Showing posts with label PoliticusUSA. Show all posts

Sunday, January 15, 2017

Quit mocking Trump

The Dangers of a Petulant President

Geopolitical reality getting under the thin skin of a geopolitical reality

When MeanMesa uses the term "geopolitical reality," it includes many aspects of "reality."

Naturally, it clearly refers to international relations between the US and other nations -- all of them. There are wars underway, here and there, but there are also somewhat "sweeter" sides to the civilized interplay this country conducts with diplomatic partners, international competitors, close friends and those cases where, for some reason, relations are more hostile.

President Trump, seen now to be very visibly suffering from some psychological affliction with origins arising from both the hyper sensitivity of psychotic narcissism and crushingly low self-esteem, is relentlessly gutting the inertia of all these previously rational policies and practises. He has implanted a horde of self-serving racists, opportunists, lobbyists and ideologues in every possible "nook and cranny" of the White House, and he has ruthlessly "cleansed" the entire existing collection of US ambassadorships around the globe.

Believe me.

Of course, such a course is quite dangerous. The political price his action will reap is going to be shockingly wide and deep. As the economy, barely back on its feet following the last Republican looting spree in 2008, falters, it will -- inevitably -- become "war time," once again. With the White House crippled by an infestation of old FOX News anchors filling the roles of actual policy makers, failed and disgraced generals in control of the Departments of Defense AND Homeland Security and campaign donors -- freshly "recycled" from their fetid hedge fund offices, hate radio studios and rancid think tanks -- sitting in US embassies around the planet, we should be prepared from some amazing diplomatic and military disasters.

George W. Bush is breathing a sigh of relief. He was afraid that he was going to die locked under the moniker of being the "worst President in history."

The Behavior of a "Petulant Oval Office"

We can see the first evidence even before the "Inauguration."

Among all the unsettling Tweets and the frightening collapse of competence in national security issues, we have an opportunity to see this part of the President-elect's tragically debilitating psychosis in action.

Vengeance on the "Crooked" Media

Yes, that would be the same crooked media

that elected him -- for free.

President-elect Donald Trump has Tweeted gaseous, impotent "messages/orders" to the GOP "Congressional committees" to "investigate" NBC News, the media entity which more or less innocently publicized damaging details from the current President's report on Russian Federation intervention in the latest election. Just as is the case with the President-elect's flippant derision of the intelligence community, such an attack on the industrial media is a very reckless gambit for The Donald. NBC will not magically become "controllable" when Trump is Inaugurated or at any time in the foreseeable future afterward. The other corporate media interests are watching -- and learning. The networks will remain an "existential threat" to the Trump Administration for its duration. All of the corporate "alphabet news" entities have the resources to accomplish this, not just once, but in an almost perpetual, gnawing fashion.

For this reason MeanMesa predicts that America's televisions will become a "knife stuck in Donald Trump's neck." The insertion and twisting of this "knife" will not be particularly lackadaisical. Both the intelligence industry and the "news" industry have "long memories" and very little "good natured forbearance" which might somehow limit their reaction to Presidential threats.

From Way Up Here Political Opponents are "Enemies" and

"Little People" either don't actually exist or don't really matter.

The stifling limits to understanding almost inevitably caused by the plutocratic "private education" which formed Trump during his adolescence is only now emerging in the President-elect's comportment. Granted, the campaign "con" was sufficient to line up a hefty collection of "lost souls" who had previously been considered "too rustic" for a warm welcome in GOP circles. For the feeble minded, conveniently distracted and heavily conflicted "news analysts" appraising this arcane style of "hit or miss populism" [their term -- not Meanmesa's] for their network audiences, there was an unsteady, intermittent, very faintly hopeful hint that a Trump Presidency would embrace working class priorities.

After all, the Democrats had left the "position" wide open.

Already being a multi-millionaire the second Trump cleared his mother's uterus, he has serious difficulty relating to "little people" and other "nobodies" -- not to mention women who fail to be "tens." This is the case with such folks in the US, but it extends to citizens inhabiting the rest of the planet, also.

