When Roger West first launched the progressive political blog "News From The Other Side" in May 2010, he could hardly have predicted the impact that his venture would have on the media and political debate. As the New Media emerged as a counterbalance to established media sources, Roger wrote his copious blogs about national politics, the tea party movement, mid-term elections, and the failings of the radical right to the vanguard of the New Media movement. Roger West's efforts as a leading blogger have tremendous reach. NFTOS has led the effort to bring accountability to mainstream media sources such as FOX NEWS, Breitbart's "Big Journalism.
Roger's breadth of experience, engaging style, and cultivation of loyal readership - over 92 million visitors - give him unique insight into the past, present, and future of the New Media and political rhetoric that exists in our society today.
What we are against:
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THE RESISTANCE
Japan has the best tsunami warning system in the world. Some of their buildings are literally built on massive springs so that they can sway instead of fall down. and experts say that the strict building codes and early warnings of the earthquake and tsunami saved countless lives. Well, you know what strict building codes and warning systems are in America?
To republicans this means "big government" - spending on infrastructure.
What if we where to experience a disaster like Japan? How prepared are we in our country? Yesterday house republican leader Eric Cantor defended republican proposals to cut spending for the United States Geological Survey, the National Weather Service, andNOAA.
Government officials predict the closure of as many as 12 NOAA offices - which provide warning services for 30 million Americans. The national weather service budget would be cut by $126 million over the next six months with furloughs at 22 forecast offices. -and shorter work weeks for the storm prediction center and the national hurricane center shall be expected.
Where are we going as a country? Last week the president of the NWS union said "that if those cuts go through, there will be furloughs at both of the tsunami warning centers that protect the whole country. The president also said, "there is a very heightened risk of life if these cuts go through."
Any local LEPC or emergency coordinator will tell you that the inability for warnings to be disseminated to the public, whether due to staffing inadequacies, radar maintenance problems, or weather radio transmitter difficulties would be disastrous.
It's very tempting when doing these bizarre, every two week cuts, continuing resolutions to fund the government, to whack away at things you think people won't notice because, hey, what are the odds there is going to be some sort of weather event?
This is what I find bizarre about all this. If you peruse through the continuing resolution - first of all, there is a lot of gimmickry in this because a fair amount of the money being saved are called rescissions, which is money not spent - so the sense is we're returning money back to the treasury because it didn't spend all the money allotted. If you're going to make an argument from the most extreme libertarian perspective there are a few things you have to conceive of as basic public goods, and things like tsunami warning systems, early warning systems for seismic events are clearly public good.
Even in the most kind of stripped down conceptions these are things you want the government doing, and in the general context of the federal budget it really doesn't cost that much money. Keep in mind that the entire defense portion of the budget and the earmarks therein - there are more earmarks in the bill than any other bill - to which they are all protected by the house republicans.
It is basic safety for American citizens that is in jeopardy. We'd be less safe if these cuts go through -- talking aviation, utilities, agriculture. It is amazing how far these republicans will really go.
Reminder - when you hear radical republicans speaking "reform"....grab your wallet and hold on tight, for soon they shall ask for it next!.
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) made a high profile trip to New Hampshire today as part of a potential 2012 presidential run, but the tea party favorite, who often refers to the early days of the Republic in speeches and media appearances, embarrassingly mangled basic American history, incorrectly stating that the battles of Lexington and Concord, and the Pilgrims landing at Plymouth Rock, to have occurred in New Hampshire, instead of Massachusetts:
“What I love about New Hampshire and what we have in common is our extreme love for liberty,” the potential GOP presidential candidate said. “You’re the state where the shot was heard around the world in Lexington and Concord. And you put a marker in the ground and paid with the blood of your ancestors the very first price that had to be paid to make this the most magnificent nation that has ever arisen in the annals of man in 5,000 years of recorded history.” [...]
“I’m thankful that you are the first in the nation state because you are the liberty state,” Bachmann said. “That is your charge. You keep that baton of liberty. You’ve done it very well for almost 20 generations from the time the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, and I’m sure the very first one came up to New Hampshire and said, ‘This is where I want to be.
Of course, as the school children in attendance at the speech could likely tell her, the Battles of Lexington and Concord that sparked the American revolution in 1775, and the Pilgrims’ landing, took place in Massachusetts, not New Hampshire, “but Bachmann did not correct her error when she referenced the battles again later in her speech.” Ironically, The Republican Liberty Caucus of New Hampshire, which hosted the event, handed out pocket-sized copies of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution “on a table a few feet from where Bachmann spoke.”
This is hardly the first time Bachmann has flubbed the country’s basic history. She has repeatedlypronounced that America was founded on diversity and guaranteed freedom for all from its beginning, completely whitewashing the existence of slavery from America’s past. In January, CNN host Anderson Cooper lambasted Bachmann for “flunking history,” saying her diversity comments were “either a deliberate rewriting of our history, or signs that she has a shaky grasp on our history.”
