Special Comment: The Republican Party has lost me again

My 67 Year old Father, who the Republican Party decided to rob blind. His name is Charlie Adkins. General Motors Employee for 31 Years. He is retired and living the good life.

I am not quite sure where to begin this editorial, so I will just start writing and I hope everything will just fall into place.

I am sure that by now you know about Michigan’s Governor Rick Snyder and his sudden swerve into the extreme right. As a disillusioned former Democrat, who voted for him, despite the fact that I come for a Democratic Party voting family; I am extremely angry at him right now and the Republican Party in Michigan.

Rick Snyder came off to me as a moderate Republican, someone who was not interested in pursuing some sort of radical agenda or in causing this sort of chaos in Michigan. Well, needless to say, I and many others who voted for him, despite our feelings about the Republican Party as a whole; have egg on our faces.

This idiotic move was nothing more than an appeasement to the Republican base. There was talk of a primary challenge by someone in the Republican Party of Michigan; I do not know who it was, but it obviously scared Snyder into taking this huge swerve.

There will be consequences for this overreach of partisan Government. My earlier posting showed some of it. If there was not enough support to get Governor Snyder recalled, there will be now. The organized labor movement is on full alert now and they are extremely pissed off and rightly so. The Democratic Party base is now totally energized and when this happens, things happen and people get taken out of office and quickly.

I will also let this out as well. I made this threat in an earlier blog posting. The Bush-era is over, and the Obama era is now in its second term. The Republican Party of Michigan and Nationally; as far as this writer is concerned, have demonstrated that they have no interest in protecting people like my Father. They have shown me, that they would rather destroy everything which my Father worked, for 31 years at General Motors. They have shown this writer that they would like to see my Father fairly earned retirement taken from him. They have shown to me, that they want to see my Father’s social security taken from him and his Medicare taken from him as well.

Because of these facts, I have decided to make the following announcement. The announcement is this: My vote for 2014 and 2016 are now officially up for grabs. The Republican Party is trending towards something that I simply cannot support and that is an extremist position towards unions and organized labor. Furthermore, they have proven to me, that they are not interested in protecting our Seniors, like my Mother and Father.

Therefore, because of that, I am now, officially rescinding my support of the Republican Party as a whole and basically of the Conservative movement. I still consider myself a “right of center.” A moderate Conservative or a Blue Dog Democrat, if you want to call me that. I still believe in the idea of American greatness and Reagan’s idea of optimism.

However, I do not believe in this awful misuse of Government power by the Republican Party of Michigan to undermine the ability of people to collectively bargain, if they should choose to do so. This is nothing more overreach and it is morally wrong and I, as am American cannot support it. This is what Hitler and the Nazi’s did and this is what the Soviet Empire did as well. It is fascism of the highest order and I cannot and will not support it. For the record, I have always believed that, and now it is time to put my convictions to use.

Therefore, there are changes coming to this blog. I will removing a good deal of the RSS feeds, save maybe one. To be honest, I do not really agree with any of them anymore. I will be adding some from a different perspective. Some people might be offended by them; but, that is just too bad. When a political party chooses fascism over liberty, something must be done and someone must take a stand.

Consider this my stand.

Cross-Posted to DailyKos

This is pretty much spot on

This is from a progressive blog, but man is she ever right:

I don’t really care why Snyder folded; the problem is that he did. Now Lansing has triggered all kindsa turmoil that we coulda shoulda avoided. Here are just a few of the ramifications of what one shitty nerd did yesterday:

1. Snyder ruined his own reputation as a moderate. Mind you, those of us who pay attention already knew he was a right wing loon. Now everyone else finally knows too. Here’s hoping we see no more of those bullshit editorials by the NYT on how Mr Snyder breaks the mold. I’d like to say I toldja so but if you are receptive to that message then you are already kicking yourself.

2. Snyder demonstrated that his “word” is worthless. We all know the difference between what he said and what he did. ’nuff said.

3. Snyder has cemented his legacy as a Dictator Governor. Removing local governments, pepper-spraying protesters, locking people out of the Capitol. Detroit will probably riot again. Rick Snyder brought us civil unrest.

