Poll Confirms: Tea Party Movement a Greater Threat to Republicans Than to Democrats

New Demographic Survey Finds Tea Party Movement Is Essentially the GOP's Voter Base: Affluent, Overwhelmingly White, Predominantly Male, Mostly Middle-Aged and Older, Fiercely Conservative -- and, At Only 18 Percent of the Electorate, More Likely to Wreak Havoc in the Spring Republican Primaries Than in the November General Election



Tea Party protesters march through Washington, D.C. last September. Strong anecdotal evidence, based on attendance at its rallies across the country, that the Tea Party movement does not represent a broad demographic cross-section of the American electorate were confirmed last week by a new survey of the movement by The New York Times and CBS News that found that Tea Party supporters are overwhelmingly white, predominantly male, middle-aged and older, fiercely conservative and heavily Republican -- essentially the GOP's electoral base. The survey also found that the Tea Party movement, which comprises less than a fifth of the total nationwide electorate (18 percent), is economically more affluent than the general U.S. population. (Photo: Aaron Wiener/The Washington Independent)


(Posted 5:00 a.m. EDT Tuesday, April 20, 2010)

By SKEETER SANDERS

Who's afraid of the big, bad Tea Party movement?

If you guessed the Democrats, you'd be dead wrong. On the contrary, it's the Republicans who need to be worried.

A new demographic survey of the Tea Party movement released last week by The New York Times and CBS News confirms what many observers of Tea Party rallies have said anecdotally about the movement: That it does not represent a broad cross-section of the American electorate, let alone a majority.

To the contrary, the movement more closely resembles the electoral base of today's Republican Party: Overwhelmingly white (89 percent), predominantly male (59 percent), mostly middle-aged and older (75 percent) and fiercely conservative (73 percent).

And while a separate poll by the Pew Center for the People and the Press released Monday shows that 80 percent of Americans overall are highly critical of government, a clear partisan divide exists over whether the public considers the government to be a threat to them.

More Republicans (30 percent) than Democrats (nine percent) and independents (25 percent) are angry with government, the Pew survey found, with 43 percent of Republicans, 18 percent of Democrats and 33 percent of independents believe the government is a threat to them.

Significantly, the Pew study found, independents who lean Republican are far more hostile toward government (37 percent angry, 50 percent feeling threatened) than independents who lean Democratic (15 percent angry, 21 percent feeling threatened).

Tea Party supporters are by far the most angry and hostile toward government, with 43 percent of Tea Party supporters angry and a stunning 57 percent of them feeling threatened.

REPUBLICANS IN CONGRESS FARING WORSE THAN DEMOCRATS -- BUT NOT BY MUCH

Chief reasons for the ill feelings are economic fears wrought by the recession and high unemployment and frustration with the partisan gridlock in Washington -- the latter of which has resulted in record-high negative ratings for Congress.

Only 40 percent of Democrats have faith in their elected representatives in Congress, the lowest positive rating by the majority party in the history of the Pew survey. But the GOP fares worse, with only 37 percent of Republicans expressing faith in their congressional representatives.

This is bad news for the GOP, for it means that the Tea Party movement, rather than pose a threat to Democrats in next fall's midterm elections, is more likely to wreak havoc in the upcoming Republican primaries this spring -- most of which are closed to independent voters.

The likely result is a Republican Party going into the November election saddled with hard-line right-wing nominees sure, particularly in Senate races, to turn off moderate voters -- whose support is absolutely vital in order for the minority party to win back control of Congress.

Already, two GOP stalwarts -- Florida Governor Charlie Crist and Arizona Senator John McCain -- are in serious danger of suffering humiliating primary defeats at the hands of Tea Party-backed insurgents.

Crist has fallen behind conservative Florida House speaker Marco Rubio in the GOP primary and is reported to be seriously considering running as an independent in November. McCain -- the 2008 GOP presidential nominee -- is fighting for his political life against right-wing radio talk-show host J.D. Hayworth, with a new Rasmussen Poll showing McCain leading Hayworth by only five points, 47-42 percent, down from a 48-41 percent lead in March.

SCORES OF TEA PARTIERS MOUNTING STIFF PRIMARY CHALLENGES TO GOP REGULARS

Crist and McCain are far from alone. Scores of other GOP incumbents and party establishment-backed Republican candidates in open races are also confronting right-wing Tea Party-backed primary challengers.

In Kentucky, Tea Party-backed candidate Rand Paul, the 47-year-old son of Representative Ron Paul (R-Texas), is favored to win the state's May 18 GOP Senate primary against GOP establishment candidate Trey Grayson, the Kentucky secretary of state. "There's a Tea Party tidal wave coming, and when it comes, it's going to sweep a lot of people out," Grayson told the McClatchy Newspapers.

In the Democratic primary, state Attorney General Jack Conway is battling Lieutenant Governor Daniel Mongiardo. Recent polls show Conway and Mongiardo running neck and neck, while Paul holds a commanding 15-point lead over Grayson.

State Republican leaders fear that a primary victory by Paul -- who's considerably to the right of Grayson -- could lead to a loss of the Senate seat now held by the retiring Jim Bunning to the Democratic nominee in the fall election. Bunning has endorsed Paul. Grayson was endorsed by former Vice President Dick Cheney as "the real conservative" in the race.

Even Fox News -- now embroiled in a conflict-of-interest scandal involving talk-show host Sean Hannity's open promotion of a Tea Party event he planned to participate in, only to pull out at the last minute on the orders of Fox News executives -- has, ironically, taken note of the growing Tea Party threat to the Republicans.

Appearing on Glenn Beck's program in March, former Bush political guru Karl Rove said that "The Republican Party, like any party that doesn't control the White House, will not have a single voice or a single leader until the 2012 presidential election, and frankly, I don't want one person [in that position] now."

Beck expressed his fear that the Tea Party movement could ultimately coalesce into a third major political party in its own right -- at the GOP's expense. Noting that independents now outnumber both Democrats and Republicans, "I think that having a third party -- it could be a nightmare [for the Republicans]," he said. "There are so many conservatives who are saying 'Please, Republicans, get your stuff together!'"

SURVEY FINDS NEAR-TOTAL LACK OF DIVERSITY IN TEA PARTY MOVEMENT

Only one percent of Tea Party members are African-American, Times/CBS News survey found -- a figure much lower than the four percent of blacks who identify as Republicans. Ditto for Asian-Americans. The survey did not specifically identify Latinos in the movement, instead listing six percent of Tea Party members as "other."

