NRA is Extremist and Hypocritical on Gun Free School Zones

After Columbine Shooting, NRA Supported Gun Free School Zones It Now Opposes

How many issues on 23 executive orders did the NRA support when they were a rational organization and not extreme.  The CEO who profits from Bushmaster sits on the NRA board -- conflict of interest?  You betcha

Mother Jones now has the paperwork on how the NRA elects its board -- guess you could say that regular NRA members have very little say:

NRA Report of the Nominating Committee, Sep 2011

After reading the 23 Executive Orders, I have a hard time coming up with where the lunatics think that Obama is taking away gun runs or doing a power grab.  There is obviously a reading comprehension problem from the hard right.  Worse then that are the Republicans calling for the President's impeachment who obviously don't have a leg to stand on and frankly are so far over the top that constitutional lawyers are scratching their heads on the news shows (except Fox) wondering where they came up with their sentiments after reading the 23 EO's.

Some recent Tweets from Twitter:

Hunter ‏@HunterDKNRA tries to get scientists fired for researching gun safety. That's how much they don't give shit about your kids. http://nbcnews.to/W7efyu 

Richard Avalon ‏@AntiWackoRT @JLRy: RT @TheNewDeal: Liberal Extremist Ronald Reagan Helped Pass the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban http://bit.ly/URHGoF  Rt #NRA #p2 #tcot 

Matthew Gertz ‏@MattGertz
If you liked the NRA's 30-second video attacking Obama's daughters, you'll love the 4 minute version http://mm4a.org/WewC5n   

Dump The GOP In 2014 ‏@SayNoToGOPLarry Ward, Gun Appreciation Day Founder, Says Armed African Americans Could've Prevented Slavery ... http://huff.to/ZDhNKc  via @BlackVoices

ThinkProgress ‏@thinkprogressThe NRA would have supported some of Obama's gun proposals...in 1999. http://thkpr.gs/W0p5ti  

Joe Spataro, MD ‏@doctorjoe56“#House can pass comp #gun legislation now & have #Boehner shape it, or wait 2yrs4 SPEAKER #Pelosi to do it.”~#JoeScarborough @JMGruver #p2

Then there is the usual trash from Limbaugh:

Rush Limbaugh To Caller: "You Know How To Stop Abortion? Require That Each One Occur With A Gun"

Rush Limbaugh Responds To Universal Checks On Gun Sales: "We Still Have Not Had A Background Check On Barack Obama"

Hope the people from the districts that some of these Republicans represent who are calling for impeachment are very proud of their Representative.  If it was me, I would be furious.  Don't think that the GOP in the House in 2014 are going to have to worry about who to elect as Speaker.  They keep up their extremists attitudes and they will be saying Madam Speaker again to Nancy Pelosi.  If they think only Democrats are disgusted, they have their heads buried in the sand if they think Republicans are not even madder at how they make the Republican Party look today.

I can see President Obama right now telling the NRA supporters in Congress to "Please Proceed" because they are on the losing end of this fight as the American people are speaking out even in Red States, in cities, in rural America, and all across the Country because we have had with business as usual on gun control and the contention gun control will not save lives.  How do they know?  If you look at Sandy Hook, the shooter would not have access to assault rifles or large magazines and his doctor would have been required to turn him in for mental health issues.

This is only a small example of Republicans who have gone over the top along with Sen Rand Paul who is not pictured here but says this about Obama:

Speaking with CBN News, Paul remarked, “I’m against having a king. I think having a monarch is what we fought the American Revolution over and someone who wants to bypass the Constitution, bypass Congress — that’s someone who wants to act like a king or a monarch.”

Way to go Kentucky with electing Rand Paul to the US Senate to go with McConnell.  Disgusting bunch of Republicans who don't have a clue how mad they have made longtime Republicans.

