Libertyvini: I do not know the year, but the UN passed, and we ratified the treaty, a fairly lengthy list of Human Rights.

Those rights include such basic things as food, clean water, clean air, and housing, plus basic health care, and sundry other things which add up to economic security being a Human Right. The Treaty may even be called Economic Rights, or include those words in the title.

The US also passed a couple of laws, one in 1946, and a more detailed version in the 1980s. I do not know the numbers of the bills, or the sponsors, but they obligated the Federal Government to activate economic measures to ‘prime the pump’ when it was necessary to protect the economic well being of the Working Class and the Middle-Class.

I realize that Right Wing Jerks and Capitalistic Bastards feel free to ignore any and all laws [including the Constitution] when it suits them, but that ignorance does not mean the laws don’t exist or that the government does not have a legal responsibility to protect the well-being of ALL the Citizenry, not just the millionaires among us!

I am certain you can find these laws and obligations on Google if you do a bit of work. Who knows? You may even learn something in the process.

And Yes, I wouldn’t mind enforcing those laws with a gun to your back - God knows the Right-Wing ass-holes running our Great Democracy have no problem forcing me to be searched if I want to travel, or arresting me for smoking a few weeds picked in my own yard!

After the democrats shut Dennis Kucinich out of the debates in Nevada in 2008. I didn’t care who won between bama and hill (although I was under the impression Obama had not signed the bill declaring Irans army a “terrorist organization”
I was wrong, he HAD signed it, along with hill).
I voted for Ron Paul in the primary.

I get my info from “C-Span”,
boring, maybe, but unedited and it forces you have to form your own opinions. C-Span has since added a 5 second delay and called me a Bigot for asking the Israel spokesman “Did (y’all) use white phosphorous on those woman and children in Gaza’. Apparently only bigots say (y’all).

I am as far left as they come and the only chance I can see to take back our country from Wall Street is Ron Paul.

I know “The powers that be” won’t let it happen.
They even hire folks to post comments on sites like these.
If the people still manage to think for themselves, Ron Paul will have a “accident” and we will read about it on page 16 while bach, pairy, donald and snooky will get page 1, as usual.
We must keep fighting, anyway.

You can watch Ron Paul in C-spans archives. He was also on PBS newshour a few weeks ago, they kept cutting him off while he was still answering their questions.

I only ask you to give Ron Paul a listen for yourself and not let others tell you how to think.

No one is paying me to post this.

The author of the above articular tries to marginalize Ron Paul by writing “Ron Paul adds enhanced meaning to the word fringe candidate”. What the hell does that mean? It means something different to everyone who reads it.
When did second place become “The Fringe”?

Be cool if her and sarah palin mud wrestle…..

It seems the US Political Observer is unable to accommodate the fact that people and politics do not fit into neatly labeled pigeon holes, or failing neat labels, that one size fits all. Perhaps it has something to do with our consumer society where individuals exist only to serve the profits of the Capitalist Class, or can be simply considered as unimportant and non-existent. Kind of like the kids of Libya and Pakistan I suppose. Unimportant on a scale of 1-10, where 10 is making lots of money and who cares how many get hurt.

Anyway, a few years ago I indulged in a bit of on-line trivia called The Political Compass. Rather than presenting a linear scale measuring one’s opinions from left to right, it created a ‘compass’, presenting quadrants and locating one’s opinions and political sensibilities on both an economic scale, from Left to Right, and a North-South scale from Authoritarian to Libertarian.

Far Left Economic-Authoritarian extreme was represented by Pol Pot, with Stalin a little less extreme in both directions. The Far Right Economic Extreme was occupied by George W. Bush, who was closer Stalin’s Position on the left than to Pol Pot on the very Far Left].

The other extremes were represented by Mohandas Gandhi, Far Left Libertarian, and Ayn Rand, Far Right Libertarian.

The center ranges from center-Left Authoritarian Fidel to Left Libertarian Noam Chomsky and Emma Goldman. Center Right ranges from Authoritarian Pinochet, thru Hobbes to Milton Friedman to Center Right Libertarian Karl Popper [whom I don’t recognize, not being a Right Wing Libertarian].

FYI, I ended up far to the left of both Chomsky and Emma Goldman, but not as Libertarian as either of them. I expected to be closer to Fidel, which is true politically, but I think my attitudes towards drugs, sex and race put me into the ‘Libertarian’ quadrant.