His tragic lack of understanding the life conditions and priorities of people in foreign countries is not entirely a fault of his education, but, more likely, the predictable result of a lack of common curiosity -- a common symptom of extreme cases of narcissism. This lack of "depth" has also left Trump with the basic psychology of "extreme exclusivity." He thinks that billionaires and high government officials are the only foreigners requiring his "executive touch" in relations with other countries.

History has seen this before. In the European wars of Dark Ages Christianity,the kings and nobility considered the common people in their realms to be utterly expendable and "doomed by their station" to be unquestioning recipients of complete neglect.

Trump's High Maintenance Friendship With the Russian Federation:

Over Estimating the Tenderness of a Suspiciously Fast, Eager Friendship and the Heartfelt Affection of the Truly Needy

So far as effective "dirty tricks" are concerned, The Donald has benefited much more from his Kremlin Connection than he has from all the amateur "dirty tricksters" inhabiting his US clown car entourage. To the point, Trump has already begun his involuntary weekly payments of "political capital" for his awkward, self-destructive petulance and the resulting, unavoidable embarrassment of having included such heavily soiled political creatures such as Chris Christie, Mike Pence, Jeffery Beauregard Sessions and Breitbart, plastic, "hate radio" denizens, Flint and Stephen Bannon in his Oval Office, 1950's "rat pack."

The chortling, corpse like, Rudy Guliani on FOX "spilling the beans" on Trump's shady political maneuvering with the New York FBI revealed a political machine as dysfunctional as its dysfunctional boss. Alarmingly, not even such a "screaming faux pax" seems to penetrate the gaseous arrogance currently inebriating the boisterous Trumpkins. Although irritating at the moment, MeanMesa expects this inauthentic ebullience to be painfully short lived for them.

A primary component of this temporary bliss derives from the promise of additional propaganda assistance from the Russians. During the campaign the GRU's semi-professional, yet obviously meat handed propaganda campaign's penetration exclusively targeted the low education, low information voters who swayed the election to Trump's favor. While this offered great utility prior to November, its effectiveness as a propaganda defense for the already faltering "Trump Administration" is, essentially, nil.

Thanks to such factors as the Obama sanctions for the Crimean annexation and US energy policies which truncated global oil prices, the Russian Federation finds itself in desperate straits. Intervening in the US election was an act of desperation if not out right panic. Had Clinton been seated in the Oval Office -- a quite reasonable speculation following her substantial majority in the November election -- the Russian Federation's extreme vulnerability would have materialized into a truly obnoxious cloud for the oligarchs surrounding the embattled Russian President.

The Russian Federation -- and, of course, Vladimir Putin -- made a "high stakes bet" by engaging in this wild political gambit to elect Trump. Of course they must be repaid, but more importantly, they have now fired their single bullet. There are no more Russian bullets in the quiver to assist President Trump during the inevitable collapse of his direly conflicted Presidency.

The Insurmountable Awkwardness of Being "Responsive"

to Supporters Still Uncertain About Why They Were Supporters

Trump supporters. Unbridled, patriotic enthusiasm. [image - BBC]

We have just witnessed the national election version of "revenge sex." Still, occupying a political office has traditionally included doing at least something for the voters who delivered one's support in the election.

With the Trump ascension this becomes awkward. All those "deplorables" who marched blindly to the polls in November are a little "different" from electoral demographics we have seen in the past.

They clearly want something, but neither MeanMesa nor Donald Trump is comfortably convinced that either of us know exactly what. Normally, there would be some sort of policy "promise" that emerged during the campaign. Unhappily, aside from building an over priced, ridiculously ineffective wall on the Southern border and sending Muslim immigrants back to where they came from, the Trump "prize bucket" remains embarrassingly empty of the cheap plastic policy trinkets -- "free bling" -- which might have, otherwise, been hauled back to the trailer park and inserted into mom's hope chest.

Trump supporters, effectively isolated from any "news" about actual conditions in the country, embraced the candidate with clouds of frighteningly undefined complaints -- most of which were carefully engineered for their consumption by the GRU. At this point all that is already history.

The important point now is, how can Trump -- as President -- "respond" to the chaotic cacophony of racism and terror among these folks who elected him? His electoral supporters won't have any idea whether or not he's "keeping campaign promises" -- especially not if such promises were in any way complicated.