Regardless of the facts, the movement to impeach Obama over these executive actions is spreading from fringe conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones and taking hold among lawmakers and Republican activists. Here are five people calling for Obama’s impeachment:
Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX)

Stockman plans to introduce articles of impeachment, calling Obama’s anti-gun violence efforts “an existential threat to this nation.”
Rep. Trey Radel (R-FL)

Following Stockman’s lead is Florida Congressman Trey Radel, who said impeachment “should be on the table” and falsely claimed that Obama wants an executive order to “ban guns.”
Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX)
Gohmert, a Tea Party favorite who recently claimed an assault weapons ban would have to include hammers, charged that the president’s action is “illegal” and grounds for impeachment. “The American Revolution was all about fighting such a monarchy — and that is not what the Constitution anticipates. It’s not something a Constitutional president would do,” Gohmert lamented.
Former Attorney General Edwin Meese (R)

Edwin Meese, former Reagan Attorney General and current Heritage Foundation official, is also taking up the call for impeachment. In an interview with Newsmax, Meese claimed Obama may have “really tried to override the Constitution itself.” Congress, he said, would have to take action, “perhaps even to the point of impeachment.”
Larry Pratt

The head of Gun Owners for America urged Republican lawmakers to stop being “spectators while the country is being torn apart” and impeach Obama. Pratt also attacked all gun safety laws as “the most pagan of paganism” because they assume guns and other “inanimate objects as possessing their own will.”

Welcome to the new Republican Party where no one in power will speak up to these guys preferring to stay silent.  Time to vote them out in 2014!

Mickey Edwards (R-OK): Slams Norquist Pledge '"t's not rational. And it's not adult"

Now this is a Conservative I can relate to when it comes to taxes and other issues.  

Edwards, a longtime conservative movement stalwart, attacked his party’s 22-year-long unwillingness to raise taxes as neither conservative, nor adult, nor rational. 

For 22 years the Republican members of Congress have been honoring the Norquist Pledge which is simply stunning that they would be so stupid to let Norquist run the Country when it comes to income tax rates.  Who died and made him king?  Finding out in this article that Norquist designed this plan when he was 12 years old should make Republicans the laughing stock of the Country.

When Moyers noted that Norquist devised his anti-tax pledge as a 12-year-old, Edwards observed “Well, you know, the fact is, the idea that, you know, ‘No, I’m not ever going to do this no matter the circumstances, no matter if we’re at war,’ whatever, it is a 12-year-old kind of thinking.” But, he noted, one “can’t just blame Grover,” as the Congressional signers or the pledge are also to responsible.

How stupid are Republicans in Congress who have signed the Norquist Pledge that was concocted by him as a 12 year old years ago?

Wish he was still my Representative.  He was gone from the House when we moved to Norman.  He talks so much sense and has a way with words (understatement).

Top Conservative Leader Slams Norquist Pledge: ‘It’s Not Rational, And It’s Not Adult’

By Josh Israel on Dec 10, 2012 at 2:10 pm 

Former Rep. Mickey Edwards (R-OK) (Credit: Gia Regan/Yale University Press)

Former Congressman Mickey Edwards (R-OK) lambasted anti-tax activist Grover Norquist and the hundreds of Republicans who have signed his Americans for Tax Reform Pledge in an interview with PBS’s Bill Moyers on Friday. Edwards, a longtime conservative movement stalwart, attacked his party’s 22-year-long unwillingness to raise taxes as neither conservative, nor adult, nor rational. 

Edwards, who served in Congress from 1977 to 1993, was a key architect of the modern conservative movement. He was one of the three founding trustees of the Heritage Foundation, chaired the Republican Policy Committee, and was national chairman of the American Conservative Union for five years. He was also an adviser to Ronald Reagan’s 1980 presidential campaign. 

Asked about the Norquist’s frequent boast that no Congressional Republican has voted to raise taxes since 1990, he told Moyers: 

EDWARDS: It’s certainly not Conservatism. It’s not rational. And it’s not adult. You know, when you create a program, you make a decision. You say, “I think we should conduct this war. I think that we should expand our security apparatus at home. I think that we should provide this additional benefit.” Then you pay for it. You vote to do it. And then you say, “Here’s what it’s going to cost.” And you pay for it. You know, Republicans may complain about the federal debt, but they’re as responsible as the Democrats for the debt being as large as it is. And once you have already done that, then you have an obligation to pay it down. 