Given the incendiary anti-Latino and anti-immigrant rhetoric by former Representative Tom Tancredo (R-Colorado) at the recent Tea Party convention in Nashville (Not to mention a fiercely personal attack by Tancredo on President Obama at a Tea Party rally in South Carolina that's been roundly condemned as racist) -- as well as extremely inflammatory rhetoric and signs at other Tea Party protests in recent months -- it's easy to see why blacks and Latinos are, for the most part, shunning the movement like the plague.

More than a third of Tea Party members hail from the Deep South -- where support for the GOP and opposition to Obama is strongest. Not surprisingly, Tea Partiers are far more hostile toward the president than the electorate as a whole. Only seven percent of Tea Party supporters approve of the president's job performance (compared to 50 percent of voters overall), while a whopping 88 percent of Tea Partiers disapprove (compared to 40 percent of voters overall).

SURVEY REVEALS SHARP CLASS DIVIDE BETWEEN TEA PARTIERS, VOTERS IN GENERAL

Significantly, the survey found that Tea Party members are more affluent economically than the nation as a whole, with more than half earning more than $50,000 a year and a fifth earning more than $100,000 a year. Twelve percent of Tea Party supporters earn more than $250,000 a year -- precisely the income brackets whose taxes are going up, while everyone earning less than that are seeing their taxes go down.

In sharp contrast, the survey found, voters in general were considerably less affluent than Tea Party supporters. While 35 percent of Tea Partiers earned less than $50,000 a year, nearly half of voters in general (48 percent) fall into that category. Only 25 percent of voters in general earn more than $100,000 a year compared to the 32 percent of Tea Partiers in that category.

The Times/CBS News survey found several telltale signs of class bias: While 54 percent of voters in general said that raising taxes on those earning more than $250,000 a year was a good idea, a whopping 80 percent of Tea Party supporters said it was a bad idea.

And while voters in general were evenly divided on whether the Obama administration favors the poor or treats all classes equally (27 percent each), Tea Party supporters were quite adamant (56 percent) in their belief that the administration favored the poor. Only nine percent of Tea Party supporters felt the administration was treating all classes equally.

OTHER SHARP DIFFERENCES BETWEEN TEA PARTIERS, GENERAL ELECTORATE

The figures stand in sharp contrast to voters in general in the Times/CBS News poll, 77 percent of whom identify as white, 12 percent black, three percent Asian and seven percent "other" (presumably Latino).

Fifty-one percent of voters in general are women, while 49 percent are men. In terms of age, the general electorate is evenly split, 50-50, between those under 45 and those over 45.

While 73 percent of Tea Party supporters identify as conservative, only 34 percent of voters in general do. Thirty-eight percent of voters in general identify themselves as moderate (compared to only 20 percent of Tea Party supporters) and 20 percent of voters in general identify as liberal (compared to only four percent of Tea Party supporters).

At Tea Party rallies across the country, activists have boldly asserted that their movement represents "the majority of the American people." But the Times/CBS News survey shows that only 18 percent of Americans identify with the Tea Party movement.

And with Tea Party supporters coming largely from the ranks of Republicans -- who themselves constitute only 23 percent of the electorate -- it's difficult to see how this movement can pose a threat to the Democrats in November, especially if, for the rest of this year, the economy picks up and joblessness goes down.

# # #

Volume V, Number 18
Copyright 2010, Skeeter Sanders. All rights reserved.

Let The Sun Shine In......

Financial Reform Goes Full Tilt

Monday, April 19, 2010

Democrats Call Out GOP Leaders On Wall Street Dealings 

With the Senate planning to begin debate this week on the largest regulatory overhaul of the financial industry since the Great Depression, Democrats are demanding that GOP divulge details of "backroom negotiations" with Wall Street executives.

Advocates of reform, both inside and outside the Senate, are pushing the chamber to adopt the strongest possible measures to regulate banks and financial institutions so as to give consumers the most protection possible.

"With the announcement that the Senate is now scheduled to begin floor debate on a comprehensive financial regulatory reform package this week, we urge Senators to enact real reform to protect Americans and our financial system," says John Morton, managing director of the Pew Economic Policy Group, a division of The Pew Charitable Trusts that promotes policies and practices that strengthen the U.S. economy. "Senators from both sides of the aisle can and should work together to pass a final bill that: creates an early warning system; ends 'Too Big To Fail' and bailouts; increases transparency in markets; and provides meaningful consumer protections. Financial reform must significantly reduce the likelihood of future crises and ensure that, should a crisis occur, the American taxpayer is not left covering the tab."

Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, a left-leaning independent who led an unsuccessful campaign to deny Ben Bernanke a second term at the head of the Federal Reserve, outlined the four provisions that he thinks are needed provisions in a final financial reform bill.

Financial reform is another high priority for President Obama, and the legislation that the Senate will vote on is a package put together by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.

“Disgust at Wall Street is profound. The American people want us to change in a very profound way how Wall Street functions, and Congress must deliver,” Sanders says, adding that he would offer amendments to the Dodd bill.

Although Dodd had worked with key GOP senators in crafting his reform bill, including Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama, the ranking Republican on Banking, no Republicans have thus far been willing to support the Senate bill.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, however, cited public comments by Shelby who has indicated that Republicans could agree on 70 to 80 percent of the Dodd proposal.

“Holding big banks accountable for the enormous economic crisis of recent years is about more than dollars and cents. It is about fairness and justice. It’s also about learning lessons from the mistakes of the past so we are not bound to repeat them,” Reid says in remarks Monday on the Senate floor.

The Senate majority leader also notes that federal regulators last week began legal action against the firm Goldman Sachs for allegedly illegal, fraudulent dealings that contributed to the 2008 financial meltdown.

Reid and his spokesman each called out Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) for "secret" meetings with Wall Street executives eager to derail the new reforms. Cornyn is chairman of the Senate GOP campaign operation. Republicans reportedly for months have been seeking campaign contributions from the financial industry in exchange for working to kill the reform legislation.

“Republicans also refuse to admit whose side they’re on,” Reid says. “Earlier this month, the Republican Leader and the head of the Republicans’ Senate campaign committee went to Wall Street. They met with the bankers and hedge-fund managers who benefited more than anyone from the broken system and are trying harder than anyone to stop us from fixing it.”

In a separate statement and citing television news interviews (video), Reid spokesman Jim Manley says McConnell and Cornyn refuse to disclose just what they have said in their talks with bankers behind closed doors. Prior to dissatisfaction due to financial reform, Wall Street executives generally gave more in recent years to Democrats.

“Senators McConnell and Cornyn should immediately reveal what they discussed earlier this month during secret, closed-door meeting with Wall Street executives in New York City,” Manley says. “Years of greed and excess on Wall Street cost 8 million jobs and trillions in wealth for middle-class families and small businesses. Since Republicans appear to be conducting backroom negotiations with these same people who took our economy to the brink of collapse, the public deserves to know what secret deals and carve-outs Republicans are offering Wall Street executives in exchange for their support.”