4. Snyder’s agenda will stall. Though since he’s never been honest about what’s on it, this may be hard to measure.

Those are just some of the consequences to Snyder. I’m not making any predictions on his re-election, though I am pretty confident that he just lost. Here are some of the consequences for the rest of us:

1. People are going to get their asses beat in union shops. Say what you want about union thugs, I know you will anyway. But if you join a union shop and you take union benefits and let the union people take all the risk and you refuse to help, someone is going to fuck with you. If you understood the history of labor, you would understand the violence. If you don’t like it, you’ve got the freedom to work at a non-union shop. Sayonara, leech.

2. Discrimination against union members will increase. Union busting shops will offer better wages and benefits to the folks who refuse to pay union dues. Some of the right wingers will use this as evidence that unions aren’t needed, but that’s because they’re stupid. Once the union goes away, so will the incentive to offer perks.

3. Recalls will begin. Targeted recalls against House and Senate members will begin as soon as possible. That’s not me organizing them; there were already talks underway. The interesting thing about recalls this time is that the people who generally do not support them are actually in favor of them now. I predict we will take out 2 House members and 1 Senator, and we will take over the legislature in 2014. Some of those House seats we might not be able keep because they’ll be in Republican territory, but a conservative Democrat might be able to hold them. (Snyder will not be a target of a recall)

4. Gerrymandering reform will begin this decade. If you have to lie about your intentions and lock people out of the Capitol, you know you are going against the wishes of the people. The way to fix that is to fix the gerrymandering system that allows the Republicans to keep control of our government even though they are the clear minority in the state.

5. The right to steal law will be repealed. We’ll have this fight all over again, and we’ll win. And it will be easier because we’ll be in the majority.

via And the republican party accelerates its decline into nothingness.

Spot on….

Pearl Harbor 71 years Ago Today

It has been 71 years since Pearl Harbor.

The Images:

A civilian killed during the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941.

The Speech:

youtube placeholder image

A Nation went to war:

People mobbing a Navy recruitment station upon hearing what happened at Pearl Harbor. I wonder if it would happen today?

Victory:

We Won.
Germany Surrenders
Japan Surrenders

May we never forget this sacred day.

God Bless America.

 

So much for transparency

I guess that is another promise broken, WaPo reports:

At a meeting with the Business Roundtable on Wednesday morning, President Obama publicly warned Republicans that he would not negotiate over the debt ceiling. But after those opening remarks, reporters were ushered out of the room so Obama could talk to the gathered CEOs in private. 

“”Yeah, I  think the press is … they’ve probably got enough there to spin a story,” Obama said as the reporters were kicked out of the room. 

via Press kicked out of Obama Q & A.

I guess Cornell West was right:

Sen. Jim DeMint to resign and head Heritage Foundation

Something moderately surprising to wake up to:

South Carolina U.S. Senator Jim DeMint will replace Ed Feulner as president of the Heritage Foundation. Mr. DeMint will leave his post as South Carolina’s junior senator in early January to take control of the Washington think tank, which has an annual budget of about $80 million.

Sen. DeMint’s departure means that South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, a Republican, will name a successor, who will have to run in a special election in 2014. In that year, both Mr. DeMint’s replacement and Sen. Lindsey Graham will be running for reelection in South Carolina.

Mr. DeMint was reelected to a second term in 2010. The 61-year-old senator had announced earlier that he would not seek a third term.

via Sen. Jim DeMint to Head Heritage Foundation – WSJ.com.

The first person I thought about, was Amanda Carpenter. Amanda is the sweetest person in the Conservative Blogosphere; well she was, she decided to get away from blogging and work in the beltway. She is Jim DeMint’s speechwriter. Amanda took to twitter to say this:

As for DeMint his leaving the Senate is a huge loss for the Conservative wing of the Republican Party. I do not doubt his story at all. But I can see why he would want to do it. Because it is obvious that the Republicans are going to concede this tax hike nonsense, so DeMint just decided, “You know what? Screw it. I am going to work in the activist arena.”

I cannot blame him, it would be a huge pay raise for the man and plus, he can actually make a difference there. Not much he can do in the Senate, when you have squishy Republicans running the show. Either way, I wish Senator DeMint the best and I also wish Amanda Carpenter the best as well.