The point in this long discussion of overlapping economic and anarchistic tendencies is that it is not that unusual for the Left Wing Socialist to also be pretty Anarchistic or Libertarian, when it comes to individual freedoms. Thus, Paul’s anti-War philosophy is very appealing tho his Economic Policies are an anathema to anyone who believes in the Human Right to Economic Security.

In Ron Paul’s opinion, as far as I can tell, a ‘Dog Eat Dog’ world is OK as long as we do not unleash the Dogs of War.

That is really a pretty inconsistent ideology, IMO, and ranges right up there with Ayn Rand: i.e Far Right Libertarian, rather than Far Left Anarchist like Gandhi.

madisolation, August 21 at 8:30 am

Why won’t they vote for him just to give Obama a real anti-war challenger? Are they so ideologically rigid that they can’t possibly think strategically?
I am in wonder that people think things are not bad enough that they would just do nothing, and they have nowhere to go, as Obama’s handlers said would happen. It seems people would rather sit in an ideological box of their own making rather than fight.

Since you asked I will respond to what is basically a rather tone deaf defense of Paul and certainly an attack against the left who will not support a candidate so vehemently against almost everything that we hold dear.

Oh wait, my previous response did exactly that. So go read it again for the first time and understand that you are fooling no one in your attempt to drum up support for libertarian politics from leftists.

This was a bizarro ‘rationalization’ of why, according
to the former head of the RNC, a candidate (Perry, in
this case) when speaking to his ‘base’ could distort
facts, outright lie on other facts, make things up out
of whole cloth…Because, according to the former head
of the RNC, he was speaking to his ‘base.’ 

Is there anyone on this site capable of ‘explaining’
this bizarro belief?

Back early in 2008, the Noble laureate in literature for the previous year, Doris Lessing, opined that Mr Obama would never become US president because, no matter what the results of the polls, the establishment would have him assassinated before he could assume office. She, like many others, was led astray by the same sort of wish thinking that led large numbers of others to neglect Mr Obama’s record and interpret his fuzzy rhetoric to mean that he would bring fundamental changes to the way in which the United States is run and the way the US government and its military disport themselves around the world. I disagree profoundly with (most of) Ronald Ernest Paul’s views on politics, economics, and government, but from what I understand he has been consistent in his opposition to a bloated military apparatus and its use in foreign wars of aggression ever since entering politics in the 70s. This, I suspect, explains why he receives so little attention - and then more or less as a kook - from corporate media in the United States. Given the interests of those who determine that country’s policies, it seems to me that, unlike in the case of Barack Hussein Obama, were Mr Paul to be elected president, the risk of his being assassinated before assuming office would be very great indeed. It would be interesting to know if Mr Paul has ever mentioned whom he would like to see as his running mate - perhaps readers who are more directly engaged in US politics than I am might care to enlighten me on this point….

Henri

The claim that “the liberal media have propelled her [MB’s] rise from well-deserved mediocrity to suddenly a “serious” candidate” is a patently absurd claim. In brief, the publication of the essay as “an article” was an editorial mistake. It should have been published as a “comment” from readers.

The article ignores the historical factors that lie behind Bachmann’s public visibility: her election as a member of the House, Palin’s selection as a VP candidate and her later support of Bachmann, the formation of the Tea Party Cacus, the ‘incestuous’ relationship between these elements and the notoriously ultra-conservative, nationally syndicated media.

Reader asked, “Why not vote someone in who is radically in favor of withdrawing American troops from everywhere around the world?”

You must read George McGovern’s piece in the new issue of Harper’s!

PatrickHenry:

Karl Schwarz is, among other things, the author of “One-Way Ticket to Crawford,” a well-meaning but absolutely impenetrable book on Bush, 9/11, illegal doings, Sibel Edmonds, etc., etc.

I never heard of this Karl Schwarz but he seems to have it nailed.

http://rense.com/general94/phyjk.htm

It’s going to be an interesting 14+ months coming up. On the GOPer/TP side, we have a couple of troglodytes racing, Ricky ‘All hat, no head’, the unevolved Texan, versus Michele ‘All mouth, no mind’, Pat Robertson’s legal disciple. Which will be unique, since up to now the only troglodytes we’ve seen have been firmly encased in layers of rock.