NFTOS is never disappointed when it comes to Michele Bachmann. She suffers from major foot-in-mouth disease.
I try pretty hard to not be judgmental and to try to look at things from different perspectives to understand where a person is coming from. I've tried that with Michelle Bachman (R-MN06) too, but I'm sorry, she's just nuts. There's no two ways about it. And then there was her statement that Americans like working two jobs. Maybe that should have tipped me off.
In addition to being a little off keel, Bachmann's track record has proven she is also a full-fledged nutjob. The type of person that makes you turn to your friend the moment she gets up to use the bathroom and mouth "She's craaaaaaazy," complete with hand motions and bug-eyes.
Bachmann has claimed that many of her career moves have been dictated by messages from God. Abraham, Moses.
If you give Michele Bachmann a microphone, there's a pretty solid chance she'll say something stupid. The kinds of statements that leave you speechless - not because you don't know how to respond, but because there is no applicable response to gibberish.
Here's a sampling of her work:
"Don't Palinize Me!"
"Not all cultures are equal."
"We're running out of rich people in this country."
""I find it interesting that it was back in the 1970s that the swine flu broke out then under another Democrat president Jimmy Carter. And I'm not blaming this on President Obama, I just think it's an interesting coincidence."
"Little children will be forced to learn that homosexuality is normal and natural and perhaps they should try it."
Michele Bachmann's statements are so inane that at some level, one has must cut her some slack. Why? No one human can really be this out of tune with reality....or can they. No real person acts like this, or do they.
NFTOS Editor-in-chief Roger West is often quoted as saying in our daily horseshoe meetings... "as if there isn't already enough fruits and nuts within the republican basket, what's one more added to the fray"?
NFTOS would love to see a Palin-Bachmann Presidential ticket, for there would never be an easier win for the Democratic ticket, one might conclude a landslide to be in order.
One thing this is for sure - You Can't Fix Stupid!
If you think republicans are scheming and conniving. You'd be right. This radical tea movement is not just about busting unions, its a much bigger plan too emaciate the Democratic society as a whole. NFTOS is going to leave you with Rachael Maddow's great special report which shall include several clips from her show last evening. While we know this is very long, its imperative that all liberal, progressive, Democrats watch and learn, for if you fail to do so, you just may find your party being executed at the guillotine.
So unless you've been living under a rock readers:
- republicans are out to take full advantage of the November mid-term shellacking and radically change how Democrats assemble and vote.
If your not listening, please hear me........ if we allow republicans to repeat conflation of reconciliation and nuclear option " we are helping Republicans spread a lie"!
Our problem is we're not tough enough. We haven't shown the spine to do what is needed, and we need, once again, a spinal transplant in the Democratic Party to play hardball.
Our country's at stake here. This isn't about Republican versus Democratic anymore. This is about whether we want to move forward and have our voices heard, or whether we want to let a small ideological minority screw up the country so they can take power again.
Progressives, get off the couch, take the Pringles out of your mouth, and let your voices be heard, for if not, you can assure yourself that you will be run over by the tea bag express.
Radical republicans pull the rabbit out of the hat, radical teas use slight of hand to ram through a bill which at the end of the day has little to do with balancing budgets.
For Republicans to support this blatant assault on workers' rights is outrageous. But the fact is that they passed it through a procedural loophole without Senate Democrats present is unconscionable.
Late Wednesday night, Republicans in Wisconsin's State Senate used the nuclear option to ram through a controversial bill attacking working families. This nuclear option detonated with a resounding thud - you could actually here the air release from progressives lungs when the news spewed forth regarding the latest choke and puke politics of Wisconsin's radical tea.
Republicans gamed the rules and did this under the cover of night.
Scott Walker and the Republicans’ ideological war on the middle class and working families is now indisputable, and their willingness to shred 50 years of labor peace, bipartisanship, and Wisconsin’s democratic process to pass a bill that 74% of Wisconsinites oppose is beyond reprehensible and possibly illegal.
Walker and the GOP were lying this whole time - this attack on workers’ rights never had anything to do with fixing the state’s budget.
Working families in Wisconsin are fighting back by mounting recall campaigns against Republican State Senators who just took an axe to the middle class.
Walker and the Wisconsin Republicans have been trying to take away workers’ rights for almost a month. They would have succeeded sooner were it not for the courageous actions of workers in the streets of Wisconsin...and Senate Democrats, who left the state to prevent any vote.