You know, so the idea that what you’re going to do is say– you know, “We’re not going to raise taxes, we’re not going to close loopholes, we’re not going to do anything” — that means that we’re not going to pay off what we’ve already created. I mean, that’s childish. That’s childish.

Watch the video: 

If that wasn't enough to make you think these elected members of Congress are not the brightest bulbs in the pack, check this out:

In fiscal cliff negotiations, the only specific proposal Republicans have made to date is demanding $600 billion in Medicare cuts over ten years by denying Medicare coverage to Americans during their first two years of eligibility by raising the eligibility age to 67.  Because the elderly are prone to chronic conditions like cancer and diabetes which can be treated more effectively, and less expensively, with early diagnosis and intervention, it makes little fiscal sense to deny coverage to people aged 65 and 66. The result will lead to more severe infirmities, higher Medicare costs, and early death which may be the Republican’s ulterior motive and another means of cutting Medicare costs over the long haul. 

If Republicans are serious about cutting Medicare costs, they should look at expenditures for unnecessary care, and fraudulent billing for care that is given. Of course, that means Republicans will have to address overtreatment that boosts corporate profits, and especially unnecessary procedures that can lead to pain, disability, and even death in older Americans. Republicans have rejected attempts to rein in unnecessary treatment in the past, and ironically, they used the government-imposed death panels argument to ward off attempts to control excessive treatment when the reality is seniors often suffer ill-effects of profit-driven overtreatment.

Republicans want to cut Medicare costs by raising the age you qualify for Medicare but don't seem to be interested in cutting unnecessary care and fraudulent billing because that helps their big donors.  This cut in Medicare is one thing the Republicans want in exchange for 'daring' to raise taxes on the top 2%.  Don't see what cutting Medicare and Social Security have to do with raising taxes on the top 2%.  Why are Republicans so obstinate in keeping the 2% tax cuts for the wealthy to the stage of alienating voters in various groups plus the middle class?  Having a Presidential candidate run who paid less than 15% in income taxes when he is a multi-millionaire didn't set well with many of us.

One Congressman, Rep John Duncan (R-TN) said he doesn't want to pass the bill to keep the Bush tax rates for those making less than $250,000 because  it would give"control of the floor to the Democrats."  What?  Is that what we have come to in this House -- Democrat bills all bad -- Republican bills all good.  From Igor Volsky at Think Progress comes this gem:

But in a recent photo-op with constituents, Rep. John Duncan (R-TN) explained why Republicans are refusing to give in. The Tennessee Republican admitted that he won’t vote to extend tax cuts to 98 percent of Americans because doing so would cede control to Democrats:

CONSTITUENT 1: Are you going to sign the discharge petition?
DUNCAN: Ummm…Oh no, I’m not. No Ma’am. I’m not about to sign the discharge petition.
CONSTITUENT 2: Well if you sign the discharge petition, you’ll immediately etend the tax cuts for the middle class.
CONSTITUENT 1: Yea, why would you not want to do that? [...]
DUNCAN: It would take too long to explain that. I’m not going to give control of the floor to the Democrats.Watch it:

When you think that Republicans cannot sound any more stupid, someone comes along and proves you wrong.  It is so obvious that Republicans are putting Party over the good of the Country.  There is a simple solution for that problem that can be remedied in 2014 even in gerrymandered districts.  The Democrats need to run candidates that independents and disgruntled Republicans can get behind.  Many of us are  disgusted with the Leadership of the House for playing up and coddling the Tea Party members which makes a 'compromise' impossible.  It is time for Republicans to get a true wake-up call and be defeated for their obstructionism, arrogance, and stubbornness.  When as a Party in the House, you are afraid to let the opposition get the credit, you have lost your way and deserve to be sent to the unemployment line.

Speaker Boehner is Out of Touch with Reality Favoring Wealthy over Middle Class

This morning on Chris Wallace's show on Fox News, Treasury Secretary Geithner and Speaker Boehner appeared.  Just like the election the Republicans lost this debate with Wallace as Boehner refused to give specifics telling Wallace he wasn't going to debate with him.  What an arrogant fool Boehner came across this morning which makes you wonder if he is now playing to the hard right which is a prescription for disaster.    On the other hand Secretary Geithner came across with the reasoned approach.