Racing against them will be our sitting (or ‘lying’, or ‘falling-down’) President, who has self-evolved into the Dark Horse in the race. His chance of winning seems to depend on whether he gets another shot-in-the-a** of some more of that ‘Get-Up-And-Go Shuck-And-Jive Joy-Juice’ he used a couple of years ago when he still thought he wanted to be President.

The mopes who closely follow these sort of contests predict that the outcome will depend on which entry is the best mudder, since the track is expected to be deep in mud for the entire race.

While the outcome may be uncertain, two things will be undeniable, no matter the ‘winner’. 1. The US will be the loser. 2. And after this spectacle has played out, having been watched by the whole world, any idiot (or idiotette) who dares to publicly proclaim the US remains the ‘Greatest Nation on Earth’, will deservedly be laughed, or stoned, off the stage.

Ardee, you write:
“I echo Reader’s wonderment that supposed leftists support the Libertarian politics of Ron Paul.”

Maybe it has something to do with putting an end to these horrific wars. Maybe it has something to do with pitting a candidate who is anti-WAR, anti-NAFTA, anti-Patriot Act, anti-bank bailouts, against a Democratic traitor who espouses all those views? Maybe it has something to do with voting in the primaries for Paul, so the people of this country can have a real debate on issues against a warmongering corporatist? 
I am in wonder that people on the left are willing to lie down and dream of a nonexistent liberal leader rather than do all they can to make sure Ron Paul is the Republican candidate to challenge Obama. Why won’t they vote for him just to give Obama a real anti-war challenger? Are they so ideologically rigid that they can’t possibly think strategically?
I am in wonder that people think things are not bad enough that they would just do nothing, and they have nowhere to go, as Obama’s handlers said would happen. It seems people would rather sit in an ideological box of their own making rather than fight.
Paul 2012

LET’S NOT DISMISS THE LADY

SK: Bachmann is so obviously an off-the-wall politician, one deservedly dismissed as a fringe candidate.

Yes, to the more liberal minded.

But that is no reason to dismiss her candidacy. She is, after all, a lawyer. Aside from being a “obeying wife” - her husband urged her to undertake the most boring of law studies, Tax Law.

That she should think that homosexuals should cure themselves through prayer is pure quackery. But, that sort of arguments strikes a respondent chord amongst many people.

Where she is completely off the mark is wanting to reduce “entitlements” and thus bring America back to its basic Christian values of “Self-Dependence”. Which, of course, it has not seen seen the end of the 19th century, when we became an Industrialized Nation developed Labor Unions. Bachmann is not a student of history, methinks.

ABOUT ENTITLEMENTS

This subject goes direct to the conscience of mainstream America?as well it should. It is therefore important to get the facts right. Consider this from here:

March 30, 2011

Macho Men are Wrong on Social Security
By Dean Baker - Financial Times

It’s hard to argue that Social Security benefits are too generous, or that retirees enjoy extravagant lifestyles. The average Social Security benefit is just over $1,100 a month. The median income for a household headed by someone over the age of 65 in 2009 was $31,400. And the vast majority of Social Security benefits go to those who need them most.

More than 75 percent of benefits go to individuals with non-Social Security income of less than $20,000 a year and more than 90 percent of benefits go to individuals with non-Social Security income of less than $40,000 a year….

Frankly, Obama could not expect a better opposite for the elections next year. He’d ask Hilary to become VP ...

I echo Reader’s wonderment that supposed leftists support the Libertarian politics of Ron Paul. Libertarians are the antithesis of Progressive government in fact, and are little more than echoing a selfish and exclusively “white” desire to keep what they have and damn the world.

Those who come here in support of such as compete de-regulation of all Industry, isolationism, an end to all entitlements, including medicare and social security are either libertarians masquerading as progressives or have failed to do their homework and support Paul simply because he wants an end to wars. One point in an anguished list doesn’t merit such support.

I would also offer that the so-called popularity of candidates like Bachmann are based only upon one “straw poll” in a rather right wing leaning state and a news media hungrier for headlines than for accuracy.

ANTIDOTE

oc: Meanwhile the voters vote out of anger and ignorance. Democracies require informed voters. Our democracy could not have this: voters vote against their own interests time and time again. George W. Bush and the current crop of radical right wing Republicans is proof.

Well put.

The only antidote are News Web-sites such as this and others that show a larger variety of “opinion input”.