Wisconsin law requires all government meetings to be conducted publicly and with advance notice except under very limited circumstances. According to a guide to Wisconsin’s open meetings law prepared by the state’s Republican attorney general:
The provision in Wis. Stat. § 19.84(3) requires that every public notice of a meeting be given at least twenty-four hours in advance of the meeting, unless “for good cause” such notice is “impossible or impractical.” If “good cause” exists, the notice should be given as soon as possible and must be given at least two hours in advance of the meeting. … If there is any doubt whether “good cause” exists, the governmental body should provide the full twenty-four-hour notice. [...]
Wis. Stat. § 19.97(3) provides that a court may void any action taken at a meeting held in violation of the open meetings law if the court finds that the interest in enforcing the law outweighs any interest in maintaining the validity of the action.
Yet, when state Rep. Peter Barca (D) informed his colleagues of this legal requirement during tonight’s conference committee, the committee’s Republican majority ignored his protests and voted to approve the bill while Barca was still explaining why their actions were illegal. Watch it here at NFTOS:
A few GOP-aligned outlets are now trying to claim that the law was not violated because the conference committee was announced two hours in advance. Yet there is no evidence whatsoever that it would have been “impossible or impractical” to give the full day’s notice required by law. In other words, Barca’s arguments are clearly consistent with the attorney general’s understanding of the law, and the most important open question is whether the courts will exercise their authority to “void any action taken at a meeting held in violation of the open meetings law” and invalidate this bill.
Republicans have no shame even if it meanspolitical suicide. This set of republicans have no scruples or morals. It was never about the budget.
If it wasn’t clear before, it should be by now that this was never about a budget gap.It should be fairly obvious that it was about union busting, but at this point, it seems that there’s likely even more to it.We have too realize that Walker and Wisconsin are not the whole story, but instead just a part of the big picture.
The tea bags are hoping that other swing states like OH, FL, VA, NC, IN, and CO, follow Walkers plan, especially because these states have very few unionized workers, if any. By the time the 2012 elections come around, Scott Walker will be pretty much irrelevant. He’ll probably be a hero at the Republican convention, but he’ll have no national prospective. Walkers visions of being bonzo jr ( Pres Ronald Reagan) where probably lost many weeks ago. Here is proof:
For weeks, Wisconsin Republicans have been insisting that the anti-union bill they abruptly passed through the state Senate last night has nothing to do with busting unions or politics, but is all about doing what is necessary to balance the state’s budget. But as we have reported, Wisconsin state Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R) admitted yesterday that he sees an electoral payoff, telling Fox News that by breaking the state’s public employee unions, the GOP can make it “much more difficult” for President Obama to win Wisconsin in 2012. On Fox & Friends this morning, his fellow Republican state Sen. Randy Hopper also tipped his hand a bit, saying the White House must be behind in the pro-union protests because everyone knows this is about 2012:
Quoting Michael Moore on Rachael Maddow:
"Wisconsin's not broke," he said. "America isn't broke. The money's just not in the people's hands. It's in the hands of the rich, the people who committed these crimes and got away with it." He held up a pair of handcuffs and looked at the camera.
"I'd like anybody who works on Wall Street, anybody who works for the banks, just take a look at this," he said. "This is what's coming. This is what's coming for you. Because the people are going to demand justice, they're going to demand that your ass is in jail."
Quoting NFTOS Editor-in Chief Roger West:
"the right has several fronts going at once and the Left simply reacts to each firefight as they erupt. There are the culture wars (predominantly against women and gays), the corporate antagonists, the unions, and the entitlement forays. They manufacture tales about our founding fathers and they push the myths and superstitions that cradle modern religions and they lie, openly and boldly, about what constitutes a patriot.
The math is incredibly slippery in the hands of radical republicans. The fact that Obama is so terminally prone to ‘compromise’ weakens us all. In the same way that teachers in this country have been so demoralized by critics, progressives have been punked by a president and a good portion of the democratic party, leaving them stunned and gunning for retribution but on the defensive.
The plutocracy has established a beach head. Soon they will be at our doors and we will be the new slumdogs."
Let’s stand with the middle class readers and send a strong message - not one of us can back down in the face of Republican attacks, period!
Wisconsin GOP Strips Public Workers' Bargaining Rights
BREAKING NEWS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ BREAKING NEWS
Republicans in the Wisconsin Senate voted Wednesday night to strip nearly all collective bargaining rights from public workers after discovering a illegal way to bypass the chamber's missing Democrats.
All 14 Senate Democrats fled to Illinois nearly three weeks ago, preventing the chamber from having enough members present to consider Gov. Scott Walker's so-called "budget repair bill" -- a proposal introduced to plug a $137 million budget shortfall.
The Senate requires a quorum to take up any measures that spend money. But Republicans on Wednesday split from the legislation the proposal to curtail union rights, which spends no money, and a special conference committee of state lawmakers approved the bill a short time later.