Boehner: No ‘Difference’ If Revenue Comes From Middle Class Or Super RichBy Igor Volsky on Dec 2, 2012 at 9:46 am 

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), who has refused to support raising marginal tax rates on the richest Americans in order to avert the so-called fiscal cliff, told Fox News Sunday that it doesn’t matter if the government raises revenue by reducing programs or eliminating tax deductions that also benefit lower and middle class Americans or asks the wealthiest to pay more:

CHRIS WALLACE (HOST): You talked about the fact that the President won and you came out with a concession the day after the election and they point out that the president campaigned on raising tax rates, you know, and it was the big issue, between him and Romney, and, they say, just as he had to cave, after your victory, in the 2010 midterms, now, it is your turn to cave on tax rates. 

BOEHNER: Listen, what is this difference where the money comes from? We put $800 billion worth of revenue, which is what he is asking for, out of eliminating the top two tax rates. But, here’s the problem, Chris, when you go and increase tax rates, you make it more difficult for our economy to grow, after that income, the small business income, it is going to get taxed at a higher rate and as a result we’re gonna see slower economic growth, we can’t cut our way out of this problem, nor can we grow our way out of the problem, we have to have a balanced approach and what the President wants to do will slow or economy at a time when he says he wants the economy to grow and create jobs.

Despite Boehner’s rhetoric, there is no economic evidence to suggest that taxing income above $250,000 hurts the economy. In fact, business thrived during President Clinton’s tenure, as the wealthy paid more. 

There is a clear “difference” to where the “money comes from,” however, and asking higher-income Americans who have benefited the most to pay more is fairer than gutting critical entitlement programs during a slow economic recovery. While middle-class incomes have stagnated, America’s top income bracket has enjoyed a period of exceptionally low tax rates thanks largely to caps on investment income and tax cuts put in place by former president George W. Bush. These super-rich Americans have fared well under President Obama, too; corporate profits are skyrocketing and the total number of millionaires in the US has exploded during his term. 

After reading what Boehner had to say this morning, I am beginning to understand why House Republicans are blocking a bill that would keep the Bust Tax Cuts for those making less than $250,000 and get that off the table.  This group of Republican Congressman have the ability to equate raising taxes on the middle class doesn't hurt us any more then raising them on the wealthy.  Are Republicans in the House that stupid?  I can guarantee you if I lose $1,000 to taxes and more, it is going to hurt a lot more than someone worth millions losing $10,000 or even $100,000.

Boehner has officially gone over the cliff with the rest of the House GOP who are too pigheaded to see they are costing votes with Middle Class voters including this longtime Republican who right now is going to have a hard time ever voting for another Republican for Congress after what we are seeing out of this House.  The lack of empathy in the Republican Party for those less fortunate is driving a lot of us up a wall.  Yet they consider themselves Christians?

A lot of members of the House came from the Middle Class who went to Congress but are now millionaires even though the cost of living is high in DC.  Wonder how that happened?  Could it be they are bought and paid for by the wealthy Republican donors?  Think this whole mess has the capability of showing how corrupt Congressional Republicans are as they are in the hip pockets of the GOP wealthy donors, the Chamber of Commerce, Big Oil, and Casino Owners for starters.

They should be smart enough to understand that the GOP only won the House because of gerrymandering and lost the popular vote big time in House races.  Even with gerrymandering, the Democrats picked up 11 House seats, two Senate seats, and the White House yet Boehner and the GOP in Congress think they have the upper hand?  Stupid Party is the correct name for the GOP along with arrogant, boneheaded, and stubborn.  Could threw in a few more words but I will stop there on this beautiful Sunday morning.

On the other hand, Secretary of the Treasury Geithner was very articulate and represented the Middle Class taxpayers very well on Fox this morning:

CHRIS WALLACE (HOST): Last question, can you promise that we will not go over the cliff? 

GEITHNER: No, I can’t promise that. That is a decision that lies in the hands of the Republicans, that are now opposing increases in tax rates, if they recognize the reality, that we cannot afford to extend the tax rates we have the basis for an agreement that would be good for the American people.

WALLACE: And the President bears no responsibility, it is all up to the Republicans? 