Let The Sun Shine In......

Junior staffer big GOP buyer

By Adam C. Smith, Times Political Editor

Published Friday, April 9, 2010

---

She was a 25-year-old junior staffer when the Florida Republican Party gave her an American Express card.

Over the next 2½ years, nearly $1.3 million in charges wound up on Melanie Phister's AmEx — $40,000 at a London hotel, and nearly $20,000 in plane tickets for indicted former House Speaker Ray Sansom, his wife and kids, for starters. Statements show thousands spent on jewelry, sporting goods and in one case $15,000 for what's listed as a month-long stay at a posh Miami Beach hotel, but which the party says was a forfeited deposit.

The credit card records, obtained by the St. Petersburg Times and Miami Herald, offer the latest behind-the-scenes look at extravagant and free-wheeling spending by the party touting fiscal restraint. Not only did certain elite legislative leaders have their own party credit cards to spend donors' money with little oversight, but Phister's records show these leaders also liberally used an underling's card — without her knowledge, she says.

"I did not have the sole discretion to initiate credit card spending," Phister said in an e-mail statement. "Over that period of time, there were multiple instances when the card was used to make purchases that I had no knowledge of, and I did not regularly review the monthly credit card statements which I understand were sent directly to the Party's accounting office."

Even after a series of embarrassing revelations over profligate credit card spending by the likes of Republican U.S. Senate frontrunner Marco Rubio, Sansom and incoming House Speaker Dean Cannon — and pending state and federal investigations of party finances — revelations of the huge charges on Phister's card had veteran GOP fundraisers apoplectic.

"Oh my God. I can't believe it,'' said Al Hoffman, a top fundraiser from Fort Myers, when told of the $1.258 million on Phister's card. "See, that's it. They have an underling do it all. There's no reason a young assistant should be ringing up charges like that."

Phister served as finance director for state House campaigns for 2½ years starting in mid 2006.

She was a Republican Party employee who mainly answered to Sansom, R-Destin, speaker-designate at the time and overseeing House campaign operations. The job involved planning fundraising events and often accompanying Sansom and other legislative leaders on fundraising and other political trips.

Sansom was indicted by a grand jury last year for inserting $6 million into the state budget for an airport building that a friend and GOP contributor, Jay Odom, wanted to use as an airplane hangar. That criminal investigation revealed that Sansom charged more than $170,000 on his party-issued credit card — everything from plane tickets for his family to clothes to electronics.

Turns out Sansom spent heavily on Phister's card as well.

Her credit card statements include at least four sets of plane tickets for Sansom, his wife and four kids. He also ordered Phister to accompany him on a trade trip to London in the summer of 2008. Phister brought her mother along at Sansom's encouragement, and Phister's GOP AmEx saw plenty of action: nearly $40,000 at a London hotel, and more than $3,600 in sightseeing expenses.

"I can't believe it. Someone should be hanged for that," Mark Guzzetta, a Boca Raton developer who has raised millions of dollars for Republicans, said of the party allowing so much spending on a low-level staffer's card.

Republican legislative leaders during that period were raising many millions of dollars, and they note that it costs money to raise money. So such Phister expenses as $1,200 for Broadway tickets in New York, or $19,000 at the Water Club restaurant during a different New York City trip may have been for evenings that raised many times that much.

Neither Phister nor the party would discuss the credit card statements in detail, citing pending state and criminal federal investigations into its financial activities as well as an exhaustive "forensic audit" of party spending about to get under way.

"The Republican Party of Florida has hired the firm Alston +Bird LLP to conduct an independent forensic investigation of the party's finances. Members of the firm's Special Matters and Investigations staff will review questionable credit card expenses to determine whether or not the party may have been the victim of improper financial dealings,'' said Florida Republican Party spokeswoman Katie Betta.

"If the audit reveals any inappropriate expenses that have not been reimbursed to the party, we will seek to collect compensation from the individuals who incurred the expense."
Judging what's an appropriate expense may be subjective.

For instance, Phister's AmEx shows $10,000 to a watch company in California in August 2008. Republican donors paid for Sansom to present every legislator, Democrat and Republican alike, with a memento watch.

Phister's card paid for nearly $650,000 in lodging, $60,000 in airfare — mostly commercial airlines — and $66,000 for charter planes. The statements show Republican donors also paid for plane tickets to Germany for Phister and her mother.

Phister declined to discuss those tickets, though the party said the trip was part of the expense of accompanying Sansom to Europe. Now 28, Phister parlayed her insider access to become a well-funded public employee, now earning about $70,000 yearly working for the Florida House of Representatives as a scheduler for special projects.

The Florida Democratic Party requires staffers and leaders to use their own credit cards and seek reimbursement for appropriate expenses. That's now the practice at the Florida Republican Party, and fundraiser Hoffman suggested it's about time.

"My company, with 4,000 employees, nobody had credit cards,'' said Hoffman, a developer.

"If you wanted to expense, you had to submit a form with backup. . . . It wasn't one employee taking another out to eat and charging it all off."

Miami Herald staff writer Beth Reinhard and Times/Herald staff writer Marc Caputo contributed to this report. Adam Smith can be reached at asmith@sptimes.com.

© 2010 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times

Let The Sun Shine In......

GOP Still Looking For Leader

Unified by Opposition to Obama, GOP Still Seeks a Challenger

Sunday 11 April 2010

by: Steven Thomma  |  McClatchy Newspapers

 

Potential GOP candidates, clockwise from left: Mitt Romney, Sarah Palin, Tim Pawlenty and Newt Gingrich. (Image: Jared Rodriguez / t r u t h o u t; Adapted: talkradionews, geerlingguy, jurvetson, godsmac, Quasimondo, Staff Sgt. Jim Greenhill)

New Orleans - Southern Republicans wrapped up a three-day meeting in New Orleans Saturday unified in fervent opposition to President Barack Obama, but wide open at this early stage about whom they want to challenge him in 2012.

Party activists at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference cheered potential presidential candidates such as Newt Gingrich, Sarah Palin and Tim Pawlenty, as well as absentee Mitt Romney.

But they also readily volunteered objections to the same names: Gingrich has personal baggage, Palin's too inexperienced, Romney pushed Obama-like health care while governor of Massachusetts and Pawlenty lacks charisma.

Given those commonly heard objections among rank-and-file party workers, it appears that no potential Republican candidate can yet claim to be the heir apparent and the race could be wide open.

Take Palin, the former Alaska governor who headlined the recent convention of tea party activists.