The lone Democrat present on the conference committee, Rep. Tony Barca, shouted that the surprise meeting was a violation of the state's open meetings law but Republicans voted over his objections. The Senate then convened within minutes and passed it without discussion or debate.
Spectators in the gallery screamed "You are cowards."
Wisconsin tea bags vote in the dark and commit political suicide.........
Stay tuned as NFTOS will be all over this breaking news the next twenty four hours.
Controversial conservative activist James O'Keefe has released a video purporting to show an NPR executive making inflammatory comments to two people posing as members of a "Muslim Brotherhood front group." As has been the case in the past, conservative media outlets andblogs are hyping O'Keefe's video.
It's not clear why anyone would believe anything that O'Keefe says about what is seen in the video.
O'Keefe pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor criminal charge for entering Sen. Mary Landrieu's office in New Orleans under false pretenses.
O'Keefe falsely claimed that his ACORN tapes were a "nationwide ACORN child prostitution investigation" that implicated many ACORN employees. In at least six of the eight heavily edited videos, either the activists did not clearly tell the ACORN employees that they were planning to engage in child prostitution; or the ACORN employees refused to help them or apparently deliberately misled them; or ACORN employees contacted the police following their visit.
Three separate investigations cleared ACORN workers of criminal wrongdoing, and a 2009 report by the Congressional Research Service stated that O'Keefe's surreptitious videotaping may have broken laws in California and Maryland.
O'Keefe and Andrew Breitbart withheld an exculpatory ACORN video from Los Angeles for two months in late 2009, during the height of the ACORN frenzy.
A September 18, 2009, New York Times article reported that Liz Farkas, a college friend of O'Keefe's while at Rutgers University, said she "grew disillusioned" after O'Keefe asked Farkas to help deceptively "edit the script" of a video involving a nurse at the University of California at Los Angeles.
In a 10-minute video posted on BigGovernment.com in June 2010, O'Keefe stated that he had been hired as a Census worker and attended two days of training. He said, "What I found were Census supervisors systematically encouraging employees to falsify information on their time sheets." The video includes clips of census leaders, who according to O'Keefe, "didn't seem to have a problem with the discrepancy" of the hours recorded on his time sheet versus the hours he claimed to have worked. O'Keefe omitted a clip that was later aired by ABC, which shows a census leader emphasizing the importance of accurately reporting on miles driven by census enumerators.
O'Keefe reportedly planned to "seduce" and publically humiliate CNN investigative reporter Abbie Bourdeau. In an article posted at CNN.com, Bourdeau reported that when she arrived for an interview with O'Keefe, she was informed by O'Keefe's colleague Izzy Santa that O'Keefe planned to lure her aboard a boat where he would secretly record his attempts to "hit on her" using "strawberries and champagne." Boudreau reported that a document she obtained suggested O'Keefe would also use props including a "condom jar," Viagra, pornography, a ceiling mirror, and "fuzzy handcuffs." The document explained the motivation: "The joke is that the tables have turned on CNN. Using hot blondes to seduce interviewees to get screwed on television, you are faux seducing her in order to screw her on television." O'Keefe later claimed that he had been "repulsed" by the scenario laid out in the document when it was presented to him, and that it did not represent his actual plan for the interview.
O'Keefe reportedly planned to "seduce" and publically humiliate CNN investigative reporter Abbie Bourdeau. In anarticle posted at CNN.com, Bourdeau reported that when she arrived for an interview with O'Keefe, she was informed by O'Keefe's colleague Izzy Santa that O'Keefe planned to lure her aboard a boat where he would secretly record his attempts to "hit on her" using "strawberries and champagne." Boudreau reported that a document she obtained suggested O'Keefe would also use props including a "condom jar," Viagra, pornography, a ceiling mirror, and "fuzzy handcuffs." The document explained the motivation: "The joke is that the tables have turned on CNN. Using hot blondes to seduce interviewees to get screwed on television, you are faux seducing her in order to screw her on television." O'Keefe later claimed that he had been "repulsed" by the scenario laid out in the document when it was presented to him, and that it did not represent his actual plan for the interview.
Given his record of systematically misleading people about his videos and his use of other dishonest tactics, it makes no sense for people to take him at his word. That should be kept in mind as details emerge about what, exactly, happened.
Okay... when are people going to stop falling for this stuff? Can't they see the pattern?
Some republican troglodyte activist with a camcorder targets a "Liberal" organization and tries to set up a sting. When they fail to get the damning evidence they need, they just edit the footage until it serves their purpose. Now enters Breitbart and O'Keefe.
Breitbart and O'Keefe are linked together tighter than two cousins seeking marriage at a family reunion. These escapades and shenanigans are the moral fiber of Breitbart and O'Keefe. No sleaze is bad enough for these two. Both of these radical teas have been on this guerrilla marketing campaign for quite awhile.