GEITHNER: Chris, ask yourself this question, why does it make sense for the country to force tax increases on all Americans, because a small group of Republicans want to extend tax rates for 2% of Americans — why does that make any sense? There is no reason why it should happen, we can’t afford the tax rates, that is like the deep tragic lesson of the last decade, we and not afford them and will not get through it, to the end now, without a recognition of the Republicans to that basic reality and that will be the responsible thing to do and my judgment is, they are going to do it because there is no alternative to that. 

And then you have this from Speaker Boehner, in addition to there is no difference between tax hikes for the wealthy and middle class, where he gave no real information but seemed flustered and flabbergasted that Wallace would have the nerve to ask him for specifics:

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) took to Fox News Sunday to counter Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s fiscal showdown proposals, claiming, “We’re nowhere — period. We’re nowhere.” 

But when host Chris Wallace started to press Boehner about specific aspects of the GOP’s counter plan, Boehner avoided any details and refused to say which tax deductions Republicans could cap or eliminate: 

WALLACE: What is the biggest proposal you’ put on the table since the election in terms of raising revenue from closing loopholes and deductions?

BOEHNER: You can cap. There are a lot of different ways but you can cap deductions at a percent of income. One way to get there. You can eliminate certain deductions for those, the wealthiest in our country. You could do all of that. 

WALLACE: Let me ask you a couple of specifics: would you eliminate or lower the home mortgage deduction? 

BOEHNER: There are lots of ways to get out there, there are lots of ways to debate or negotiate with you, but if you can sign the bill into law, I would be happy to. 

WALLACE: … Charitable deductions? You are a big charity guy. 

BOEHNER: The President has seen a lot of the options from us. There are a lot of them put on the table and I’m hopeful the conversations will continue.

Boehner is avoiding specifics, just as Republicans are recycling Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) budget plan — including voucherizing Medicare and significantly cutting Medicaid — which voters largely rejected when they re-elected President Obama. Wallace went on to press Boehner about whether Republicans will allow the economy to go “over the fiscal cliff,” and Boehner acknowledged, “There is a chance.”

You just want to shout at your TV to Boehner -- Republicans LOST!  The American people had their say and chose Obama and his policies for four more years.  Republicans have shown they are a bunch of sore losers who cannot believe the American people were smart enough to see through their arrogance and support of the wealthy agenda.

The GOP war on minorities, women, veterans, poor, teachers, fire, police, civil service, and gays for starters or those of the 47% show a party that doesn't understand the middle class.  We spoke very loud in this election with our votes, our donations, and our volunteering for the Obama campaign who represents the middle class very well.  Obama didn't win by giving gifts to all of us as alleged by Romney on why he lost.  Obama won because he represents our best interest against a Party that has become the party of the wealthy donors.

When I heard that a Romney Administration planned to do away with regulations on oil and gas, it did me in as there are some pretty unscrupulous oil and gas people who would wreck the environment if they didn't have rules and regulations.  Romney it was also alleged (Republican sources) was going to stop bribery investigations in foreign countries by US citizens dead in their tracks was another reason not to vote for Republicans.  Then there was turning the National Parks back to the states so oil and gas could have their field day to make more money.  How about telling people here illegally to self deport and challenging legal Hispanic Americans on their votes as part of the GOP Voter Suppression in Battleground States?  Then there was the definition of 'rape' as another form of conception or the personhood bill granting a fetus the right to property, or denying contraceptives paid for by insurance companies, banning all abortion, treating women like second class citizens, etc.

House Republicans did a good job of telling the Country what they think of women with choosing all males for the conference chairs and then throwing a bone to a woman for the Housekeeping Chair of the House. This is not the Republican Party I grew up in and certainly not the Party of Lincoln and Eisenhower.

Republican Party still doesn't get it -- they can change some of the rhetoric but if they don't change their policy, they are not going to get back the votes of us who didn't vote Republican for the first time in our lives.   I realized how far the GOP had gone hard right after joining Republicans for Obama.  As it stands now, I will never vote for another Republican for federal office.  Today I am staying GOP to be a thorn in their side and vote for the more moderate (used to be conservative) when they run in the primary.  Because of the GOP going hard right, a lot of us who considered ourselves conservatives are now considered moderates.  You don't win elections by trashing the middle class voters who were at one-time your base but have been thrown under the bus in favor of the Tea Party, John Birchers, and wealthy donors.