Each American, regardless of sex, age or class, has the duty to not only vote but to inform themselves well before voting - which means to be careful of the Boob-Tube that has long since passed into “corporate hands”. For which, its journalist objectiveness can be seriously questioned - the most egregious being Fox News.

The scions of BigNews can be influenced by their sponsors without which the Golden Parachutes would not exist.

The Internet has gone a long way towards correcting the partisan imbalance of BigNews. And long live WikiLeaks - of which we need more particularly from Business Sources.

NB: It will surprise you to know that Murdoch, in his earlier days, was a staunch supporter of Left-wing politics whilst at university in England and later back in Australia. He was an important supporter of the Australian Labor Party. (Will wonders never cease ... ?)

IN THE MIDDLE

Reader: why not vote someone in who is radically in favor of withdrawing American troops from everywhere around the world?

Because that would be eminently stupid, the mistake of a disingenuous presidency that thinks All is Well in this Best of all Possible Worlds.

Reduce significantly our exposure “around the world”, yes. Reduce overall DoD expenditures to only base priorities, yes. To nothingness, no.

We could use the money saved by spending it on internal domestic priorities - which, I suggest, does NOT entail lowering the debt - but using it more wisely.

The national debt will lower itself, by spending that creates jobs that contribute to tax revenues and sales taxes from enhanced consumption. Those revenues will lower the debt, if we ware not profligate in spending.

But we must adopt sound priorities - which means focus on domestic and not foreign objectives. And, imho, this should be the Central Debate Theme in our Election Year 2012.

MY POINT

As usual, good sense is somewhere in the middle between two extremes ...

Uncle Sam could use a period of what Daniel Moynihan called “Begign Neglect”, where we observe but do not participate - but defensively.

There are the less powerful than us who seek only that moment when they think we are off-guard. Bin Laden indeed took advantage of just such a lapse. So did the Lockerbie Bombers (thought to be Khadaffi). So did Carlos. (Remember them? Or have we forgot - or perhaps never learned - the lessons of history?)

The list our enemies is long and only a very naive person would obviate it altogether.

Kutler makes some good points but the principle force enabling this craziness is the voter. Newspaper truly are agents of the rich and Republicans have gone radical right wing because it pays them to do so—payment comes from plutocrats and their sabotage of democratic government is not punished by an informed and activist voter.

The weapons used to promote plutocratic interests include ideas, education (or lack thereof), money, media, and government.

The ideas are dispersed by the media, some subtle and some not so subtle. The not so subtle is the propaganda distributed by conservative media like Fox News (sometimes called Fox Noise), which is a subsidiary of the Republican Party. Talk Radio, under the auspices of the so-called Clear Channel Communications, is also part of the effluence.

Several generations of Americans are increasingly vulnerable to this toxic and divisive message, for they have been under attack by social and economic war against them: jobs going overseas, rampant unemployment, opportunity curtailed, and constant favoritism to the corporate rich.

Still the people react with emotion and refuse to educate themselves about who their enemies are.

The subtle purveyors of propaganda are now more dominant in the beltway media. Autocratic governments know that they must always control the message. Let me give some examples.

Republicans tank the economy and threaten default and the media attacks both Republicans and Democrats. If a media source strays from this line, conservative sources threaten and intimidate like circling vultures, forcing living tissue that cowers to dive for cover. Moreover, the beltway media doesn’t much question the Republican onslaught against the deficit and the debt ceiling, when a stimulus is sorely needed.

Meanwhile the voters vote out of anger and ignorance. Democracies require informed voters. Our democracy could not have this: voters vote against their own interests time and time again. George W. Bush and the current crop of radical right wing Republicans is proof.

So Mr. Kutler the media is not the principle cause of the problem. They are only a tool of the plutocrats who are winning the war against the people.

To the one commenter.. whether the earth and all life on it was created in a few days at the whim of an omnipotent being (now absent in time of need, btw) or the progeny of chance and self-determination of dominant and preferential abilities and traits over thousands of millennia is not simply a religious concept..

Someone not understanding natural evolution or denying the history and power of the science of Evolution is blind to a massive portion of human knowledge of several fields of study. .. knowledge hard fought and proved and gained against extreme pressure and ignorant (religious) prejudice .. information of
critical value not only to historians and scientists but to potential planners and leaders as well.