Huge Blogger and Media round-up here.

Pat Buchanan calls it exactly like it is

This one is very good.

Saith Patrick Buchanan on his website:

Two years ago, Obama had to eat crow and extend the Bush tax cuts. Now it’s payback time. And behind their arrogance lies a belief that the GOP cannot say no. For if the Bush tax cuts and the payroll tax cuts expire on Jan. 1, Americans will face the highest tax hike in history.

– Every family earning up to $100,000 would see 2 percent of its income lopped off, as the employee half of the Social Security tax rises from 4.2 to 6.2. percent. The discretionary income of Middle Americans would be ravaged.

– The federal tax rate on capital gains will rise from 15 percent to a maximum 24.7 percent, a jump of 60 percent.

– The federal tax rate on interest and dividends will triple from 15 percent to a maximum 44.7 percent.

– Where $5 million of an estate can now be passed on to one’s heirs non-taxed, that will be cut to $1 million. And the death tax rate would shoot from 35 percent to a neo-Marxist 55 percent.

Even Senate Democrats fear this would force a selloff or breakup of family farms and family businesses at death. Yet somewhere, the radical socialist Saul Alinsky, who inspired the young community organizer, is smiling.

[….]

What to do?

Forget the deal. Walk away from the talks with Geithner. Pass an extension of the payroll tax cut, and send it to Harry Reid. Pass the Bush tax cuts, and send them to Harry Reid and say:

“Harry, you are going to have to pass this extension of the tax cuts, or kill them, or send us a counteroffer. Do nothing, and you, not we, will take America over the cliff.”

When Sen. Edmund Ross rose to cast the decisive vote in the impeachment trial of President Andrew Johnson, he said, “I looked down into my own political grave.”

Reviled by the radicals of his era, Ross yet made it into JFK’s “Profiles in Courage.” We are at such a moment.

Indeed we are, and the Democrats are going to own this one, big time. Ignorant overreach has consequences and the Democrats are going to reap the whirlwind come 2014 and so will the establishment Republicans as well.

 

The Thursday Morning Music Express Presents: Dave Brubeck

I will not lie to my readers, Jazz is really not my thing. I am a rock and roller. However, I always show mad respect to the great ones in music. Jazz is an American thing, and we invented it, and people overseas wanted to sound like us. This was back, when America was a great Nation and people around the world wanted to be like us.

Enjoy the music:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faJE92phKzI

Dave Brubeck, the pianist and composer who helped make jazz popular again in the 1950s and ’60s with recordings like “Time Out,” the first jazz album to sell a million copies, and “Take Five,” the still instantly recognizable hit single that was that album’s centerpiece, died on Wednesday in Norwalk, Conn. He would have turned 92 on Thursday.

He died while on his way to a cardiology appointment, Russell Gloyd, his producer, conductor and manager for 36 years, said. Mr. Brubeck lived in Wilton, Conn.

In a long and successful career, Mr. Brubeck brought a distinctive mixture of experimentation and accessibility that won over listeners who had been trained to the sonic dimensions of the three-minute pop single.

Mr. Brubeck experimented with time signatures and polytonality and explored musical theater and the oratorio, baroque compositional devices and foreign modes. He did not always please the critics, who often described his music as schematic, bombastic and — a word he particularly disliked — stolid. But his very stubbornness and strangeness — the blockiness of his playing, the oppositional push-and-pull between his piano and Paul Desmond’s alto saxophone — make the Brubeck quartet’s best work still sound original.

Outside of the group’s most famous originals, which had the charm and durability of pop songs ( “Blue Rondo à la Turk,” “It’s a Raggy Waltz” and “Take Five”), some of its best work was in its overhauls of standards like “You Go to My Head,” “All the Things You Are” and “Pennies From Heaven.” — Source

Others Remembering — Left and Right: BBC, Gothamist, Los Angeles Times, The Maddow Blog, Gawker, Truthdig, Stinque, The Week, Blazing Cat Fur, Balloon Juice and Althouse, The Atlantic Online, Los Angeles Times, Outside the Beltway, Gimme Noise, The Democratic Daily, The Reaction, Power Line and The Volokh Conspiracy, FIRST DRAFT