Saturday, March 26, 2011

Mitch McConnell Finally Tells It Like It Is.


You know how the Republicans keep caterwauling and demanding bipartisan solutions to our problems … how they keep after President Obama to “reach across the aisle”?

In plain, simple language, it’s all B.S. Here’s what Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell told the National Review:

“The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”

See? It’s all posturing. Whatever Obama says, it’s wrong. Whatever Obama does, it’s wrong … even if it’s right and good for the country. And these are the super-patriots … who claim to love America more than those of us who vote Democrat most of the time. Their hypocrisy is almost limitless.

And they know it. And they don’t care.
.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

War on Health Care Reform Continues Unabated

I continue to be astonished at the hysterical screeching we continue to hear from the right about health care reform. I suppose it’s understandable when it comes from the typically uninformed (or willfully ignorant) writer of a letter-to-the-editor. But the outright fabrications we continue to hear from some elected officials are nothing short of disgusting. Because they know better.

It’s one thing to oppose the reforms, but quite another to deliberately perpetuate the loony notion of “death panels” and misrepresent other aspects of the law. Michelle Bachmann, the Republican congresswoman from Minnesota, heads that list, although there are a lot of others tied for second place.

There are many provisions to the legislation, of course, but one would require health insurance companies to pay out for medical care at least 80 percent of what they take in from premiums. What could possibly be wrong with that? If an insurance company fails to meet that bare minimum standard, they are – in plain language – screwing their policyholders. Yet many on the right oppose that part of the law purely on the basis of ideology. Good heavens! Doesn’t common sense ever trump ideology?

In Michelle Bachmann’s case, of course, ideology isn’t the real issue. The lady apparently is serious about running for president that makes it pretty clear that she belongs in a rubber room. I suppose, adopting our most charitable persona, we should probably pity her. But what, then, should we think of the people who are passionately supporting her? That's the really scary part in all this.
.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Bill Maher Nails It ... and Them ... Again.

“It turns out that the Republican budget that they submitted for next year slashes funding for the agency that issues tsunami warnings and organizes responses to the tsunami. In their defense, Republicans say that tsunamis are just a theory, they are not a real threat like ACORN, the Black Panthers, NPR, and math teachers in Wisconsin.”
.

Saturday, March 5, 2011

Doing their best to make things worse.

The unionized workers at Hawaiian Electric Company (represented by IBEW) have been negotiating a new contract for some weeks now, but without coming to an agreement. Yesterday was set as a strike deadline.

But– just as the weather people had predicted – yesterday also saw the arrival of a storm with rain and high winds. Sure enough, power went out to about 8,000 homes on the leeward side of Oahu.

And the union guys walked off the job anyway, leaving a vastly reduced workforce -- a few management people and some workers recruited from private electrical contractors -- scrambling to get power back to all those families.

So back in Wisconsin we have public employees doing their best to fight off the blatant union-busting efforts of Scott Walker, the dumb-ass Republican governor there.

And here in Hawaii we have dumb-ass union guys giving all unions a bad name with the worst-possible timing of their walk-out.

What the hell are they thinking?
.

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Fox News Thinks We’re Stupid … Again.

The other night, Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly was exchanging comments with a reporter on the ground in Madison, Wisconsin. The subject, of course, was the on-going protests by government workers there.

During the story, Fox ran video clips of angry, out-of-control protesters -- pushing and shoving, shouting at the camera, shaking fists in the air, etcetera and so forth.

But wait! What do we see there in the background behind what we assume are angry government state workers in Wisconsin? Palm trees? In Wisconsin??

Fox News is a disgrace.

Fox News viewers are morons.

Check out the actual video here.
.