“We keep hearing fiscal conservatives claiming that the Republican Party is for smaller government, and call for the party to “get back to its roots.” But are the roots of the Republican Party small government? For that matter, have Republicans EVER been for smaller government? This video looks at the history of Republican presidents to answer that question.”
via Are Republicans Really for Smaller Government? – YouTube.
This just in:
Anti-global warming Sen. Inhofe formally endorses Perry
By NBC’s Carrie Dann
TULSA, Okla. — Sen. Jim Inhofe, a strident conservative voice in the Senate and a vocal skeptic of global warming, formally endorsed Gov. Rick Perry on Monday, calling him “the only guy who can really win this thing.”
“The one thing that he has that nobody else has is this background of experience, not just him being an administrator but doing the right thing, cutting down the deficit, increasing jobs. And he’s done everything right,” Inhofe said, adding, “No one out there running is as aware as to the cost of all the overregulation that we’re experiencing right now.”
Nah, seriously I was never going to vote for him anyway. As I’ve already said here before both directly and indirectly I think Rick Perry is arguably the worst candidate for President of the United States I have seen in my lifetime. I think his getting the endorsement from Inhofe, the lead climate change denier in congress, falls under the “why am I not surprised” category.
Some notes regarding Rick Perry’s records of accomplishments in his 26 years as a government employee in Texas and the so-called "Texas Miracle" he created as Governor. The emphasis on some of the items in the list is mine.
From:
LADIES AND GENTS… THE REAL RICK PERRY
[…]
The truth of the matter is that Texas actually lost 352,500 non-farm jobs since 2008 according to seasonally adjusted data over the past three years… and they lost 61,600 additional since March 2011 alone according to the Texas Workforce Commission.
The only “Miracle” is that this degenerate hasn’t yet been struck by lightning.
Texas standings against all 50 states on a variety of issues (1st means highest ranking, 50th means lowest ranking).
- State Aid Per Pupil in Average Daily Attendance – 47th
- Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT) Scores – 45th
- % of Population 25 and Older with High School Diploma – 50th (RTOL- No wonder 48% of the jobs Rick Perry claims credit for are minimum wage jobs!)
- High School Graduation Rate – 43rd
- Per Capita State Spending on State Arts Agencies – 43rd
- Birth Rate – 2nd
- Percent of Uninsured Children – 1st
- Percent of Children Living in Poverty – 4th
- Percent of Population Uninsured – 1st
- Percent of Non-Elderly Uninsured – 1st
- Percent of Low Income Population Covered by Medicaid – 49th
- Percent of Population with Employer-Based Health Insurance – 48th
- Total Health Expenditures as % of the Gross State Product – 43rd
- Per Capita State Spending on Mental Health – 50th
- Per Capita State Spending on Medicaid – 49th
- Health Care Expenditures per Capita – 44th
- Physicians per Capita – 42nd
- Registered Nurses per Capita – 44th
- Average Monthly Women, Infant, and Children (WIC) Benefits per Person – 47th
- Percent of Population Who Visit the Dentist – 46th
- Overall Birth Rate – 2nd
- Teenage Birth Rate – 7th
- Births to Unmarried Mothers – 17th
- Percent of Women with Pre-Term Birth – 9th
- Percent of Non-Elderly Women with Health Insurance – 50th
- Rate of Women Aged 40+ Who Receive Mammograms – 40th
- Cervical Cancer Rate – 11th
- Percent of Women with High Blood Pressure – 16th
- Percent of Pregnant Women Receiving Prenatal Care in First Trimester – 50th
- Women’s Voter Registration – 45th
- Women’s Voter Turnout – 49th
- Percent of Women Living in Poverty – 6th
- Mortgage Debt as Percent of Home Value – 47th
- Foreclosure Rates – 10th
- Median Net Worth of Households – 47th
- Average Credit Score – 49th
- Retirement Plan Participation – 47th
- Amount of Carbon Dioxide Emissions – 1st
- Amount of Volatile Organic Compounds Released into Air – 1st
- Amount of Toxic Chemicals Released into Water – 1st
- Amount of Recognized Cancer-Causing Carcinogens Released into Air – 1st
- Amount of Hazardous Waste Generated – 1st
- Amount of Toxic Chemicals Released into Air – 5th
- Amount of Recognized Cancer-Causing Carcinogens Released into Water – 7th
- Number of Hazardous Waste Sites on National Priority List – 7th
- Consumption of Energy per Capita – 5th
- Workers’ Compensation Coverage – 50th
- Income Inequality Between the Rich and the Poor – 9th
- Income Inequality Between the Rich and the Middle Class – 5th
- Homeowner’s Insurance Affordability – 46th
- Number of Executions – 1st
A stunning list of achievements huh?
In particular one article I read the other day that I found particulary good reading was from Texas Kaos: The Success of Rick Perry. In it we learn that Governor Rick Perry….
"….earned a D in The Principles of Economics while an undergraduate at Texas A&M University. As the Governor of Texas for the past ten years his so called fiscal conservative economic policies managed to rack up a $27 billion budget deficit."