Trump voters will continue to cheer no matter what outcome is incompetently delivered to them.

Why the Choice of the Term, "Mocked,"

By Trump's Press Secretary Is Important

Words matter. This particular word reveals Trump's "sensation"

of being widely criticized by Americans after his "election."

Trump’s Press Secretary Begs The American People To Stop Mocking Donald Trump

By Jason Easley on Sun, Jan 1st, 2017

[Visit the original article here/PoliticusUSA]

Trump's press secretary Sean Spicer went on national television to complain that the American people are mocking Donald Trump and called on every American to support the president-elect instead of mocking him.

Trump’s press secretary Sean Spicer went on national television to complain that the American people are mocking Donald Trump and called on every American to support the president-elect instead of mocking him.

Spicer was talking about Trump trying to take credit for jobs that were already announced when he claimed that the American people are mocking and undermining the president-elect.

So the idea is everyone wants to talk about the tweets he sent. But I would actually focus on the action he’s getting. Donald Trump is not president yet and he’s getting action, successes and wins, both abroad and here at home.

Everything he does right now, he gets — he speaks for the head of Sprint, gets 5,000 jobs moved from abroad. And everyone starts to mock him. Oh, those jobs were already announced. They weren’t. The sales jobs have been a previous announce. These jobs were coming from abroad to America.

And instead of trying to mock him or undermine him, it’s time that people started to give him credit for actually getting things done.

Trump is mocked because he isn’t getting anything done. The president-elect is taking credit for things that already happened, or the accomplishments of others. For example, Trump took credit for the good economic numbers in November despite the fact that the growing economy has nothing to do with him because he is not yet the president. Trump took credit for the horrible Carrier deal that Mike Pence negotiated, and Trump is trying to pass off the Sprint job announcement, which he had nothing to do with, as an accomplishment.”

President-elect Donald Trump’s Press Secretary was practically begging America to stop making fun of the incoming president. Trump isn’t going to find much popular support for his presidency because the majority of voters did not support him.

If Trump continues to act like a narcissistic and petty reality television star instead of a president, he is going to mocked.

One can only imagine the howls of laughter from Republicans if Obama’s press secretary would have gone on national television and complained about the American people making fun of him.

Trump isn’t even in office yet, but his team is demanding credit for things that they have not done, which is exactly why the American people will continue to mock the president-elect.

Words Matter

"Mocking" the President,

and "Winning" a Nomination Hearing

Even intentionally obscured psychology emerges in word choices.

First, the term, "mocking," corresponded to a very serious matter in Dark Ages Europe. The established nobility of the time was curiously sensitive to such utterances when they arose from the Plebeian class of "lesser folks." When "mocking" arose from the noble class, it often resulted in two of these head strong noblemen engaging in an overly dramatic, yet no less lethal, "duel" to protect the "honor" of the aggrieved.

A review of the history of the time reveals that these European noblemen had what is more modernly called a "zero tolerance" for serfs even briefly questioning what was considered to be the "Divine Right of Kings," that is, "mocking their betters." The policy worked well for a number of centuries until these same hungry peasants pulled out the guillotines and began to "get even."

Think of it as a social-cultural "correction." Also, remember that Donald Trump was already a multi-millionaire by the time his mother's pediatrician delivered the first, gentle swat to his bloody infant behind in a high class, private delivery room.

Donald Trump has been either a millionaire or a passably good con man every minute since then.

Secondly, Presidential cabinet appoints are approved by the Senate. Cabinet appointees don't "win" Senate approval. It is -- usually -- not some sort of arcane "contest" to be characterized as a "battle of will."

Unfortunately, The Donald sees this important process in precisely this light.

Fasten your seat belts. We're in for one hell of a ride.

Friday, January 6, 2017

A Practical Guide to Resisting Trump

The Americans are getting organized.

Watch this space.

Grassroots Anti-Trump Movement Spreading Like Wildfire Ahead Of Inauguration

By Sean Colarossi on Wed, Jan 4th, 2017 at 9:59 pm

"If a small minority in the Tea Party can stop President Obama, then we the majority can stop a petty tyrant named Trump."