She gave an impassioned speech to the Republicans, denouncing Obama's foreign policy and domestic agenda, particularly his energy policies. She favors more oil and gas drilling along U.S. coasts. She's said she may run.

"I'm for Palin," said Vance Martin, a Republican volunteer from Oklahoma City. "She has authenticity; she's a strong constitutionalist, and a fighter. She takes a hit and keeps on going."

Others also said they liked her, but said her work as a small town mayor and her half-term as governor were not enough experience to lead the party's charge against Obama, even if he also had scant experience before winning the presidency.

"She's great. But she lacks the experience," said Elmer Flucht of Maumelle, Arkansas, in a comment heard several times Saturday. "She's a heck of a lot better than the clown that's in there now, but she needs more experience."

"A great rah-rah gal," said Bonnie Re of Boca Raton, Florida. "But I don't think she's presidential. She's not worldly. She doesn't have a business sense. She needs more vetting, more experience."

Romney also had fans and detractors.

"He's a true statesman," said Re. "He's a brilliant businessman. Our country needs a businessman, especially right now."

But Romney in one way has the opposite problem as Palin - too much experience in his one term as governor, particularly his experience enacting a health care plan with a mandate that people get insurance that some Republicans find uncomfortably similar to the Obama plan they hate.

"He really hurt himself with the health care," said Flucht's wife, Mozella.

Martin of Oklahoma City had this critique of Romney: "He has a very clear grasp of economic issues. If we were the nominee, I'd support him. But I don't think he can win the nomination because of health care. He's the one who first pushed it in Massachusetts. That will be an albatross around his neck."

Romney did not appear at the gathering, saying a book tour kept him away.

Gingrich, the former House Speaker, used his speech to tear into Obama as the leader of "a secular, socialist machine." He said he'd decide next year whether to run.

"I hope he does run," said Elmer Flucht. "He's so knowledgeable. He has great experience. He has the ability to articulate them. He makes a lot of sense."

Several attendees lauded Gingrich for his intellect and his skills as a speaker. But several also questioned whether he could win.

"I like everything he says. He made a lot of good points we can use to elect candidates," said Judy Smith of Montgomery, Texas. "But Newt can't win. He has a lot of baggage. The way he left his first wife. Then the way he left the second wife."

Pawlenty, the second term governor of Minnesota, did not attend the conference, but spoke via videotape. Said Smith: "He doesn't have the charisma."

As attendees lined up to vote in the conference straw poll, one possible presidential candidate urged the party not to pay any attention to that contest until after the 2010 Congressional elections, which he said required their focus.

"I hope no one here spends one whiff thinking about the 2012 election," said Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour. "Don't get distracted by 2012....Don't take your eye off the ball."

Barbour also urged the conservatives not to tear themselves apart between tea party activists and Republicans.

"We cannot let ourselves be torn apart by the idea of purity," he said.

The results of the straw poll: Romney, 24 percent with 439 votes; Rep. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas, 24 percent with 438 votes; Palin, 18 percent with 330 votes; Gingrich, 18 percent with 321 votes; former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, 4 percent; Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana, 3 percent each, former Pennsylvania Rick Santorum, 2 percent; and former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson, 1 percent.

Editor's Note: McClatchy Newspapers updated the headline of this story, so we changed it accordingly. -mr/to

All republished content that appears on Truthout has been obtained by permission or license.

Let The Sun Shine In......

Replacing Justice Stevens

SUPREME COURT

Replacing Justice Stevens

On Friday, Justice John Paul Stevens, the longest-serving Supreme Court justice on the bench, announced that he would retire at the end of the term. President Obama, who has been preparing for an additional court vacancy for some time, suggested that he would name Steven's replacement in a matter of weeks. "We cannot replace Justice Stevens' experience or wisdom," Obama said in a brief statement. "I'll seek someone in the coming weeks with similar qualities: an independent mind, a record of excellence and integrity, a fierce dedication to the rule of law and a keen understanding of how the law affects the daily lives of the American people. It will also be someone who, like Justice Stevens, knows that in democracy powerful interests must not be allowed to drown out the voices of ordinary citizens." Stevens was a Republican named to the court in 1975 by President Gerald Ford and became the court's most liberal justice in the second half of his tenure, as the composition of the court grew more and more conservative. Obama described Stevens as a "brilliant, non-ideological, pragmatic" justice who "applied the Constitution and the laws of the land with fidelity and restraint." He said he hoped the Senate would make sure Stevens' successor is in place for the beginning of the court's new term in October.

STEVENS' LEGACY: In his more than three decades on the court, "Stevens leaves a legacy of defending abortion rights, expanding protection for gays, restricting the availability of the death penalty and ensuring a robust role for judges in interpreting the nation's laws and curbing executive power," the Washington Post notes. "He embraced affirmative action (after first questioning it); declared a belief that the death penalty is unconstitutional (after first voting to restore it); and supported protections for gays. He also defended abortion rights and opposed the notion that the Second Amendment guarantees a right to personal gun ownership." The decisions Stevens is likely to be remembered for most, however, are those he authored on national security and presidential power. He wrote the court's 5-3 decision "repudiating President Bush's assertion of unilateral executive power in setting up war crimes tribunals at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba," and he authored the court's 6-3 decision allowing the Guantanamo detainees to challenge their detentions in the U.S. courts. In one of his least known decisions, Stevens convinced his fellow justices that "VCRs did not violate copyright laws when used in the home to make a single copy for personal use," refuting Hollywood's push to ban the devices and punish both the manufacturer and the home user with fines for copyright infringement. Stevens' 1992 decision in Quill v. North Dakota -- which held that Internet vendors "are free from state-imposed duties to collect sales and use taxes" -- paved the way for the massive growth of companies like Amazon.com and other Internet retailers. His 1997 ruling overturning the Communications Decency Act protected the Internet from broadcast-like regulations which would have made it a felony "for even a news organization to post certain four-letter expletives." "Replacing Justice Stevens is harder because Stevens plays so many critical roles on the current court: He's the leader of the liberal wing, the best opinion writer on the court and, simultaneously, the justice most able to build surprising coalitions," Douglas Kendall, head of the liberal Constitutional Accountability Center, said. "When the justices vote in private conference, the senior justice speaks just after the chief justice. This has meant, especially in close, ideologically divisive cases, that Stevens has had a chance to counter the views of former chief justice William H. Rehnquist and current Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr."