After watching a portion of the video on youtube (sorry, we found it mostly tedious and boring), I'm lost as to what horrific things these NPR executives said. Because you may not agree with NPR and their positions doesn't mean your undercover covert reporting has any relevance! When does thought become evidence, prima facie, of criminal intent?
Did NPR lie about the tea bags being racist? Absolutely not! Are tea bags scary, no doubt in this bloggers mind! If you doubt these claims visit a local tea bag session for your one time dose of radical ideology.
On NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday morning, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) — chair of the House Tea Party Caucus and potential 2012 presidential candidate — said that she opposes a government shutdown. Gridlock during upcoming votes on federal budgets and the debt ceiling could lead to a shutdown, and host David Gregory asked Bachmann if she agreed with White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley, who said earlier in the program he was “hopeful” a shutdown could be avoided. “Well, I’m hopeful,” Bachmann said. “I don’t think anyone wants to see the government shutdown.” Watch it here at NFTOS:
This stance is consistent with Bachmann’s earlier public record on a government shutdown, which she has warned would be undesirable. “To me a shutdown is an admission of failure that we have not been able to come together and get our work done,” Bachmann told The Hill last month.
However, one obvious fact — that Gregory failed to mention — undercuts Bachmann’s anti-shutdown message. Only days ago, she opposed continued funding of the government because the funding bill did not completely remove federal funding for Planned Parenthood.
On Tuesday, the House passed,without Bachmann’s vote, a continuing resolution that funded the government for 18 more days. The Senate passed the resolution Wednesday morning, and Obama signed it later that afternoon, less than 48 hours before government funding would have expired.
Bachmann "Welfare Queen"
Hours after the vote, Bachmann told anti-abortion activists she opposed the resolution because it supposedly allowed federal funding of abortion by not stripping Planned Parenthood appropriations, and because it didn’t completely defund health care reform. “For me personally, there were a few of us who voted ‘no’ on the continuing resolution… because it did not defund implementing ‘Obamacare’ because, as you know, ‘Obamacare’ will allow for taxpayer-funded abortions for the first time in history of the nation,” she said. “We shouldn’t have one red cent go for Planned Parenthood,” she added. (For the record, health care reform does not fund any abortion services because the Hyde Amendment already prohibits it; the same is true with Planned Parenthood funding).
If the House resolution that Bachmann opposed did fail, it’s virtually certain the government would have shut down. Bachmann may be backing away from direct calls for a government shutdown simply because it would be politically harmful: a poll this week showed a large plurality of Americans would blame Republicans for a shutdown. But her actions — motivated by fealty to far-right activists — speak louder than her words.
This type of nonsense is typical for the lunatic known as Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN). Ms. Bachmann is so ill-informed on so many levels; NFTOS believes that she must be an embarrassment to the District to which she represents. One would think that if the electorate is not embarrassed, they must be as ill-informed as she is.
Ms. Bachman appears to be a bigger socialist than Fidel Castro. She has been on the corporate farm welfare dole for a very long time. Her business could not exist without government handouts, nor could it ever compete on the global market. Therefore she is unlikely to kill her own cash cow.
Sunday's antics are just more grandstanding to appease her medieval support base.
NFTOS
(portions of blog brought to you by thinkprogress)
The list of issues causing bitter divisions among Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill has a new entry: biodegradable cups.
When the House returns Monday from a week-long recess, members and staffers will see something that hasn’t been in the Capitol for four years: Styrofoam.
In the first move toward phasing out part of Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) “Green the Capitol” program, polystyrene cups were reintroduced this week as an option for coffee drinkers in the Capitol Carry-Out, the building’s mini-cafeteria.
The basement eatery had been part of Pelosi’s “Greening” program since 2007, when Democrats took control of the House. The program brought climate-friendly vending machines and compact fluorescent lightbulbs to the Capitol; caused the Capitol Power Plant to switch from burning coal to natural gas; and reduced energy and water consumption in Capitol buildings by 23 percent and 32 percent, respectively, according to an April 2010 report
“‘Foamed polystyrene’ is a miraculous invention that manages to be completely awful through every step of its near-eternal ‘life cycle’ — it is manufactured with petroleum that must be imported from Middle East dictatorships, toxic ‘styrene oligomers’ migrate into the food it holds, it’s highly flammable and produces black poisonous smoke, and most of the 25 billion polystyrene cups tossed every year will take more than half a millennium to degrade. And that’s why the Republican-led House of Representatives made it an immediate priority to cancel the House cafeteria’s four years of biodegradable food and beverage packaging.”
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), not surprisingly, isn’t happy, noting that the new Republican policy will send 535 more tons of waste to landfills.