Ahead of Donald Trump’s inauguration on Jan. 20, the grassroots movement to resist the president-elect is picking up steam and spreading across the country.

One group of activists even released a highly detailed guide with strategies on how to effectively oppose the incoming president and try to limit the threat he poses to the country.

The 26-page document, titled ‘Indivisible: A Practical Guide for Resisting Trump’, lays out a game plan for progressives and urges activists to give the Republicans who dominate D.C. a taste of their own medicine.

Monday, October 12, 2015

GOP Lies About Obama Deficits

Take It Easy on the Oligarchs

They're really frightened.

The billionaires have had to tranquilize their Congressmen.

These days the billionaires are "throwing plenty of spaghetti" against the walls to see if any will stick.

Some of this "spaghetti" -- frantically ladled from a particularly rancid pot -- smells even worse the the rest. Interestingly, amid the flames and smoke of the ill fated Benghazi Gambit and the terminally confusing Email Caper, the billionaires' "hate machine" has now taken desperate refuge in one of their old, favorite topics. Granted, their horrific "media thing" runs on tar and coal, but this time around, not even the strangely willing hill billies and bigots of the GOP base seem to be able to make sense out of what they have been commanded to believe.

Amazingly, the oligarchs have decided to once again begin "discussing" the Federal Budget deficit. And yes, someone's installed "rock concert" sized speakers on the Clown Car.

In the dismal absence of traction for any of the rest of their stuff, they've fired up their old lie machine. We all need to be familiar with the information presented in this POLITICUSUSA article so we'll be ready to engage in "political discourse" with our fellow citizens.

Obama Saves America From

Republican Failure

By Bringing Deficit Below 50 Year Average

By: Sarah Jones

Thursday, October 8th, 2015

This hat makes Republicans gag.[for photo and quoted article POLITICUSUSA]

“Big government and debt doubled under a Republican administration,” 2016 Republican presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul said. “And it’s now tripling under Barack Obama’s watch.”

Those are some scary words, and they feed the willfully ignorant frenzy driving Republicans to refuse to raise the debt ceiling. That and their failure to understand what the debt ceiling actually is.

As we head into yet another GOP shutdown showdown allegedly over Republicans unwillingness to pay off the debt they’ve already spent, it’s worth noting reality for a moment. The Congressional Budget Office put the deficit for the just ended fiscal year at 2.4% of GDP, below 50-year average, and also, 2015 was the sixth consecutive year in which the deficit declined as a percentage of GDP.

The federal government ran a budget deficit of $435 billion fiscal year 2015, CBO estimates—$48 billion less than the shortfall recorded in fiscal year 2014, and the smallest deficit recorded since 2007. Relative to the size of the economy, that deficit—at an estimated 2.4 percent of gross domestic product (GDP)—was slightly below the average experienced over the past 50 years, and 2015 was the sixth consecutive year in which the deficit declined as a percentage of GDP since peaking at 9.8 percent in 2009. By CBO’s estimate, revenues were about 8 percent higher and outlays were about 5 percent higher in 2015 than they were in the previous fiscal year. CBO’s deficit estimate is based on data from the Daily Treasury Statements; the Treasury Department will report the actual deficit for fiscal year 2015 later this month.

We can’t have an honest discussion about the deficit without noting that “the FY2009 federal deficit was running at a rate of $1.2 trillion on the day he (President Obama) took office in the midst of a financial crisis.”

Also, Factcheck continued (note this was written in 2014):

But a fact that may surprise Obama’s critics is that Obama’s spending increases have been historically modest — much smaller than his predecessor’s, and well below the rate of inflation. Federal spending in the current fiscal year, which ends this month, is running only 7.9 percent higher than it was when the president took office. This increase is well below the 12 percent rise in the Consumer Price Index, which we’ve mentioned.

…

But the spending increase under Obama would be even lower — only 5.9 percent — if we used the most recent estimate of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office from August 27. CBO puts the current year’s outlays at just over $3.5 trillion. The final, actual spending figures for this year should be announced sometime next month, and we’ll report on them in our next update.