Evolution deniers (and climate change deniers) display a fundamental ignorance that should eliminate them from any consideration as President or Policy makers at any level..

Yet we are not seeing the rising of an age of knowledge and readon, are we?

Adios!

What a crock, as are most of the comments, btw. A country ruled by an International Conglomerate of gigantic corporations, private armies and virtually universal surveillance gets what the bosses decide is the flavor of the day, year, or decade. Especially a country that has spent the past 50 years with its head in the sand, existing on the fairy tale that next year everyone will be a millionaire. Or, possibly in jail, dead, or in heaven, depending on their skin color and religious beliefs.

We’ve gutted our education system in exchange for creating robots who cannot think, but may get a job, altho even that is becoming less likely by the day. Our so-called safety net now consists of a chain attached to a cement block. And, the Bill of Rights has been re-written in invisible ink.

As for the EU, it is so busy replaying the script we’ve followed these past 50 years that it is nonsensical to hold the new Europe up as a bulwark against increasing disintegration. Has no one noticed the riots in Britain, Greece, Spain, Italy, and France, or the mass unemployment, and increasing militarization. NATO is at least as bloody as the US, they simply prefer to use what’s left of our dollar for financing their adventures at re-colonizing great swaths of the globe.

We need to concentrate on building our own society, not sit around bemoaning the loss of a past Nirvana. Where is the new Political Philosophy that will unite the Middle-Class, Working Class, and the World’s Under-class?

I’d be far more optimistic about the future if people were paying attention to, and talking about, the ALBA Nations and the Leftist ideas coming out of Latin America. IMO, it is the one part of the Globe that is trying to build a future rather than just hang on by its toes.

As for nightmares to keep anyone awake all night, there is the tremendous increase in focus on Covert Ops and the Special Forces by our Military and the Obomba Admin. Did anyone note that Obomba is planning to expand the number of countries where Special Forces are operating to 120 rather than the current 60. Now that is a number to conjure with…

Our ignorance is mind-boggling. Anyone who thinks the 2012 election is worth a counterfeit dollar is crazy. We are living in an asylum, and the inmates and keepers are all crazy - They just have different delusions.

@Paul J. Theis

PJ, I think the mainstreamers just wish Dr. Paul would dry up and blow away—they don’t understand him, so they think he’s a nutter. But I see him as a strangely sane man in a country full of nutters.

FAST-FORWARD

Thomas Paine, in “Common Sense.” wrote in 1776 that “there is something absurd in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island.”

That was during an era of Monarchic Colonization, where the necessity for a nation to aggrandize an agrarian wealth came from foreign colonies inhabited by natives - where further agrarian as well as mineral wealth were available.

Fast-forward 230 years and what have we in our “democracy”? An aristocracy has been substituted by a plutocracy, which accumulates its riches by means of Industrial & Financial Wealth.

What, pray tell, has changed?

At least those ancient Monarchies in Europe are just window-dressing for tourists nowadays. Europe’s operative economic policy is to implement highly progressive taxation in order to level the playing field.

POST SCRIPTUM

Anyone not convinced that the EU is further ahead in the notion of Social Justice need only look at a comparative info-graph of the Gini Coefficient innovated to demonstrate Income Disparity, here.

Compare the Gini Coefficient at much lower levels of the EU-countries. How do the achieve lower values? By means of taxation and expenditure on Public Services. (Like a Public Option Health Care system for one, but the are also a great many others that make a difference.)

(NB: The higher the Gini Coefficient the worse is Income Unfairness.)

And how does that Gini Coefficient look on a state by state basis for the US? See here.

And amongst the worse in the US are DC, Connecticut, Texas and Louisiana. (Gosh! I didn’t know that oil had been discovered in Connecticut! ;^)

MY POINT

The Income Unfairness of this “Great Nation” is an immoral disgrace.

I am not buying at all the idea the the liberal media is to blame for Michele Bachmann. That said, I do think the mainstream media underplayed Ron Paul’s close second place finish in the Iowa straw poll, especially given that Iowa is Bachmann’s place of birth. And I believe the reason for Ron Paul’s strong Iowa finish was his ringing call to bring our troops home now.

Kutler may yet be singing a different tune about Dr. Paul once the primaries begin—something on the lines of: “That man and all he stands for are dangerous and must be crushed!!!”

We’ll see ...