Part of me wonders if the GOP policy brought back the environmentally-irresponsible cups just to annoy Pelosi, or if Republicans are choosing to thumb their noses at “green” policies, just because it makes them feel better about themselves.
In a script that would have even made Scott Walker look good, and in what could be described as one of the sleaziest legislative moves we here at NFTOS have ever seen, the republicans in the Ohio senate jammed through their union busting SB5, but only after removing two Republicans on two separate committees who were opposed to it in order to get it to the Senate floor.
Firemen fighting for their rights
While the eyes of the nation have been transfixed on the uprising in Wisconsin, Republicans in Ohio have used an unprecedented parliamentary maneuver to railroad their own version of a union busting bill through the legislature. The unpopular measure known as SB5 makes public sector strikes illegal and mirrors a savage assault on workers planned throughout the country.
The former attorney General of Ohio explains what happens in Ohio with the corporate tax cut:
"A dozen cookies are put down in front of a CEO, a Tea Partier, and a union member. The CEO grabs 11 then says to the Tea Partier, “That union guy wants your cookie”.
SB5 passed by a razor thin 17-16 vote, with 6 Republicans switching sides and voting with Democrats against the bill. Before the vote could take place, SB5 had to clear 2 committees where it didn’t have the votes needed.
That is the point where Senate President Tom Niehaus (R) did something never before done: he made the autocratic decision to remove 1 sympathetic Republican from each committee that was against the measure and replaced them with a Republican Senator that supported it. Niehaus pulled Sen. Bill Seitz (R-Cincinnati) off the Ohio state Senate’s Commerce, Insurance and Labor Committee without warning or Message, which violated Senate Rule 19, replacing him with a an anti-union loyalist Senator Cliff Hite (R-Findlay). This allowed a 7-5 vote for the measure.
Plutocracy: rule by the wealthy, or power provided by wealth.
Oligarchy: a form of power structure in which power effectively rests with a small number of people.
Plutocracy + Oligarchy = Plutarchy
Repeating this autocratic move a second time, Niehaus also ordered the removal of Sen. Scott Oelslager (R-North Canton) from the Senate Rules Committee to avoid a split vote.Two decrees to strip committee membership and replace with loyalists is unheard of in the history of American politics.
This Starve The Beast pattern is familiar in many states at the moment, where new republican majorities elected to state legislatures as part of the astroturfed Tea Party movement are trying to railroad pro-corporate, pro-rich legislation through chambers at the expense of workers, often in very large bills with little time given to debate or discussion.
This is characteristic of the national policies as well, that have seen a huge ballooning of the national debt under every republican administration in the last 30 years except Clinton. Tax cuts for the rich and corporations paid for on the backs of the poor and the middle class: America is getting a classic case of buyer’s remorse.
There is a reason for this "strong armed robbery" and lead tea bag Jim DeMint states it best:
"Unions are the most powerful political group in our country today. Their power in politics is unprecedented. AND WITHOUT UNIONS, THE DEMOCRAT PARTY FADES AWAY".
Well there you have fellow progressives, the radical right wing agenda is displayed for our very own eyes.
Did you see the NBC/WSJ poll out in the above clip (a must see). Clearly Americans are feed up with the choke and puke politics by these right-wing-nut-jobs.
If we do not allow our voices to be heard, then the freight train called the "tea bag express", which is more powerful than a locomotive, will annihilate the left quicker than a speeding bullet.
If we listen to "economist" like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Dana Loesch, Sean Hannity.....er what a minute, those folks aren't economist are they? No they are not, but if you where too listen to their daily diatribes on the US economy and its woes, their fingers would point directly at unions, teachers, fireman and police for the states monetary plights.
In reality readers this concept or ideology couldn't be further from the truth. States total budget deficits account for 175 billion dollars through 2013 and these states can't print money like the feds can. This means Governors like Wisconsin's Scott "Koch whore" Walker target unions and teachers with their plan too satisfy their 3.6 billion dollar budget shortfall.
All this while most choose stunningly to turn a blind eye (to include MSM) to the mounting evidence of recklessness and outright fraud on Wall Street, that fraud which is responsible for the massive spikes in unemployment and the massive decline in US housing - you add these two things together - this is what's called revenue in America, our tax revenue is driven by the value of your housing stock and the level of economic activity employment in your state and in our country.
So shame on those whom indulge a system that would torpedo the foundation of American finance, housing and unemployment - let those who caused this problem go "Scott" free, and then try to take this out on the nations unions and teachers.
"The pension plan is the direct result of deferred compensation- money that employees would have been paid as cash salary but choose, instead, to have placed in the state operated pension fund where the money can be professionally invested (at a lower cost of management) for the future.