Congressional Republicans deserve to lose big in 2014 after their obstructionists tactics for the past four years.  Only a few Republicans have woken up but the vast majority are sticking by their obstructionist tactics putting Party over Country.  They deserve to lose in 2014 and lose big.

Will GOP leadership get the message or stay the course of the hard right after President Obama's Huge Win Last Night?

My first time voting for a Democrat for President was a success as President Obama won handily not only in the electoral college but in the popular vote proving conservative pundits wrong.  A strong message was sent by voters to the Republican Party that going hard right is not going to win national elections and becoming the all white party is a huge mistake.  The question is whether or not the GOP will learn the lesson.  Senator John Cornyn last night calls for 'period of reflection and recalibration' for Republicans as the Hard Right Tea Party Senate candidates that wanted to redefine rape went down in flames.  Shame Senator McConnell couldn't have said similar words as his statement was defiant not congratulating the President on his win or offering an olive branch.

Now we are starting to hear from conservative pundits that the GOP lost because Romney was a Massachusetts liberal.  How can Republicans/Conservatives be so stupid?  Many of us were saying that when Romney ran and the hard right started supporting him.  The RNC went all in for Romney and the GOP/Rove/Morris/Fox News kept lying about Obama to the stage a group of us joined Republicans for Obama as we could not take the lies any longer refusing to be part of a group that supported a man who thought 47% of us were worthless.

If the GOP continues going to the hard right, you can put a fork in them for national elections.  The days of the white voters being the determining factor are coming to a close especially when you realize that a lot of white women won't vote for Republican Neanderthals.  White male blue collar works in the old 'rust belt' states stood up for Obama against Romney.  The unions didn't make the huge monetary contributions to candidates but they provided something more tangible -- boots on the ground.  In states that Obama won, his campaign turned out the volunteers in big numbers, his donations were fueled by small donors who bought into his campaign, and his message was heard loud and clear as he stood on his record saying there was more to be accomplished.  Many liberal leaning pundits thought he was giving the wrong message but in the end the Obama strategy was correct.  The American people were willing to give him four more years to get the job done.  This time if the Republicans obstruct, they will be out on their ears in 2014.

Romney had the huge donors who spent over $1B, but he had to hire people to make calls and door knock, had very few small donors relying mostly on the wealthy and little GOTV in operation as Rove and company thought they could buy this election with negative ads that lied and little ground game.   The American people said NO to a candidate trying to buy an election and to vote suppression.

GOP is now trying to blame the hurricane and Gov Christi, but they are wrong IMHO.  The day Romney lied about Jeep moving everything to China which was repudiated by Chrysler and General Motors, was the day he lost the rust belt states.  Romney doubled down keeping up with the lies and even made a campaign ad which ran in the 'rust belt' states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa.  The worst part was seeing Republicans I trusted spring to Romney's defense on Jeep.  Finally Ohio Governor Kasich broke with Romney on Jeep but Senator Portman doubled down along with others.

Rudy Guiliani made an absolute fool of himself in the end calling for the President Obama to resign, be impeached, or voted out for his incompetence over Libya and his response to Hurricane Sandy which made no sense but he lost it completely and with it the respect of a lot of us who had worked for his 2008 election.

I have included this email below from MSNBC this morning that breaks down the demographics and shows just how bad off the Republicans are in the future if they don't change.  They had better look to Florida, Pennsylvania, and Ohio where voter suppression didn't work.  Cutting voting hours to help Romney or making it hard to get a voter ID, only added to the disgust of many minorities but also to life long Republicans like me.  The very idea that Rick Scott cut voting hours so drastically should get him kicked out of office as the Florida Governor in 2014.  Americans want voting laws that encourage people to vote -- no one should have to stand in line for 7-8 hours to vote.  Anyone involved in this voter suppression we witnessed should be charged IMHO.