THE SHORTLIST: Three candidates are rumored to sit atop Obama's shortlist to replace Stevens. "Solicitor General Elena Kagan, whom Obama appointed as the first woman to hold the post; Judge Diane P. Wood of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit in Chicago and Judge Merrick B. Garland of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit." Kagan, who some have argued is far more conservative than Stevens and could shift the political dynamic of the high court, is rapidly emerging as a frontrunner. Before becoming the first female Solicitor General in the nation's history, Kagan, 49, served as dean of Harvard Law School, where she showed an ability to build consensus and was widely credited with bringing more diverse views to the school. "As a result, when Kagan appeared last year before the Senate Judiciary Committee for her confirmation hearing as solicitor general, two conservative law professors from Harvard were on hand to support her, including Jack Goldsmith, who has been assailed in liberal circles as an architect of the Bush administration's anti-terrorism legal strategy." Some liberals have also expressed concern that she is too moderate in her views. Diane Wood is 59 and has been a federal appeals judge "since Clinton tapped her in 1995 after she served in the Justice Department for three years." Wood's writings and opinions show that she believes in a federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage, is markedly a supporter of abortion rights, and would like to see the phrase "under God" removed from the Pledge of Allegiance. Merrick Garland, 57, was an assistant federal prosecutor who handled a drug investigation into then-D.C. mayor Marion Barry before helping run the criminal division at the Department of Justice and serving as the principal associate deputy attorney general. "From his new perch, he oversaw the prosecution of Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski and the cases coming out of the anti-government movement at Ruby Ridge, Idaho." In 1997, President Clinton nominated Garland to the "U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, considered the nation's most crucial court behind the Supreme Court." "At the outset, Garland may have the easiest path to confirmation. He is considered a judicial moderate. On the appeals court, he largely handles regulatory and national security cases, thus avoiding others involving controversial social issues," the Los Angeles Times concludes.

GOP PREPARED TO FILIBUSTER: "The retirement of Justice John Paul Stevens presents a test for Republicans as much as it does for Obama as they weigh how much they want to wage a high-profile battle over ideological issues in the months before crucial midterm elections," the New York Times observes. Indeed, the party was split in its reaction to Stevens' announcement, promising to filibuster any "ideological" nominee while also pledging to give every candidate a fair hearing. Senate Judiciary Committee members Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and Jon Kyl (R-AZ) said they would use the filibuster should Obama nominate someone they view to be outside the mainstream. Sessions even released a statement suggesting that he could make opposition to health reform a litmus test for an Obama nominee, even though the constitutional case against the Affordable Care Act is so weak that even ultra-conservative Justice Antonin Scalia rejects it. Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) promised to filibuster "if the president picks someone from the fringe or someone who applies their feelings instead of applying the law." Meanwhile, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), another member of the Judiciary Committee, said, "We need to do our due diligence, and we need to probably bend over backwards both in appearance and in reality to give the nominee a fair process." On ABC's This Week, conservative columnist George Will criticized conservatives for saying that they want judges who will strictly follow the law while simultaneously cheering decisions that overturn the work of elected officials. Conservatives "say they're against judicial activism. By which they mean they want the court to defer to the elected political branches of government. But if you look at what's happened recently, the decision that most outraged conservatives was the Kelo decision on eminent domain. ... The court did defer to the city government in Connecticut and it enraged conservatives. The recent decision that most pleased conservatives -- Citizens United, overturning part of McCain-Feingold -- was the court not deferring to the Senate," Will said. Meanwhile, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) also a member of the Judiciary Committee, said that Obama in all his appointments has nominated "people in the mainstream," and predicted that the "likelihood of a filibuster is tiny." "One of the most important qualities for the new justice is the ability to win over Justice Kennedy," Schumer said. In other words, he added, "somebody who's going to be one of the five and not one of the four."


Let The Sun Shine In......

Two Nevada Republicans Call for Ensign to Bow Out.

Yep, things must be getting really bad on the Ensign front.

April 8, 2010

By ERIC LICHTBLAU

WASHINGTON — Senator John Ensign’s political troubles worsened Thursday as more Republican colleagues from his home state of Nevada said that the ethics investigations surrounding him have threatened to damage the party statewide.

Two Republican leaders in Las Vegas called Thursday for Mr. Ensign to resign, a day after Representative Dean Heller, a Republican from northern Nevada, said that the ethics inquiries were causing “real problems” for party members around the state.

Their comments came on the heels of a front-page article Monday in The Las Vegas Sun that read much like a political obituary. It said Nevada Republicans were upset “that Ensign seems oblivious to the collateral damage caused by his actions, and unwilling to make the matter disappear by resigning.”

Mr. Ensign was considered a rising Republican star and a possible presidential contender in 2012 until he admitted publicly last year to an affair with an aide’s wife.

Mr. Ensign’s office said Thursday that he was traveling in South Asia with a bipartisan Congressional delegation and that the office had no immediate comment on the concerns voiced by Nevada Republicans.

Both the Justice Department and the Senate ethics committee are investigating allegations first raised in The New York Times last October that Mr. Ensign got lobbying work for the aide, Douglas Hampton, and intervened on behalf of his clients in an effort to contain the damage from his affair with Mr. Hampton’s wife.

The senator’s efforts to help Mr. Hampton could be seen as a violation of a one-year moratorium on senior Congressional staffers lobbying their former employers, legal analysts say. The Justice Department is also examining a $96,000 payment that Mr. Ensign’s parents made to the Hamptons.

As new allegations of potential improper lobbying have surfaced in recent weeks against Mr. Ensign, Republican colleagues in Washington and Nevada have remained largely silent, and associates say Mr. Ensign has found himself more isolated politically.

A number of onetime allies in Nevada, including some who received grand jury subpoenas for documents about their dealings with Mr. Ensign, have also said that they felt used by the senator after he turned to them for help in finding lobbying work for Mr. Hampton without disclosing the affair.

In a column posted Thursday on a political Web site, Nevada News and Views, Richard Scotti, former chairman of the Clark County Republican Party, and Swadeep Nigam, former treasurer, said it was time for Mr. Ensign to resign.

“Nobody is coming to his rescue,” they wrote. “Only a small handful of Republican candidates have even sought his endorsement.”

They said the negative publicity had already damaged Republican fund-raising efforts in Nevada and threatened to drag down Republican candidates in the November election. In appearances on Las Vegas news shows on Wednesday, Mr. Heller, the Republican congressman who has been seen as a potential successor to Mr. Ensign, stopped short of calling for the senator’s resignation but said that Mr. Ensign’s “situation” had hurt “the ticket up and down” the state.

He called on Mr. Ensign to publicly answer the ethics questions.

“Let’s get this behind us,” Mr. Heller said in one television appearance. “Let’s move forward. It’s not good for him, it’s not good for me, it’s not good for the Republican Party, it’s not good for the state of Nevada.”

The office of the Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, asked Thursday about Mr. Ensign’s political future in light of the criticism, had no immediate comment.