At least, I can hope. 

Yeah, Bachmann’s a serious candidate. David Koch refers to her as ‘Our Batshit-Babe’. Charles, a bit more circumspectly, calls her ‘My Guano-Gal’.

Just about perfectly put by Stanley Kutler. Especially the part about liberal
media doing it’s part to boost these nut-cases, not least by constantly talking
about them! MSNBC is unbearable, Maddow in particular. She sits parsing the
lies of the crazies as though her viewers consist of reactionaries tuned in to be
convinced and by the end saying to themselves, “Amen, sister. Think I’ll switch
parties tomorrow now that you’ve exposed my idols for the liars and hypocrites
they really are.”

But too, as Kutler writes, they participate in deciding who’s serious and who’s
not, perhaps fearing their man will lose for having no backbone and so might
as well try to get so-called “independents” to vote for Huntsman, or even
Bachmann if the primary choice is between her and Palin.

Kutler’s absolutely right about media.

If these Iowa-style things were going on anywhere else in the world—and
assuming our media were paying any attention, which it never does to the rest
of the world unless on fire and/or bleeding or occasionally when an economy is
(gleefully) collapsing—one can only imagine the mockery on the part of talking
heads.

I’d go so far as to argue that MSNBC is and has been better for the loons than
Fox. Fox hates Obama but I don’t think it devotes nearly so much time to
running down liberals as the reverse at MSNBC. While “fair and balanced” CNN
has gone whole-hog reactionary as they seem to believe their audience consists
of older, tea-party conservatives. Brazile and Begala, two Clinton neo-lib
leftovers, are CNN’s idea of the left. Though CNN has a weird relationship with
Bill Maher, apologist extraordinaire. Maher is close as media gets to Paine, I
suppose. Apparently, so long as whomever is also a comic, he or she is allowed
access to speak some truth.

Kutler’s quite right about Buffett too, whom I nominated as Truthdigger of the
week. His class has taken him out back of the gold shed for his remarks,
mostly by mocking him through suggesting he write a fat check to the
government, an idea that proves elitist media is completely clueless as to
Buffett’s point, which isn’t surprising at CNBC where Steve Forbes and Steven
Moore and Larry Kudlow are taken seriously. Forbes’ flat-tax scheme is so
regressive as to make Bachmann-Perry oversteer blush. (Not really.) Buffett’s
made CNBC’s shit list from the sound of it and so I’m guessing no more foot-
kissing from Becky Quick.

The exception at CNBC was, as usual, Jim Cramer, who agrees with Buffett.
(Cramer’s a wild man with a hellacious lot of smarts, smarter than all other CNBC
personnel combined, and Buffett too. He’s also a ruthless SOB.)

Wasn’t it Hedda Hopper who said any publicity is good publicity? Big media
operates like the old Hollywood studio system, including the production of
fiction and promotion of air-heads by other air-heads both before and
behind the camera.

One thing Paine did was leave, or rather was forced out. Media might have been
marginally better back then, what with presses on every street
corner, but I doubt so much better as claimed by many historians, particularly
on the left. With the internet available to most Americans (sadly, still not all),
these times might really be better than ever, relatively speaking. At least until
the fascists (FCC in league with telecoms and Murdock) figure out a way to shut it all down.

Much as I distrust and disagree with Ron Paul, if I was forced to choose between him and Michelle Bachmann or Rick Perry, it would be no contest.  Paul has a consistent and fairly rational basis for his positions on issues, and those positions don’t sway with the polls.  I may not like what he says, but he doesn’t say flat-out whack-job dangerous idiocies like the other two.

That a few thousand voters filter the Presidential field 15 months before the election is just flat-out stupid.

But the Democrats WANT to run against Michelle Bachmann as a slam-dunk win, Perry not so easy but still… However Ron Paul is a real crap shoot because of ALL the GOP trolls he’s the only one who can appeal to the Left, the now very-disaffected Left.

For Republicans, no matter how nutty and sleazy Bachmann and Perry appear, they are far preferable to them than Paul, who, for them, represents a serious challenge to the two main streams of Republicanism: The Corporate Whores (like McConnell and Boehner) and the TeaParty Whack-jobs (Ryan, Cantor and Coburn). Paul is a bad fit for both, better for the TeaParty (which means the CorpWhores lose power) but I believe that the TeaParty won’t ride Paul as the Horse, he’ll ride them.