And right when I was about to credit Republican austerity for some of this:

To be sure, some of the spending restraint has been forced on Obama by a Republican-controlled House of Representatives. Even so, the contrast with the Bush administration’s spending increases is quite dramatic. Federal outlays rose nearly 33 percent during the first four fiscal years for which Bush signed the appropriations bills (FY2002 – 2005) and rose again by another 34 percent during the next four fiscal years, even subtracting $203 billion from FY2009 to adjust for Obama’s additions that year.

PolitiFact checked Rand Paul’s claim and found “Quite a few readers asked us if the debt has tripled since Obama took office in January 2009. We took a look at the numbers, and it hasn’t. It’s increased about 1.7 times.”

Want to know how Rand Paul’s “office” justified his claim? Watch the shells move (my bold): “Looking at the whole statement — not just the second clause — Paul wasn’t saying the debt has tripled under Obama alone. Instead, he was saying that it doubled under President George W. Bush. And since Obama took office, it has risen to a point that is triple what it was when Bush first took office. By this measure, Paul’s statement is closer to accurate. Let’s go through the numbers.”

Jobless claims also fell to near a 42-year low today, after the Department of Labor released their update:

In the week ending October 3, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 263,000, a decrease of 13,000 from the previous week’s revised level. The previous week’s level was revised down by 1,000 from 277,000 to 276,000. The 4-week moving average was 267,500, a decrease of 3,000 from the previous week’s revised average. The previous week’s average was revised down by 250 from 270,750 to 270,500.

So what we have here is a President who has set historic records for continuous private sector job growth, has lowered spending increases dramatically – in fact they have been “historically modest”, and the deficit for the just ended fiscal year is at 2.4% of GDP, below 50-year average.

What’s it all mean? It means that President Obama is not the big spender Republicans make him out to be, unless they really want to blame him for picking up the tab for their 2007 financial crisis and the two unfunded wars they started and put on a credit card. So when Republicans talk about not raising the debt ceiling due to their objections to “spending”, not only is this irresponsible because the money has already been spent, but it’s irrational and ridiculous. For a big spender, see Obama’s predecessor – the entitled “decider”.

In other words, President Obama is the only adult in the room.

Sunday, August 2, 2015

State of Play - Citizens United 2016 Edition

The Billionaires Are Picking the Next President

Every voter has a price, right?

Happily, most of us have no appetite for bread or circuses.

MeanMesa at first began writing down the "featured" reporting in this PoliticusUSA article with the intention of creating another of the now famous Short Current Essays graphics. However, the more time that was spent on the body of the reporting, the clearer it became that the entire thing merited being posted on the blog. The formatting for points emphasized [red] has been added to the original content.

While Other Candidates Tap Millionaires, Sanders Campaign Is Fueled By Small Donations

By: Keith Brekhus

Saturday, August, 1st, 2015

[Emphasis added. Visit the PoliticusUSA site here.]

On Friday, campaign super PACs filed financial reports with the Federal Elections Commission (FEC), giving the public a more complete picture of which candidates are doing well and which ones are doing poorly in the fundraising race. The August 1st edition of The New York Times ran a piece showing how much money each candidate has raised, and it also included how much cash has been raised by super PACs supporting each candidate.

Presidential Candidate, Senator Bernie Sanders [I-VT]

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has raised 13.7 million dollars in total contributions, with 80. 7 percent of that money coming from donations of 200 dollars or less. For comparison, 19 percent of Hillary Clinton’s donations have been 200 dollars or less. Just 3.3 percent of Jeb Bush’s contributions have come from small donations.

Only retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson comes close to matching Sanders in his reliance on small donors to power his campaign. 80.2 percent of Carson’s money has come from donations of 200 dollars or less.

While those figures are from the actual campaigns themselves, the race for dollars among super PACs might be even more revealing. For example, over 95 percent of contributions to super PACs that support Texas Senator Ted Cruz have come from donations of one million dollars or more. Over 75 percent of super PAC funds in support of Mike Huckabee, Rick Perry and Marco Rubio have also come from contributions of a million dollars or greater.

For Hillary Clinton super PACs, the figure is 51.1 percent. By contrast, no pro-Sanders super PAC has received any donations exceeding a million dollars.