"…His brilliance also lies in the Governor’s ability to fool voters by whipping them into frenzies about secession, bashing the "evil doing" government and by fomenting fear, unrest and anger over social wedge issues and culture wars that have absolutely nothing to do with the complex financial challenges that continue to undermine the U.S. economic security."
"…what on earth would a life long politician who never held a job outside politics know about U.S. and global defaults and credit ratings? After all Rick Perry himself ran his own state’s fiscal house into the ditch. And the Governor essentially outsourced his fiscal responsibilities and duties to the next legislative session. After the 2012 elections of course."
My thoughts at the end of this second week in August of the field of canidates for the Republican Presidental nomination.
From Living The Dream | The Digital Cuttlefish.
August 13, 2011 at 11:11 am cuttlefish
Look at the fearless Republican candidates
Telling the people their comfortable lies
Magical thinking, revisionist history,
Alternate versions as seen through their eyesCompromise seen as a sign of your weakness,
No one admits to his previous deals
Matching the facts is completely irrelevant
Truth is determined by how a thing feelsLying is raised to an art or a science
The bigger, the better, or that’s how it seems
People are frightened by too much reality
Better to peddle them beautiful dreamsThere in the crowds, cotton candy surrounds them,
Melting away into sugary air
Sweet little nothings, political promises
Served by the ton at the Iowa Fair.In the New York Times, an editorial, “Magical Unrealism“, examining the antics of not the extremists, but the putative center of the Republican party. It’s one thing when the wingnut faction lives in fantasy land; it’s quite another when the mainstream is building castles in clouds.
Believe it or not I describe myself as Free Thinking Secular Humanist Kenysian Rockefeller Republican. As a very very young kid I can recall a conversation with my dad who was a die-hard Rockefeller Republican and activly worked in Republican state & local politices about the John Birch Society and while I don’t recall what exactly he said to me about them the lasting imppression I have had all my life was that they were wacko right wing extremists and outside of mainstream Republican thinking….that is until now.
Looking back ten, twenty, thirty and forty years now I am so shocked at how far the Republican party has moved to the right and how they have now come to embrace the radical irrational revisionst extemists of the reactionary fringe,… the Tea Party and even worse the Tea Baggers.
On the news today it was stunning to see that last night all 8 GOP candidates in the Ames, Iowa Republican primary debate would walk away from a 10 to 1 spending compromise deal with Democrats and the audience cheered the response!
Not at all willing to work with Democrats on a compromise deal these are not politicians and in my estimation they are not at a qualified to lead our coutnry. Each one of them (and I am sorry to say John Huntsman & Mit Romney joined the crowd) are uncompromising ideologues.
This country doesn’t need ideologues. This country doesn’t need any more seperation and division than it has right now. This country needs genuinne authentic stand-up honest leadership and while individually that group of Republican canidates may be able to lead a small group of uncompromising right wing ideologues they can’t, never should, and never will lead this great county of ours.
Matthew Yglesias wrote on this moment:
One can say that this was merely politicians playing to their base and some of them know better. And perhaps it was, but it’s extremely difficult to turn around and break a promise like that. So you have the entire Republican Party committed to the view not only that tax increases are undesirable, but that it’s unthinkable to include even small increases in a bipartisan bargain for large spending cuts. In a normal country, that would be an extreme and strange position to take, but I’m not sure it would be a damaging one. The question, after all, would simply be whether such an extreme party can or can’t win a governing majority. If it couldn’t, its weird views would be irrelevant. If it could, then it would deserve congratulations and good luck in its effort to implement an all-cut agenda. But by a series of odd quirks of fate, the Republican Party exercises substantial influence over budget outcomes even if it mostly loses elections. So as long as they stick to this view, it will be neither possible to raise taxes nor to substantially reform major spending programs.
Standard and Poor’s work may be shoddy, but it hardly strikes me as an insane conclusion that this is not the soundest political culture in the world.
Rationally thinking Republicans should feel let down if not outright eembarrassed and ashamed by that sad grouping.
I couldn’t agree anymore with this had I written it myself.
…Never in my lifetime has the Republican Party nomination process involved so many divisive figures, second-rate figures and genuine loons, nor evoked such a lack of broadly shared enthusiasm for any one candidate. In short, the Republican Party today is reminiscent of the Democratic Party of the early 1970s, and that’s a huge edge for President Obama no matter which Republican nominee he faces in 2012.
Mitt Romney needs a new wrap for his campaign bus (does he have a bus?)
Arraugh,…That’s gonna leave a mark.
How big a mark? Rachel Maddow tells us hoow and I will add it here as soon as it comes online.
News Worth Reading:
We’re Just Not That Into You
After years on the rocks, Wall Street is ready to break up with the GOP.
DAVID CALLAHAN | August 11, 2011
For more than a century, big business has counted on the Republican Party to do its bidding in Washington. Given recent debates over taxes and regulation—in which GOP lawmakers have catered to corporate interests—it might seem that not much has changed.
