Excerpt: "We are witnessing a full-on implosion of the Republican Party. GOP used to stand for 'Grand Old Party,' but it now stands for 'Greedy Old Plutocrats.' "
U.S. Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney listens to questions from the press. (photo: Jim Young/Reuters)
The GOP Is Officially a Third Party
24 September 12
f one political party's standard-bearer for president wrote off half of the electorate as people who would never vote for him, and his message appealed to and was catered specifically toward only 1% of the voting public, why should anyone take that party or that candidate seriously enough for them to have a shot at winning?
It's understandable that Mitt Romney wrote off half of the electorate, because he and his friends in the American corporatocracy simply speak entirely different languages. The nation's median income, which is already a statistic skewed far higher than normal by outliers at the top, is only $50,000. But according to Romney, a household making a quarter of a million dollars a year, which only 2% of households make, is "middle class." And $360,000 for speaking fees, which is greater than 6 median income families make per year combined is apparently not a lot of money. His assertion that the 47% of Americans who pay no income tax are government moochers applies to a wide swath of Americans, including working families with children making anywhere from $30,000 up to above $50,000. These families pay negative federal income tax rates thanks to programs like the Child Tax Credit and the Earned Income Tax Credit. Besides, Romney himself benefited from a $10 million bailout at Bain Capital. For a family of 3 on welfare to receive as much help from Uncle Sam as Mitt Romney, they'd have to be on welfare for 328 years.
For those still convinced that the GOP should still be a major party, Romney's gaffes notwithstanding, take a look at how the Republicans in the House of Representatives have voted over the last few years, particularly for the budgets they've proposed and endorsed. While they have no problem voting down tax cuts for middle class households (those making less than $250,000 a year), Republicans have steadfastly endorsed cutting taxes for the top 1% to even lower levels in their official budget proposal. That same budget makes the bulk of its cuts from social programs that are primarily there to benefit the middle class and the poor. The House Republican budget even makes part of its $4 trillion in cuts by ending federal funding for school lunch programs, meaning 280,000 poor kids would have less to eat, all so millionaires can have even bigger tax cuts.
Not to be outdone, Senate Republicans unanimously voted down a bill that would stop taxpayer subsidies for corporations that fired American workers and shipped their jobs overseas. They voted down assistance for homeless female veterans, and even just recently voted down a bill that would have provided jobs to unemployed veterans. The American Jobs Act, which would have created around 2 million new jobs for teachers, first responders and construction workers across the US, was unanimously rejected by Senate Republicans around this time last year. The reason? To pay for all of those new jobs, taxes on millionaires would have gone up by a few percentage points. Anyone who legitimately believes the Republican Party is there to serve anyone but 1% of the public is simply delusional.
Mitt Romney is now tanking in the polls, Republicans' chances of taking back the Senate despite 33 seats up for grabs have fallen to 21%, and even John Boehner admits there's a 1-in-3 chance he won't be Speaker next year. We are witnessing a full-on implosion of the Republican Party. GOP used to stand for "Grand Old Party," but it now stands for "Greedy Old Plutocrats." The Republican Party is now no longer a major party, and there is no better indicator than their nominee for the presidency openly mocking poor people at a $50,000 per-plate fundraiser.
Since the GOP is an irrelevant third party now, and still being invited to the presidential debates, how about we let other third party candidates debate? Jill Stein, from the Green Party, has a 2% approval rating in the polls despite a fraction of the fundraising capacity, and is on the ballot in 38 states. Libertarian Gary Johnson is winning voters over as a presidential candidate who acknowledges the corporate corruption of the two major parties and the electoral process as a whole. All third parties deserve to be heard by the American voting public on the debate stage.
Carl Gibson, 24, of Lexington, Kentucky, is a spokesman and organizer for US Uncut, a nonviolent, creative direct-action movement to stop budget cuts by getting corporations to pay their fair share of taxes. He graduated from Morehead State University in 2009 with a B.A. in Journalism before starting the first US Uncut group in Jackson, Mississippi, in February of 2011. Since then, over 20,000 US Uncut activists have carried out more than 300 actions in over 100 cities nationwide. You may contact Carl at carl@rsnorg.org.
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Irving Krystol ONLY cosseted and cajoled the two most clueless, inward-looking and in Dimwits' case at least, vapidly-incurio us -plus Reagan's accelerating Alzheimer's, was the ideal breeding ground for the coven of brain-damaged patsies listed in the article and their spawn, still pushing endless war!