So BOTH parties would rather have the whack-jobs and Paul out.  And I think BOTH sides of the GOP would rather have the Chris Christie who’s f***ed up 10 ways from Sunday here in NJ than Perry, who’s dumber than a house plant.

As for me, I’d like to see a serious primary challenge to Obama crop up, whether from Howard Dean, or maybe even Corey Booker (nah…too soon for Booker. His next stop is unseating Christie).  Obama’s counting on the Left to support him with no place else to go, forgetting that NOT voting is the same as voting Republican, and lots of people will stay home, and many others will hold their nose.  The excited people who worked for him in 2007 and 2008 have dwindled. When Maxine Waters challenges him to stand up for the people who worked for him, you know he’s in trouble.

Put it in personal terms: Cheat on your partner and your partner will never trust you again, whether it’s a business partner or a bed mate.  Obama has cheated on his partner, the Left, and doesn’t believe or realize that the Left no longer trusts him.

She is a serious candidate and that speaks volumes to the stupidity of a significant proportion of the electorate.  Some of the framers were concerned about extending the franchise to the wider public, because they saw the possibility of the ill informed being manipulated.  Their concern was not unfounded. These right wing ideologues educate themselves in manipulative techniques. That’s the function of right wing “think tanks.” How are we supposed to combat all this reactionary bloviating?  Oh I know—stick our heads in the ground and refuse to acknowledge that the MicheleMarcus’s are “serious” candidates.  That will make them fade into oblivion. Oh yeah.

Why are you blaming the “liberal” media?  This moronic woman gets plenty of exposure on Faux and right wing radio which has more viewers and listeners than “liberal” outlets by a very wide margin.  Do you think that the way to deal with the MarcusMichele’s is to hold your nose—to treat them with silent contempt—- to consider them beneath contempt and not worthy of comment?  I for one would prefer to take them on straight up and call them out for their moronic world view and reactionary politics.  If the American electorate likes what they see, if democracy can’t win the argument, then it deserves to die.  If Americans succumb to these assholes, they deserve what they get. When cockroaches invade the kitchen you don’t go into the living room and read a book -  you get the cockroach spray out!

Ron Paul is a “fringe” candidate only because he doesn’t buy into the corporate/military/industrial dogma of constant military interventionism and foreign wars. Like others here, I don’t think much of his economic philosophy because the first people to whine if the government every got out of supporting and subsidizing private corporations would be all the great
“entrepreneurs” who fancy themselves such independent
operators. The fallacy of the libertarians is that the
government has always subsidized and propped up private enterprise in this country starting with Alexander Hamilton and his report on manufactures. And as we saw in 2008, the first place the Wall Street crooks turned to get bailed out was the Government and the American taxpayer.

The main stream media, experts at creating false perceptions through movies, TV and written media, willfully fail to recognize reality even when it is biting them on the ass.

A case in point is Ron Paul, the victim of nonreporting by our free, but owned, press.

“Where are you, George Carlin, now that we need you?”
Indeed. In the wake of recent happenings, I’m starting
to miss good ole’ George. I’m sure he would have
something profound to say as well as a solution to the
current crisis.

Too bad there isn’t a real litmus test for “serious” Republican candidates (and I’d really like a reporter in every city these candidates go to ask this simple yes no question:  Do you believe that evolution is the basis of biological life on Earth? Yes or no.
Answer: Yes, OK you may move on. Answer No: You are disqualified as a “serious” candidate because you put religion before science and math and an understanding of those two items are necessary to run the damn country. And flim flam answers like evolution is a “theory” so it is not proved, or “there is some kind of “intelligent creation” crap counts as a “no” and a DQ. 

Let’s check with the Republican front runners:  Bachmann: DQ Perry: DQ Romney: DQ

What’s a party to do?  What’s wrong with the press?

The answer to all this is as simple as eliminating the electoral college. To narrow the presidential race down to two or three or even twenty states is unfair and easily manipulated by the media and the candidates. Since whoever is elected is the president of ALL the states then All the citizens should do the choosing and in this day and age a popular vote is easily done.

To continue the system as it is will only discourage more and more voters as they are truly correct in saying that their vote does not matter. I know because I live in a solid red state with two time zones which always leads to the election being called at least an hour before half the state votes. So why bother? A popular vote is the only way to go.