Thirty-one wealthy donors have given 1.1 million dollars or more to fund presidential candidates or pro-candidate super PACs. Each of those donors has funneled their money to Republicans, with Ted Cruz supporters Robert Mercer and Toby Neugebauer leading the charge. Each has donated more than ten million to support Cruz’s presidential bid.

While no individual has given over a million dollars to back any Democrat running for president, a handful of individuals have contributed exactly one million to help elect Hillary Clinton. Philanthropist George Soros and film director Steven Spielberg have each contributed a million dollars to help elect Hillary Clinton.

Since Bernie Sanders is explicitly taking on the “billionaire class,” it makes sense that his campaign would resonate with ordinary citizens, while failing to catch hold with the super wealthy. The fundraising reports released so far bear out what it probably obvious. Bernie Sanders campaign is a grassroots, people-powered movement, while most of the other campaigns are being backed by millionaires and billionaires.

What We Have To Do

The Message Which MUST Be Carried

The road weary talking point that "money has taken control" of the democracy turns out to be much more than mere idle filler for the current narrative. Hearing this popular lament on a radio or television show may be unsettling enough, but when some hard numbers are added to the story, what used to be a mild irritation should become chilling -- bone rattlingly chilling.

Much of contemporary ethics and juris prudence deals with election fraud as highly material instances of bribery, voter suppression, identity theft, extortion and so on. Such criminal acts are now no longer necessarily elements in the "main scheme" for manipulating US elections. However, the precise dilemma facing the democracy at this moment eludes indictment under those traditional provision thanks to its cleverly crafted nature.

Don't miss this point. Something inescapably stranger has replaced these more familiar, traditional types of electoral crimes, and that "something" is uniquely dangerous to the democracy because it is not particularly a violation of any statutory law. Let's look at this as a two part definition.

1. Pump huge amounts of money into PAC entities and use it for volumes of negative, psychological propaganda, and,

2. Isolate and develop an electoral demographic which can be targeted to listen to this negative advertising -- and believe it -- at least enough to materialize the propaganda's intended influence at the polls.

However brilliantly compelling this "two stage" argument might seem, it is, in fact, incomplete. MeanMesa suggests that two additional "stages" must be included, and they must be positioned before "number one." The completed list becomes:

1. Ruthlessly conduct psychological research to determine existing fears and desires -- or the means required to incite them -- in the targeted demographic.

2. Control the narrative entering into the thoughts of the targeted demographic to constantly reinforce the "vitality" of specific fears and desires which can then be manipulated for electoral advantage.

3. Pump huge amounts of money into PAC entities and use it for volumes of negative, psychological propaganda, and,

4. Isolate and develop an electoral demographic which can be targeted to listen to this negative advertising -- and believe it -- at least enough to materialize the propaganda's intended influence at the polls.

Plus, our billionaires are still solid.[image UCubed]

This post is about money. This is what MeanMesa sees that money doing. In a very troubling sense the problem with what that money is doing has more to do with why the voters in the lockstep thrall of the Republican base can be manipulated than with the banal machinations of the billionaires driving the process.

Amazingly, the zombie-like voters who continue to elect the folks the oligarchs send to run our government are demanding nothing beyond a quite economical dose of propaganda. Inside their minds everything seems to make some sort of urgent sense, but this state can only be sustained so long as the carefully crafted "psychological incitement" remains un-examined.

This "examination" represents the oligarchs' "Achilles heel." If the propagandized's blindly proffered credibility were to lapse -- even for a moment, the on-going billionaires' take-over scam would falter and collapse.

MeanMesa has proposed a couple of possible solutions in previous posts:

CASH TRACK - Lighting Up the Clown Car's Check Book

The Plan To Stop Red State Election Crimes

Friday, July 31, 2015

Mitch McConnell's Heartbreak

When Plans for the Oligarchy Hit a Snag

SOMEBODY forgot to bribe the Federal Court

MeanMesa encountered this extremely well written article from PoliticusUSA and thought it would be a "bright spot" for ending July. Please take a moment to read through the entire thing. Apparently Senator Mitch "the Chin" McConnell was unable to deliver the goods to the Owners of the Republican Party as quickly as the Kochs ordered.