Let The Sun Shine In......

Profits Over Safety

LABOR

On Monday, 25 miners died and another four went missing after an explosion took place at 3 p.m. at Massey Energy-owned Performance Coal Co.'s Upper Big Branch Mine-South between the towns of Montcoal and Naoma in West Virginia. The deadly accident resulted in "the most people killed in a U.S. mine since 1984, when 27 died in a fire at Emery Mining Corp.'s mine in Orangeville, Utah." Rescue teams attempted to retrieve the four missing miners on Tuesday, but were forced to turn back "because unsafe levels of methane and carbon monoxide posed a risk of a second explosion." Early today, four rescue teams entered the Upper Big Branch Mine-South, "working their way to a chamber where it is hoped four unaccounted-for miners may be found." Though there is a "sliver of hope" that the miners could be rescued, "officials and townsfolk alike admitted" to the Associated Press that "they didn't expect to find any of the four still-missing miners alive." "We've been working against long odds from day one," said West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin (D). Since the accident on Monday, Massey Energy CEO Don Blankenship --  whose mines have a long history of safety violations -- "has appeared several times before the cameras," but "has said very little, his face seeming almost expressionless as he quietly answers questions about his concern for miner safety." According to the New York Times, when Blankenship attempted to "announce the death toll to families who were gathered at the site" around 2 a.m. Tuesday, "people yelled at him for caring more about profits than miners' lives."

OVER 3,000 VIOLATIONS: According to Mine Safety and Health Administration (MSHA) records, since 1995, Massey's Upper Big Branch-South Mine has been cited for 3,007 safety violations. Massey is contesting 353 violations, and 127 are delinquent. "Violations in 2009 were roughly double the amount from any previous year" and a violation involving mine foreman Terry Moore "was one of at least 50 'unwarrantable failure' violations assessed there in the past year, the most serious type of violation that MSHA can assess."  In March 2010, 53 new safety citations were issued for Massey's mine, including violations of its mine ventilation plan. Federal regulators issued two citations against the Upper Big Branch Mine-South on Jan. 7 "because the intake system that was supposed to pull clean air inside was moving air in the wrong direction. Similar problems were also noted by the mine safety agency after a 2006 fire at a Massey mine in Logan County, W.Va., killed two miners. " The New York Times reports today that "federal officials said two safety citations were made against the mine's operator on the day of the explosion." "One of the citations issued Monday against the operator, the Massey Energy Company, was for failing to properly insulate and seal spliced electrical cables" while the other "was for failing to keep maps of above-ground escape routes current." Blankenship is dismissive of the safety violations. "Violations are unfortunately a normal part of the mining process," he said in an interview with the Metronews radio network in West Virginia. "There are violations at every coal mine in America, and U.B.B. was a mine that had violations," he added, referring to Upper Big Branch Mine-South. In a 2003 Forbes profile, Blankenship said, "We don't pay much attention to the violation count." In addition to violations at the Upper Big Branch Mine, the Washington Independent's Mike Lillis notes that "the dozens of other active tunnel mines owned by" Massey "have run up thousands of safety violations this year alone."

A HISTORY OF DISASTER: Monday's tragic explosion at the Upper Big Branch Mine-South was not the first environmental or safety disaster to occur at a Massey Energy-owned property. Massey is the parent of Martin County Coal, which was responsible for the "nation's largest man-made environmental disaster east of the Mississippi" until the 2008 Tennessee coal-ash spill. "In October 2000, a coal slurry impoundment broke through an underground mine shaft and spilled over 300 million gallons of black, toxic sludge into the headwaters of Coldwater Creek and Wolf Creek," in Martin County, Kentucky. In 2008, Massey's Aracoma Coal Co. agreed to "plead guilty to 10 criminal charges, including one felony, and pay $2.5 million in criminal fines" after two workers died in a 2006 fire at the Aracoma Alma No. 1 Mine in Melville, West Virginia. Massey also paid $1.7 million in civil fines. The mine "had 25 violations of mandatory health and safety laws" before the fire on January 19, 2006, but Blankenship passed off the events that caused the deaths as "statistically insignificant." Days before fire broke out in the Aracoma mine, a federal mine inspector tried to close down that section of the mine, but "was told by his superior to back off and let them run coal, that there was too much demand for coal." Massey failed to notify authorities of the fire until two hours after the disaster. Three months before the Aracoma mine fire, Blankenship sent managers a memo saying, "If any of you have been asked by your group presidents, your supervisors, engineers or anyone else to do anything other than run coal...you need to ignore them and run coal. This memo is necessary only because we seem not to understand that the coal pays the bills." A week later, however, Blankenship sent a follow-up memo, saying that safety is the first responsibility.

PAID-FOR POLITICAL PROTECTION: Blankenship is not just a coal baron, he's also a right-wing activist millionaire who sits on the boards of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Mining Association. He's "a highly active GOP fundraiser and bankroller who is known for his outspoken opposition to labor unions." The Center for Responsive Politics has calculated "that individuals and PACs connected to Massey Energy have contributed more than $300,000 to federal candidates in the past two decades, 91 percent of which went to Republicans." "Blankenship contributed the federal maximum of $30,400 last year to the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and he has supported Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) and GOP Senate candidates Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Rob Portman of Ohio," the Washington Post reports. After the Marin County Coal spill, then-U.S. Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, who oversaw the MSHA, "put on the brakes" on an agency investigation into the spill by placing a staffer to her husband, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), in charge. In 2002, a Labor Department judge levied a $5,600 fine. "In September 2002, Massey's PAC gave $100,000 to the National Republican Senatorial Committee," which McConnell had previously chaired. Overall, McConnell has been one of the top recipients of Massey-related contributions, collecting $13,550 from Massey-connected contributors. Blankenship's closeness to prominent Republicans helped him land allies at the highest levels of the federal mine safety system during the Bush administration. Massey COO Stanley Suboleski was named a commissioner of the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission in 2003 and was nominated in December 2007 to run the Energy Department's Office of Fossil Energy. Suboleski is now back on the Massey board. After being rejected twice by the Senate, President Bush put one-time Massey executive Dick Stickler in charge of the MSHA by a recess appointment in October 2006. In the 1990s, Stickler oversaw Massey subsidiary Performance Coal, the operator of the deadly Upper Big Branch Mine, after managing Beth Energy mines, which "incurred injury rates double the national average." Bush named Stickler acting secretary when the recess appointment expired in January 2008.
 

Let The Sun Shine In......

The danger for the GOP

Is this the end of a cycle in America? 