The whine coming out of Karl Rove last night was actually funny as he couldn't believe Fox News had declared Ohio for Obama.  Rove went into a meltdown talking about his numbers, his numbers when it was Cleveland and Cincinnati where votes which were still out -- no way was Romney going to win in either county.  Rove was demanding that Fox News pull back their call of Ohio for Obama, but they refused.  Then there was the right wing media:

Right-Wing Media React To Obama's Re-Election: War, Impeachment, Revolution

It is time the GOP wake up and realize that they need to be reaching out to minority voters or in the years ahead they are going to be the real minority party left with a bunch of neanderthal ideas trying to go back to the 1950's.  Whether that hard right Tea Party and social conservative coalition wants to admit it, they lost big last night.  Only a matter of time, until AZ, TX, and GA start turning blue with their large minority populations.  GOP either changes and embraces the change or they can be stubborn like Minority Leader McConnell and start demanding.

The question is, "Will GOP leadership get the message or stay the course of the hard right?"  When you read the demographics of voters in the email below, they had better wake up or the GOP as we know it will go down in flames as the hard right party of white male Neanderthals with a bunch of wealthy donors who were repudiated even if they won't admit it today.  The American people in fairly large numbers are sick and tired of social issues at the National level, but social conservatives cannot seem to get it through their heads that the majority of Americans don't care about the hard right positions -- they are in the minority on those positions no matter what they say.

When you read this email about demographics, it says it all.  America has now become a true melting pot. The Republican Party to survive needs to embrace the change not throw them under the bus.  We have a whole generation of young people who will add a lot to America if given the chance and embraced.  President Obama is correct -- Time to Move America Forward!

First Thoughts: Obama's demographic edgeWednesday, 07 November 2012 06:12:44 PST 

Obama’s demographic edge… And the GOP’s demographic dilemma… Breaking down last night’s results… Do status-quo election results = status-quo governing?... Obama’s swing-county swagger…His tactical dominance…  And lots of history was made last night.  

By NBC's Chuck Todd, Mark Murray, Domenico Montanaro, and Brooke Brower 

*** Obama's demographic edge: Yes, the auto bailout mattered in Ohio. Sure, Hurricane Sandy helped the president. And, yes, the economy was the No. 1 issue. But make no mistake: What happened last night was a demographic time bomb that had been ticking and that blew up in GOP faces. As the Obama campaign had assumed more than a year ago, the white portion of the electorate dropped to 72%, and the president won just 39% of that vote. But he carried a whopping 93% of black voters (representing 13% of the electorate), 71% of Latinos (representing 10%), and also 73% of Asians (3%). What’s more, despite all the predictions that youth turnout would be down, voters 18-29 made up 19% of last night’s voting population -- up from 18% four years ago -- and President Obama took 60% from that group. The trend also played out in the key battleground states: The president won about 70% of the Latino vote in Colorado and Nevada, and he won 60% of it in Florida (a high number given the state’s large GOP-leaning Cuban-American population). On Monday, we wrote that demography could determine destiny. And that’s exactly what happened. While the campaign’s turnout operation deserves all the credit for getting these voters to the polls, the most significant event of this presidential contest might very well have been the 2010 census. 

*** And the GOP’s demographic dilemma: Obama’s demographic edge creates this dilemma for the Republican Party: It can no longer rely on white voters to win national elections anymore, especially in presidential cycles. Indeed, according to the exit poll, 89% of all votes Mitt Romney won last night came from whites (compared with 56% for Obama). So the Republicans are maximizing their share with white voters; they just aren’t getting the rest. And come 2016, the white portion of the electorate will probably drop another couple of points to 70%. Politico’s Martin puts it this way: “Battling a wheezing economy and a deeply motivated opposition, Obama still managed to retain much of his 2008 map because of the GOP’s deficiencies with the voters who are changing the political face of once conservative-leaning Virginia, Florida, Colorado and Nevada. Republicans face a crisis: the country is growing less white and their coalition has become more white in recent years. In 2004, George W. Bush won [about 40 percent] of Hispanics. Four years later, John McCain, the author of an immigration reform bill, took 31 percent of Hispanics. And this year, Romney captured only 27 percent of Hispanics.” 