The past few weeks, though, show that everything has changed. Today’s Republican Party is turning out to be the worst friend business could imagine, led by politicians who don’t understand the modern economy, and, worse, are ready to blow it up on principle.
This spring, as a GOP beholden to the Tea Party geared up for brinksmanship on the debt ceiling, lobbyists for Wall Street and corporations begged Republican leaders to back off. These pleas were ignored, and now a few trillion dollars in shareholder equity, wealth owned primarily by the top 10 percent of the richest Americans and corporate executives, has gone poof.
I am fairly confident Rick Perry is going to to take a run at being the Republican nominee for President. But if anyone ever thought Barak Obama had a ‘Pastor Problem‘ that is nothing compared to the witches brew truck load of kooks Rick Perry is associating himself with through his ‘Response: Day of Prayer’ event that I wrote about in my post A Day of Prayer In Texas To Solve Our Nations Problems???
Rachel Maddow has given us a good great video look at some of the personalities Rick Perry is aligning himself with:
Here are some of my own observations:
— The evangelical Mike Bickle has proclaimed that Oprah Is a Forerunner Of The Antichrist, one of the principal “pastors” of the “Harlot Babylon,” which he says is the precursor to the coming of the Antichrist. And not wanting to leave it at that Bickle jumps into the anti-gay barrel too by saying marriage equality Is "Rooted In The Depths Of Hell" (Gay Marriage Is From Hell).
— The racist and anti-gay gasbag Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association wants to exclude Muslims from military service, says the 1st Amendment only applies to Christians (excluding muslims & Jews and I would think Agnostics & atheists too), wants to ban the building of any mosques in the USA, believes that Hitler formed the Nazi party in a ‘Gay Bar" with other homosexual thugs, and that ‘Gay rights and religious liberties cannot coexist, and that Native Americans deserved to be killed and forced out of their lands during American expansion because they didn’t all convert to Christianity and until they do can’t be considered full-fledged American citizens, and I am sure there is more.
— C. Peter Wagner of Global Harvest Ministries believes that the nation of Japan is controlled by a demon spirit (The Sun Goddess) because the Emperor had sexual intercourse with her and sex with demons brought down the Japanese stock market (C. Peter Wagner: Japan Is Cursed Because The Emperor Had Sex With A Demon), hmmmnnn, yeah that makes a lot of good economic sense. He also believes that "Catholic saints bring honor to the spirits of darkness" and he has promoted the burning of Catholic statues of saints as well as the sacred objects of Mormons and Native Americans too.
— The ‘Christian Zionist‘ anti-Catholic bigot John Hagee has a good part of his career proclaiming that the Catholic Church is the "whore of Babylon." Of Jews who Hagee has called "poisoned" and "spiritually blind " he has said: "It was the disobedience and rebellion of the Jews, God’s chosen people, to their covenantal responsibility to serve only the one true God, Jehovah, that gave rise to the opposition and persecution that they experienced beginning in Canaan and continuing to this very day… Their own rebellion had birthed the seed of antisemitism that would arise and bring destruction to them for centuries to come…. it rises from the judgment of God upon his rebellious chosen people." Lurking prominently behind his supposed pro-israel Zionism are his beliefs that Hitler was sent by God to force Jews to return to the Holy Land (God Sent Hitler) and that if Israel will just bomb Iran we can get on with the war of the Tribulations and get on with the end times. Yeah! I can’t wait!!
— A kook I never even heard of before until I started looking into all this named John Benefiel claims that Homosexuality Is An Illuminati Conspiracy. It’s not enough that he believes in the modern day mythical creation of Dan Brown and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider Illuminati he is sure (I guess he has evidence) that these so-called Illuminati have "stated it as their goal…to limit the world population to no more than 500 million." Benefiel has also told us that The Statue Of Liberty Is A ‘Demonic Idol‘ too. A ‘Demonic Idol,’ geez,…I mean just where do these guys come up with this crap?
In addition to having to deal with and answer questions on the absurd idea that we can solve our most difficult national problems through prayer one has to ask does Rick Perry have a wacko Pastor Problem too?
I think he does.
Can you imagine a President of the United States that calls on kooks like these for spiritual counsel?
I have to wonder just what Newt Gingrich is really thinking . This is a guy I always managed to respect and admire even while i disagreed with him and his policies but with his over the top over reaction to the Sherry Sherod case, his over the top irrational response to the near ground zero Islamic mosque cultural center and now this naked "racial animus" (David Frum’s phrase) he’ jumped the shark and needs to be thrown in the same pile as some of the other irrational crazies and paranoid lunatics on the right such Michelle Bachman and worthless pandering players such as Sarah Palin.
Just what did Gingrich do? I’ll refer you to David Frum’s article: Gingrich: Obama Wants Whitey’s Money for an explanation of the depth of the absurdity of Gingrich (and D’Souza’s cover story in Forbes which Gingrich was affirming).
A couple of years ago here I published a short list of Conservatives I Like (but don’t necessarily agree with) and Therefore Listen To, Gingrich has managed to strike himself off that list.
For more on Gingrich and D’Souza you might also want to read:
I’m sure there will be more on this over the coming week or two.
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