Just over 40 years ago, Bobby Kennedy was gunned down in the kitchen of a hotel in L.A., thus ending the longest spree of political assassinations in U.S. history. We had turned into a banana republic barely disguised as a Democratic Republic. 

Last time, the Democrats got the blame for everything they managed to accomplish, even though most of what they accomplished was good and has stood the test of time. 

We all paid with worsening and worsening right-leaning administrations. Now, we find our selves so tilted to the right that moderate programs, programs like Nixon and Reagan advocated in their days, are considered nothing short of communism, totalitariansim, even Nazism, in todays GOP. 

It is definitely the Right who are in the streets with hate contorted faces. How many are on drugs, as well? 

Is all that foul mouthed, hatred owing only to their own brain chemistry? I would feel better if we found out they were all on Cocaine or Oxycontin. Then, we could at least say, "well what can we expect from drug addled brains?" If no drugs are involved, we are dealing with something much worse. These states are permanent, just below the surface, ready to erupt when the fire is turned up by hateful tirades of disinformation, blasted over the airwaves 24/7.

Who is in the greatest danger? 

The ones who created the monster? Politically, it is the creator and Karma can be a  bitch

This monster has been in the making for close to 40 years. Since the heady days of Ronald Reagan, the monster was well known by people who pay attention, even with a certain detachment.

 Will this monster devour it's creator? The chances are good, if the stoking continues. I just hope that something really more horrible does not have to happen before before we all turn and address this nation threatening horror before it costs us dearly, a price we cannot afford to pay. Not again. 

When will the Right realize that they will be held responsible for what their monster does. They will not be allowed to simply walk away wiping their blood stained hands as mentally unstable people, riled by ugly hate speech, carry out their programming like robots who have been engineered for destruction; self destruction if not other destruction.

It is the people on the Right who are acting out this time. They, too, are motivated by fear, just as the anti-war movement was and the Civil rights movements, in certain quarters, was. None of these movements were filled with courageous people. 

There will always be people who want a revolution. Usually, they are the very ones who will nit be brave enough to fight it. Thankfully, there are those who believe in evolution, even in the angry glare of the faces that bear witness to it's opposite.

Change is coming. It has to. It must. 

We can no longer walk down this same tried path of deception in the form of fear-mongering. It will be the end of us all, in one way or the other

Who wants to die over it? 

Who wants to kill over it?

Those are serious questions and they need answers, individual answers. These are not questions that should be answered while in a group. This is an individual kind of thing. When we are angry and our anger is being fed by a group, it becomes a mob and mob mentality is psychotic.


Who wants to calmly work through the problems and solutions we have or might have?

Let The Sun Shine In......

Tea party, violence, GOP fundraising

Off topic, but I sure would like to see Charlie Crist run as an true independent, win and behave as one would in the Senate. How refreshing. 

How impossible?

by Meg White
You'd think after being portrayed as at least tangentially involved in the intimidation and threats of violence against members of Congress over the healthcare bill, tea party organizers would tone down the rhetoric and try to make the practical first birthday of the movement less inflammatory than in recent weeks.

So what's their latest plan for fundraising over the Tax Day holiday? I kid you not, they're promoting a Great Patriot Money Bomb. Basically, a nonpartisan (really?) group of tea party activists have put together a list of bona fide tea party candidates (or as they call themselves "constitutional conservatives") and linked them all together on one fundraising page.

I suppose they're hoping this effort will be more successful than the Republican National Committee's campaign to set ablaze fire House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (though the campaign has raised a fat $1.5 million for the GOP, there's little doubt that Pelosi will retain her seat).

It does bear mention that Liberty Candidates' Photoshop abilities don't come close to the slick imagery of GOP.com surrounding Pelosi in flames -- a shocking number of candidate pictures are very shoddy cut-and-paste jobs of a candidate's photo on top of the American flag (as you can see from the few I've scattered into this piece). But the passion is all there.

The time period of the money bomb is from midnight on Tax Day to April 18 (the anniversary of Paul Revere's famous ride). The idea is for tea partiers who are all jazzed up following the April 15 protests to have a place to go spend their money other than the local Gadsden flag emporium. The site's creators are no doubt hoping that when protesters ask Tax Day tea party speakers what they can do to get involved, they are directed to this site.
Questionable imagery aside, it's a very smart idea. Lesser-known liberal candidates have found grassroots fundraising success (and a certain amount of outside-the beltway street cred) online in ActBlue.com since back in 2004.

And considering the RNC's apparent inability to move away from courting the bulging pockets of corporate executives with strip club outings, small-scale campaign contributions from the right have to go somewhere.

Candidates who wish to be considered for the fundraiser must abide by five principles:  individual liberty, constitutional government, sound money, free markets, and a noninterventionist foreign policy. On the campaign's website, this translates into the notion that the "recovery should be left to the free market," the federal government should not restrict personal liberty beyond what is explicitly laid out in the constitution, foreign policy should be limited to commerce, the Federal Reserve Bank should be dismantled, gun rights should be strengthened, and increased use of domestic oil, coal, gas and nuclear energy.

If you agree with the above, all you need in order to be considered is to say so in a short survey, have a website and a picture. (Oh and if you don't happen to have a website, the vice president of Liberty Candidates, Sally O'Boyle, would be happy to charge you to make one. She can also make you a logo and create your very own online store -- "your profit is low, but it's all yours," she notes.)

Though Liberty Candidates is attempting to make this a "nonpartisan clearinghouse" for tea party candidates, the ideological checklist sounds a lot like the Republican purity test proposed by the RNC late last year. While the Liberty Candidates' checklist is covered by the purity test, the GOP added in a few non-liberty items, such as retaining the defense of marriage act (don't think that one's in the Constitution, guys) and some decidedly interventionist plans in Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran and North Korea.

Liberty Candidates will have none of that. Indeed, on their front page the group posts something of a warning to the RNC:

It is critical that Liberty Candidates be separated from neo-con Republicans, "Tea-o-cons" and others who would attempt to hijack the Liberty Candidates movement!

Tea-o-cons, huh? That's a new one for me. Will elected constitutional conseratives be Tea-presentatives of the people? Could Marco Rubio become Florida's Tea-nator?

In all seriousness though, this might be the tea party's best chance at electoral legitimacy. The GOP seems intent on out-crazying the crazies, so Republicans are increasingly unable to claim the upper hand in restrain or sanity on the right. While they love the tea party's anger at the status quo, Republicans can't seem to grasp the importance of the tea party's pockets, perhaps because they're not as deep as the pockets they're used to reaching into.

But, when large crowds are necessary, the tea party and the GOP will always have their collective willingness to rely upon the vague suggestion of violence to unite them.