What an achievement!
As long as people continue to believe that 9/11 was perpetrated by Osama Bin Laden and al Qaida, the world will continue on its path to its own self-destruction.
(Continued)
I first noticed Viggo Mortensen when he was interviewed by Charlie Rose in 2002 on his upcoming debut of "Lord of the Ring - The Two Towers." Reference the following URL:
http://www.brego.net/viggo/viggo-politics.php
I don't remember how I caught this program since I generally don't watch Charlie Rose, but I did. It's one of the things that sticks out in my mind, almost like September 11th, 2001. He wore a T-shirt on which he wrote using a sharpie, "No More Blood for Oil." This was a year before Bush illegally invaded Iraq. Viggo already knew at the time of this interview that Bush was planning on invading Iraq in 2003. If you watch Democracy Now, Amy plays a portion of the video from that interview.
I especially liked the ending of his movie entitled "Hidalgo" because of his support for the wild mustangs which are being systematically destroyed by the U.S. government via the BLM.
In any case, Radscal, I would suggest that you watch his interview with Amy Goodman on Democracy Now today.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3vbTuo47VQ&list=PLFCF256772039511C&index=33
He was under constant attack by Charlie Rose for his wearing of the T-shirt. I wonder how Charlie Rose feels today about what he did in 2002 when he interviewed Viggo Mortensen?
You're right. That was an incredible interview with Mortensen. I haven't seen any of the Rings/Hobbit flicks, and so was unaware of this actor, but I'm really impressed with him as a human being.
Thanks.
The title of the movie, "Hidalgo," is actually the name of his horse which is a wild mustang which together run many cross-country races.
The main plot of the movie which is supposed to be a true story was that he signed up to run a cross-country race in Arabia across the ocean in which the prize money was $100,000, a lot of money at that time. Until the very end of the movie, no one viewing the film really knows why he did this. I like to protect the wild animals that roam the open areas of our nation, and one of them is the wild mustang who are quickly becoming an endangered species if the BLM can get its way.
The race was long and hard, but, in the end he won the money. The scene then turns to his return to the U.S. at a remote location where the U.S. calvary is about to slaughter thousands upon thousands of wild mustangs that they had corralled. Mortensen rides up to the officer in charge and hands him a note in which he paid the U.S. government to allow these horses to run free. He and two Indians open all the gates and let all the mustangs run free including his own horse, Hildago.
Could you give a specific example of such "libel", Mr. Weismann?
If any other country but Israel has profited from 9/11 and the resulting War on Terror, could you please name that country, Mr. Weismann?
Please write/educate US more.
https://books.google.com/books?id=DD8oNl63gBEC&dq=Perle+Reagan&source=gbs_navlinks_s
This book which will come as a surprise to many educated observers and historians suggests that Jews and Jewish intellectuals have played a considerable role in the development and shaping of modern American conservatism. The focus is on the rise of a group of Jewish intellectuals and activists known as neoconservative s who began to impact on American public policy during the Cold War with the Soviet Union and most recently in the lead up to and invasion of Iraq. It presents a portrait of the life and work of the original and small group of neocons including Irving Kristol, Norman Podhoretz, and Sidney Hook. This group has grown into a new generation who operate as columnists in conservative think tanks like The Heritage and The American Enterprise Institute, at colleges and universities, and in government in the second Bush Administration including such lightning rod figures as Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle and Elliot Abrams. The book suggests the neo cons have been so significant in reshaping modern American conservatism and public policy that they constitute a Neoconservative Revolution."
I agree with you and Weissman - putting ANY label on Jews (blacks, Muslims) nationalism is simplistic/xeno phobic. Not all Germans were Nazis, not all Russians were/are communists etc.
The liberal imperialists, as they are better classified, also come from the Cold War Truman/CIA crowd -- that is their common root. Brzezinski, his spawn Albright, and the lying twins, Susan Rice and Power, are just as obsessively bent on achieving the goals of PNAC as the neo-cons, and are fully allied with them, e.g., with the Libyan intervention, Ukraine, and the anti-Assad mantra.
Sadly, other than a tease, Weissman gave them a pass in his article. Perhaps he will pick this up in a future article.
"Big Money and the Corporate State: How Global Banks, Corporations, and Speculators Rule and How to Nonviolently Break Their Hold."
Gotta read that one. First time I couldn't find anything to disagree with!