Many of us are familiar with the concept of deferred compensation from reading about the latest multi-million dollar deal with some professional athlete. As a means of allowing their ball club to have enough money to operate, lowering their own tax obligations and for other benefits, ball players often defer payment of money they are to be paid to a later date. In the meantime, that money is invested for the ball player’s benefit and then paid over at the time and in the manner agreed to in the contract between the parties.
Does anyone believe that, in the case of the ball player, the deferred money belongs to the club owner rather than the ball player? Is the owner simply providing this money to the athlete as some sort of gift? Of course not. The money is salary to be paid to the ball player, deferred for receipt at a later date."
Walker seems to follow the path of a pathological liar. Time and again Scott Walker has aggressively neglected the facts about Wisconsin's budget woes. InWalker's attempt to maintain good standing with the puppet masters he failed to account for one major variable....fact checking.
As soon as time permits Wisconsinite's need to recall Scott Walker. Many residents of Wisconsin are suffering from "buyer's remorse".
A "do-over" is indeed in order for Wisconsinite's. Please exit the door Mr. Governor, and don't let the door hit you where the good Lord split you.
Just because Green Bay is the all-time very best Super Bowel-winning cheese-making state doesn't mean you know how to govern Scott.
What has happened to reason? What has happened to common sense? When it comes to radical tea bag ideology, these two concepts rarely seem to exist.
Today at 5 pm EST Governor Walker will give his budget speech to fellow Wisconsinites.
As the standoff between the Main Street Movement and Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) continues for the twelfth day, much of the media coverage — and anger — from both sides has focused on Walker’s efforts to strip Wisconsin public workers of their right to collective bargaining. But Walker’s assault on public employees is only one part of a larger political program that aims to give corporations free reign in the state while dismantling the healthcare programs, environmental regulations, and good government laws that protect Wisconsin’s middle and working class. These lesser known proposals in the 144-page bill reveals how radical Walker’s plan actually is. Here is why the governor is blocking access to the capitol building, here is what Scotty doesn't want marchers and protestors to hear:
1. ELIMINATING MEDICAID: The Budget Repair Bill includes a little-known provision that would put complete control of the state’s Medicaid program, known as BadgerCare, in the hands of the state’sultra-conservative Health and Human Services Secretary Dennis Smith. Smith would have the authority to “to override state Medicaid laws as [he] sees fit and institute sweeping changes” including reducing benefits and limiting eligibility. Ironically, during the 1990s it was Republicans, especially former Gov. and Bush HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson, who helped develop BadgerCare into one of the country’s most innovative and generous Medicaid programs. A decade later, a new generation of radical Republicans is hoping to destroy one of Wisconsin’s “success stories.”
2. POWER PLANT PRIVATIZATION AND ENVIRONMENTAL NEGLECT: The same budget bill calls for a rapid no-bid “firesale” of all state-owned power plants. One progressive blogger called the proposal “a highlight reel of all of the tomahawk dunks of neo-Gilded Age corporatism: privatization, no-bid contracts, deregulation, and naked cronyism” and suggested that the provision will open the way for large, politically connected corporations to buy up the state’s power plants on the cheap. While it’s unclear whether corporations would be interested in buying the plants, a similar proposal was vetoed six years ago by Gov. Jim Doyle (D), who called the plan fiscally and environmentally irresponsible. Many of Wisconsin’s power plants are in violation of federal clean air regulations and desperately need to be upgraded and cleaned up — not dumped into the private sector.
3. DANGEROUS DRINKING WATER: Republican lawmakers have introduced bills in both the Senate and the House which would repeal a rule requiring municipal governments to disinfect their water. Conservatives have said that the clean water rule — which went into effect in December — is simply too expensive. Yet the rule only affects 12 percent of municipalities and the price may be worth it. In 1993, 104 people died and 400,000 fell sick when the Milwaukee water supply became infected. Even two decades later, the Environmental Protection Agency Advisory Board notes that 13 percent of acute gastro-intestinal illnesses in municipalities that don’t disinfect their water supplies are the result of dirty water. Municipalities can keep their water clean for as low as $10,000 per well — but apparently for the Wisconsin GOP that is too high a price to pay to keep citizens safe from deadly microorganisms.
4. DESTROYING WETLANDS: In January, Walker’s proposed regulatory reform bill exempted a parcel of wetland owned by a Republican donor from water quality standards. But the exemption was more than just an embarrassing giveaway to a GOP ally: environmental groups believe the bill’s special provision would actually affect the entire county, eliminating public hearings on proposed wetland development, short-circuiting approval of development projects, and disrupting the region’s water system.