So while the mainstream media plays up Steele's follies as a coup for the Democratic Party, be wary that the tea party may be raising more than hell. After all, who needs lesbian-themed bondage clubs and Photoshopped flames when you've got the American flag (however pixelated) backing you?

BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS

Let The Sun Shine In......

Still doon't know what to think of the current GOP.....

.....but I do know that my deceased father is spinning in his grave. 

They have truly become the party of projection.

BARBARA'S DAILY BUZZFLASH MINUTE

Straight from Karl Rove's playbook: Blame someone, anyone, else for that which you yourself are doing, and it's the one lesson Sarah Palin has down pat! Try as she might though, Sarah Palin cannot blame anyone else for the violence she's inciting.

Using the words, "Don't retreat", "Reload" and pictures of gunsight "crosshairs" targeting Democrats is not part of one's First Amendment rights. These are pointed and intentional acts of terrorism and should be treated as such!

For those who are unaware of the meaning of terrorism:

Terrorism - political violence - violence or the threat of violence, especially bombing, kidnapping, and assassination, carried out for political purposes

Key words here being, "the threat of violence"!

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John Boehner Signals to Fundamentalist GOP Base That President Obama is the Anti-Christ
Now that we know the game the Repuglicans play; you know, the one where they project their own persona on their opponent? You can be sure that John Boehner is the real "Anti-Christ"!  Think about it, who actually called on "hell", who said, "like 'hell' we will", who's the one that needed the devil's backing for the destruction he's causing for the American people? John Boehner, that's who!

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Some people forget that not that long ago most of the healthcare industry was a non-profit service, subsidized by local and federal government! They forget that the American people were told that "privatizing healthcare would provide better quality care at a much cheaper price" and we now know just how well that worked out.

We have the most expensive healthcare system in the world and contrary to what the Repuglicans would have you believe, America is not #1, in fact we're quite a ways down on that list. We're even ranked below Cuba and Chile in life expectancy! Wake up to the fact that Americans spend the most money for health care and we're not getting what we've paid for -- we're being scammed! Healthcare reform is long overdue!

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Where do conservatives find so many brainless sad sacks to run for office?  It's no wonder the Repuglicans are losing respect when these ding-bats represent the GOP:

Bachmann: '100% Of Our Economy Was Private' Before September 2008

The woman doesn't have the brains God promised a brass monkey. The whole world is laughing at her and the Repuglican Party!

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I give you House Minority WIMP, Eric Cantor:

Eric Cantor's latest defense: I didn't know that the police had concluded the bullet in my (sometimes) office was randomly fired until after my press conference in which I said my office had been targeted. You know it's bad when your fallback defense is reckless disregard for the truth.

A WIMP and a LIAR, no wonder the Repuglicans are losers!

---

So he did know and five will get you ten that the Pope will not resign:

Dr. Huth said he issued the explicit warnings — both written and oral — before the future pope, then Joseph Ratzinger, archbishop of Munich and Freising, left Germany for a position in the Vatican in 1982.

Which leaves us wondering: Was the "future pope" more concerned with his promotion to the Vatican than he was with the children being molested?

BARBARA'S DAILY BUZZFLASH MINUTE

Let The Sun Shine In......

GOP Psychosis Not Flying.....

With anyone but those who are psychotic or bordering on it. This is not good news for the GOP.

For a long time anyone who opposed foreign-policy decisions, e.g. the war in Viet Nam, was called un-American and accused of disrespecting the troops - - 38,000 of them - - who fought and died there. And questioning defense appropriations was considered tantamount to giving aid and comfort to our enemies. The national-security gambit was used repeatedly by Republicans to great advantage. On last Sunday’s This Week, when David Plouffe alluded to the ill-timed “Mission Accomplished” banner hung aboard the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln for the Bush visit, Karl Rove charged him with dishonoring the service of the ship’s crew - - the same outrageous sort of tactic he found so effective in manipulating the electorate during the Bush years..


According to conservatives government should keep taxes low, create war materiel, uphold states rights, support market-based endeavors and return to a simpler version of itself. But the “good old days” weren’t good for everyone; a Darwinian survival-of -the-fittest paradigm defined our social construct. It wasn’t until news footage of fire hoses and dogs being used on protesters in the south that it began to dawn on the rest of the country that violent suppression of basic human rights was occurring. Still it was generally understood that voting rights didn’t necessarily accrue to all citizens and the existence of “colored” water fountains, schools, and bathrooms didn’t seem all that remarkable. That’s just the way it was, back then.


Civil Rights advocates fought the bloody battles of the period and won in the court of public opinion and the federal courts as well. In time equality of purpose and opportunity emerged as national goals. It wasn’t quite so simple but doors opened and progress, however halting, was made. The high point of the country’s evolving social awareness and acceptance of diversity appeared to culminate with the election of Barack Obama.


Not so fast we have been forced to acknowledge. No matter how hard Tea Baggers and other administration foes try to paint themselves as grass roots activists supporting basic, albeit Republican tending, American values, their ranks swell with angry white people engaged not just in philosophical arguments but in unprecedented ad-hominem attacks on the president. A recent poll indicated large numbers of Republicans believe him to be a Muslim, a socialist, not native born and for 24% of respondents the “anti-Christ.”


The Republican Party denies that racist angst invigorates much of its base, but, obscured by verbiage about taxes and freedom, there runs an ugly undercurrent of bigotry. That and religious fanaticism animate Republican rhetoric in ways both subtle and overt and recall struggles mistakenly thought to be a thing of the past. However Republicans may live to regret their continued reliance on a “southern strategy” that appeals to the baser elements of society. The sight of congressional figures like Michele Bachman waving from a House balcony to a fractious crowd during the health-care debate may not resonate positively among the majority of Americans, no matter how they feel about the bill itself. Sadly, some legislators spend too much time sharpening their gamesmanship skills and pursuing narrow personal agendas instead of addressing critical national concerns.


It is undemocratic if not downright un-American for Republicans to choose the path John McCain has charted for the remainder of this congressional session, which is not to cooperate with Democrats on anything although, since his party has been obstructing and delaying everything on the president’s to-do list all along, this may not be the shocker it seemed when this silly man who wanted to be president made his churlish remarks. But can even party loyalists take pride in their leaders’ use of arcane Senate rules to bring all Senate business to a standstill?


That not one Republican chose to work in a constructive manner on health care legislation speaks to a leadership that has a poorly developed sense of duty - - a venal and ideologically driven clan that preaches principles but behaves in a manner that defies standards of decency and good government. The party would do well to focus less on self-righteous grandstanding and concentrate instead on conduct more in keeping with the democratic ideals most Americans embrace.

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FINDING A VOICE by Ann Davidow

Let The Sun Shine In......