MeanMesa's compliments to Rmuse and PoliticusUSA.

Federal Appeals Court Dealt

McConnell And the Kochs A Bad Day

By: Rmuse

Thursday, July, 30th, 2015

[Links enabled. Visit site here - PoliticusUSA]

In America’s extremely divisive political atmosphere, one that informs there are really two separate Americas, it is remarkable indeed that Americans on both sides of the political spectrum agree on at least one very important issue. One segment of the population pants for, and avidly supports, theocratic government, widespread poverty, white racial purity, and perpetual war against everyone, and yet curiously, even the inhumane religious bigot voting bloc (Republicans) that retain power due to corporate money believes there is just too much money, especially corporate money, in politics. For Republican politicians though, and their funding machine the Koch brothers, there can never be enough money to buy control of state and federal government.

Subsequently, after at least two Supreme Court Justices commingled, conspired, and

Brazen Kentucky Corruption -
Selling Democracy for Cheap [image]

colluded with the Koch brothers and an entity (Citizens United) over how to get more corporate money in politics, the High Court ruled for the Koch brothers, Citizens United, and now-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. The now-infamous Citizens United ruling fundamentally put control of America’s government up for sale to the highest bidder and no human being in America, except maybe the Koch brothers, was happier than Mitch McConnell.

Earlier this month, the media was relatively silent about a ruling in Washington that was likely the second worst day of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s 35-year political life. Nearly a year ago at a ‘secret’ Koch brother strategy meeting for billionaires buying shares in the Koch venture to control of the United States government, McConnell complained mercilessly that he was forced to vote on foolish things like minimum wage and unemployment insurance, and to get retribution against Democrats and satisfy the Koch brothers he pledged to “go after” and abolish most of the federal government, if not “all of it.” Of course Mitch thanked the Koch brothers for their support because without it McConnell and Republicans could not complete the task at hand. McConnell also shared an intimate, poignant moment regarding a personal tragedy he said was the “worst day of his 35-year political life; the day George W. Bush signed the McCain-Feingold campaign finance legislation into law.”

Now, if that was the worst day of his political life, a unanimous (11-0) ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington must be a close second. The Appellate Court ruled that the ban on federal campaign contributions by individuals who contract with the government is constitutional. The takeaway from the ruling, besides putting a damper on McConnell’s political life, is that regardless the push by the Koch-Republicans and two horrendous rulings by Koch acolytes on the Supreme Court, 11 appellate judges firmly believe there is too much money in politics and that more “can be a very bad thing.” Mitch McConnell believes otherwise despite polling after polling revealing that an overwhelming 85 percent of Americans believe that political campaign financing needs at the very least “fundamental changes,” or better yet “a complete overhaul.” However, Republicans have an innate following the will of the people, or the Constitution for that matter, and in that spirit McConnell and Republicans are conniving to gut more from campaign finance laws to expedite the Koch brothers’ purchase and control of state and federal government.

After the 1974 Watergate scandal, Congress passed a law establishing limits on how much money people could give and how much politicians could spend on their campaigns; it also “mandated” disclosure to ensure that regular citizens could “follow the money.” The High Court eviscerated 1974 law immediately by eliminating campaign spending limits in Buckley v. Valeo; that ruling started the “fundraising arms race” the wealthy are winning and to ensure total victory, the Koch Supreme Court wiped out the rest of Buckley, and Citizens United and McCutcheon v. FEC allowed corporations to spend unlimited money directly and voided individual aggregate contribution limits; all in the name of “freedom of speech.” Apparently, the High Court’s Koch surrogates ruled according to the phrase “money talks,” and since the Kochs and corporations have lots of money, they get lots of “free speech” to buy government.