5. FISCAL IRRESPONSIBILITY: Walker signed a bill this week requiring a 2/3 supermajority in the legislature to pass any tax increase. Republican lawmakers are now reportedly considering a constitutional amendment that would make the rule permanent. A similar constitutional amendment in California has been called the “source of misery” of that state’s crippling budget crisis and has forced lawmakers to “gut public education, slash social services and health care programs, close prisons, and lay off record numbers of public employees.” While claiming to “make a commitment to the future instead of [choosing] dire consequences for our children” Walker and GOP lawmakers are instead putting generations of Wisconsinites in a “fiscal strait-jacket.”
6. DISENFRANCHISING VOTERS: This week, Republican lawmakers moved forward on a bill that would require voters to present a photo ID from the DMV at the polls, making it significantly more difficult for the elderly, the disabled, college students, and rural residents to participate in elections. While Republican lawmakers insist the bill is necessary to prevent voter fraud, there have been almost no documented cases of fraudulent voting in the state. Instead, the Wisconsin State Journal writes, the GOP bill is going “overboard in limiting ballot access in a state proud of its long history of high participation in elections.”
7. CUTTING JOBS, LOSING THE FUTURE: Last fall, Walker killed an $810 billion federally funded high-speed rail project, forcing the Transportation Department to pull its funding. Walker’s decision killed 130,000 expected jobs and forced the Spanish company Talgo to close its Milwaukee factory and layoff its 40 person staff. A spokeswoman for the company told The Daily Reporter that “the state’s decision to back away from the high-speed rail project sends a terrible message to businesses considering locating in the state.”
8. STIFLING INNOVATION: In late January, Walker introduced a bill that would ban wind-powered energy from Wisconsin and exacerbate the state’s dependence on out-of-state coal. If passed, it’s estimated that the law would immediately eliminate $1.8 billion in new wind power investments and jeopardize eleven currently proposed wind projects. After a public outcry earlier this month, Walker’s bill is (for now) dead.
9. “NAKED POWER GRAB”: Earlier this month in a party-line vote, the legislature ceded “extraordinary control” of the state’s rule-making oversight process to the governor. Walker now has complete power to draft agency rules which the legislature must then either approve or reject. The law gives Walker the power to write rules for formerly independent state agencies like the state Departments of Justice and Education — and most ominously the Government Accountability Board, the state’s ethics watchdog.
10. POLITICIZING STATE AGENCIES: A provision in Walker’s budget repair bill would convert thirty-seven state employees from civil servants to political appointees —
Republican Disease
Republicans often suffer from foot-in-mouth disease. Why is that you ask? This disease forms when one constantly exhibits diarrhea of the mouth and constipation of the brain. Its clear that Walker's "budget" proposal is the model of radical right wing leadership.
The above plan looks like a script created and formulated by Koch Industries as they seem best suited to gain the most fruit from this less than bountiful tree.
Walker in his childlike giddiness to be the next Ronnie Reagan exemplifies what old school republicans are not - a extremely racial group.
Walker's efforts to undercut the unions is just the tip of the iceberg, and his framed assault on the states residents will hopefully be quashed with a resounding thud.
NFTOS THINKS' Bill Clinton should be allowed to be President again... Remember when he left us with a balanced budget?
NFTOS Thinks' the attack on teachers across this country is reprehensible...
NFTOS THINKS' the attack on unions is a right wing attempt to destroy the Democratic backbone.
NFTOS THINKS' Hilary Clinton will some day be the nation's first female Vice President...
NFTOS THINKS' it's tragic the way the tea bags ignore the climate change...
NFTOS THINKS' it's somewhat shocking that the USA is still so dependent on oil...
NFTOS THINKS' that Faux News should be held accountable for its lies and actions...
NFTOS THINKS' that Glen Beck-istan, Dana Loesch, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Andy Breitbart should be shipped off to some war torn country and then forced to defend "their" country....then maybe they will have a better understanding and outlook on "their" country..
NFTOS THINKS' that the republican tea baggers should be forced to get an education prior to them opening there mouths...
NFTOS THINKS' that Michele Bachmann, Christine O'Donnell, Sharon Angle, John Boehner, Mitch McConnell, Scott Walker, are dimwitted muttonheads of epic proportions.....
NFTOS THINKS' that the Chamber of Commerce and Koch Industries need to step away from imposing their business ideologies on politics...
NFTOS THINKS' republicans need to learn to speak for themselves and not their puppet masters..i.e. Rupert Murdock and David Koch...
NFTOS THINKS' that it is the woman's prerogative whether to not abort or not...especially in cases of rape and incest!!!!
NFTOS THINKS' that Democrats are for the working man and Republicans are for the Businessman......
NFTOS THINKS' Democrats think for themselves and Republicans do what they're told.
NFTOS THINKS' that republicans should study and understand the constitution prior to invoking everything is "un-constitutional".....
NFTOS THINKS' that's enough of thinking for the day.....
