isn't very popular. Policy problems have their own logic, and their own demands. The Republican Base is demanding fealty to a platform that even Reagan, for all his formidable political gifts and advantages, couldn't hew to. His would-be successors, in office, will do no better.
(Emphasis mine)
Indeed.
Keep in mind that this Champion of Liberty™ spoke in favor of repealing the 22nd Amendment:
Reagan himself seemed to warm up to the idea in 1987, telling an interviewer that he’d support an effort to repeal the 22nd Amendment for his successors so Americans would be free to “vote for someone as often as they want to do.” Though the Iran-Contra scandal had already damaged Reagan’s reputation, and Alzheimer’s symptoms were slowly becoming apparent, a group called Project ‘88 formed to try and change the law to allow for Reagan’s second re-election effort.
Swell. There's some great leadership to remember. The man whose brain was already becoming Swiss cheese by the end of his 2nd term of office supported the ability to run for a 3rd term.
Another case of Right-wing idolatry and revisionist history: If the past wasn't good enough, try it again.
Here's a wonderful Frederick of Hollywood campaign ad, as imagined by Heada'State.com's Andrew Arnold:
Comedy gold from the Tennessee Stud, who should spend more time, you know, studying the issues:
Mr. Thompson at times seemed to be looking for his sea legs. In an interview with Kay Henderson of Radio Iowa today, in talking about Iran, he referred to the “Soviet Union and China.” (Ms. Henderson, at the end of her blog post on the exchange, wrote: “No, I did not mistype. Thompson said Soviet Union rather than Russia.”)
On the first day of his visit here, he attacked the Medicare prescription drug plan signed into law by Mr. Bush in 2003 as too costly. That bill that was “written and championed by Iowa’s popular Republican Senator Charles Grassley,” as was tartly noted in a front-page article in The Des Moines Register, referring to the senator whom all the Republican presidential candidates are assiduously courting for an endorsement.
Good grief! This is a serious candidate? We can only hope the Republicans pick him.