Despite the Koch Court wiping out campaign finance regulations, there was one particular rule that Mitch McConnell was unable to eliminate last year. McConnell waited until the eleventh hour of a must pass spending bill to insert a provision that “relaxed” campaign finance coordination between candidates and political parties. Having failed to enact a provision that would consolidate power within party committees that raise money for House and Senate candidates, McConnell snuck the same “campaign finance reform” in the completely unrelated fiscal 2016 Financial Services spending bill due by this Friday. McConnell, and the Koch brothers, lust to enact into law, abolish more campaign finance regulations before the 2016 general election season fully gets underway. Apparently the Kochs, who are rumored to have pledged upwards of a billion dollars to buy all three branches of government, want all campaign finance regulations abolished to buy the government in 2016 and end their costly crusade to own America. With an owned and operated acolyte like McConnell, who also wants campaign finance rules eliminated, the Kochs are closing in on their vision of America without campaign finance regulations to hasten achieving their bigger goal of abolishing the Federal Elections Commission along with free and fair elections. It is exactly what a fascist dictator would do and a means for the Koch brothers to repay Republican Mitch McConnell with the greatest day of his 35-year political life.

Although the Appellate Court’s ruling will be appealed to the Supreme Court for the Koch brothers to overturn with extreme “free speech” prejudice, it was encouraging that eleven federal judges unanimously decided that there can be too much money in politics. However, that hopefulness has to be tempered with despair that the ruling did not, in any conceivable way, threaten Citizens United or the Kochs’ progress in buying government. It just temporarily kept in place the ban on federal campaign contributions “by individuals” who contract with the government; there is no ban on companies, corporations, the Koch brothers, oil industry, Wall Street, and defense industry, or Republicans would cease to exist as a political power and Mitch McConnell would know what “the worst day of his political life” really feels like.

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

GOP Congress Attacks the Disabled and Children

Bernie Sanders Exposes Republican Plot

To Cut Social Security For 11 Million Disabled People

by Jason Easley

January 12, 2015

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is warning that Republicans are plotting to cut Social Security benefits for 11 million disabled Americans through a rule change that would make it more difficult to fund the disability account.

In a statement, Sen. Sanders explained what the House rules change will mean for disabled Americans who depend on Social Security:

Senator Bernie Sanders [V-I]

“Around 11 million Americans, including nearly 2 million children with a disabled parent, rely on Social Security to help keep them out of poverty,” said Sanders, the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee.

A new House rule creates a legal obstacle course that would make it harder to shift funds from the Social Security retirement account, which has a big surplus, to the smaller disability account. Such transfers have been done routinely in the past under both Republican and Democratic presidencies, including four times under President Ronald Reagan.

Without a transfer to shore up the disability fund, Social Security Administration experts say the disability program will run short of money next year, and there will be only enough to cover 80 percent of scheduled benefits.

“Instead of working to strengthen Social Security for all, the House Republicans’ new rule puts America’s most vulnerable at risk,” Sanders said.

The rule change is a part of a Republican effort to kill Social Security. If the disability fund can’t be replenished, Benefits will have to be cut, and some of the most economically vulnerable people in our society will be pushed deeper into poverty.According to experts, the problem with the Social Security disability cash assistance programs is that it limits the earnings of disabled individuals to just above the poverty line. This creates a trap that makes it impossible for individuals who can’t work to escape poverty.

The ideal solution would be the exact opposite of what Republicans are trying to do. Instead of cutting benefits, lawmakers should raise the income limit, so that disabled individuals can keep their benefits while also possessing an avenue to potentially escape poverty.

The Republican rule change that would lead to more benefits cuts will only push millions of Americans with no source of income further into poverty. House Republicans are repeating a pattern of attacking those who most need assistance. Since they have taken over the majority, Republicans have tried to cut benefits for the unemployed, children, wounded veterans, the elderly, and the disabled.

Sen. Sanders is using his position as the ranking member on the Senate Budget Committee to sound the warning about what Republicans intend to do. The Republican agenda is all about taking from those at the bottom in order to give more to those at the top. Republicans want to carry out a massive upward redistribution of wealth. John Boehner rejected the idea of a $2,000 tax cut for middle-class families but has long been a champion of permanent tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations.

The Republican desire to remake America into an oligarchy knows no limits. Sen. Sanders is leading the charge against the oligarchs, and the economic future of millions depends on his warnings being heeded.

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MeanMesa's compliments to Senator Sanders and Mr. Easley.