*** Hard for the GOP just to turn to the Midwest: Now Republicans might argue, “Look, we can win back the Midwest -- Ohio, Iowa, and Wisconsin.” Yet those account for 34 electoral votes. But the Sun Belt states where Obama campaigned and which have more diverse populations (Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia) have a total of 57 electoral votes. And then there are Arizona, Georgia, and Texas. Do those states come into play in 2016? What about 2020? Come 2016, you could argue that Arizona and Georgia become for Democrats what Michigan, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania are for Republicans -- just slightly out of reach. 

*** Last night’s results: The morning after, here are the results (so far) from last night: Obama holds 303 electoral votes and Romney 206. (NBC News has yet to call Florida and its 29 electoral votes, but Obama leads there 50%-49%.) In the popular vote, it’s Obama 50%, Romney 48%. Also, Democrats have held on to their Senate majority and might add to it -- with undecided races in Montana (where Democratic incumbent Jon Tester leads 48%-48% with 77% in) and North Dakota (where Democrat Heidi Heitkamp is ahead by about 3,000 voters with 93% in). But Republicans held on to control of the House, holding 237 seats vs. 197 for the Democrats, plus-minus four seats. 

*** Does status-quo control = status-quo governing? So in the end, we got a status-quo result -- with Obama holding on to the White House, Democrats keeping control of the Senate, and Republicans maintaining their grip on the House. But here’s the question with the “fiscal cliff” negotiations coming up: Will the governing be status quo, too? Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell released this statement last night: “To the extent [Obama] wants to move to the political center, which is where the work gets done in a divided government, we’ll be there to meet him half way. That begins by proposing a way for both parties to work together in avoiding the ‘fiscal cliff’ without harming a weak and fragile economy, and when that is behind us work with us to reform the tax code and our broken entitlement system.” And House Speaker John Boehner makes a statement on the “fiscal cliff” negotiations at 3:30 pm ET. But who holds the mandate here? The GOP? Or a president who waged a national campaign on raising taxes for the wealthy, and who won? And here’s another question: Do Boehner and McConnell take advantage of the lame duck to compromise? 

*** Obama’s swing-county swagger: Turning back to last night’s presidential contest, Obama beat Romney in almost all of the swing counties (won by Bush in ’04 but by Obama in ’08). Indeed, Obama won three of four swing counties in Florida (Hillsborough, Pinellas, Osceola), four of six in Ohio (Hamilton, Wood, Ottawa, Sandusky), 11 of 14 in Virginia (including Loudon, Prince William, and Henrico), and all six in Colorado (including Jefferson, Arapahoe, and Larimer). And despite losing North Carolina, Obama may have proved that the state is changing, becoming more “Mid-Atlantic” but not quite all there, as Charlie Cook has said. Obama won nine of 13 swing counties in the Tar Heel State (including the large counties of Wake, Forsyth, Cumberland, and Buncombe). 

*** And his tactical dominance: But it was more than winning the swing counties for Obama; it was tactical dominance. Romney made inroads all across the country from previous GOP performance. What happened, however, was that the Obama campaign exploited the census and changed the margins. The best example of this was in Florida. 

*** Making history: Finally, it was an historic-making election. With Obama’s re-election, we now have the first time since Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe that Americans have elected three two-term presidents in a row… Tammy Baldwin will become the Senate’s first openly gay member… The Senate will have at least 19 female members -- the most ever -- and there’s a chance that number could increase to 20 if Heitkamp wins… Maryland and Maine became the first states to approve of gay marriage at the ballot box… And initiatives to legalize marijuana passed in Colorado and Washington state. 

Are Some GOP Members of Congress Morally Corrupt on Libya?

Things must be getting desperate in Republican land in Congress as they see this election, slip, slipping away out of their grasp as the Libyan attack is blowing up in their faces:

But now, a growing drumbeat of evidence has found that the administration’s claims were substantiated by the the intelligence community. Eyewitnesses in Benghazi initially told officials and reporters that “members of the group that raided the U.S. mission specifically mentioned the video, which denigrated the prophet Muhammad” and “found no evidence that it was ordered by Al Qaeda.”  

They have no one to blame but themselves for their obstructionism, lies and lack of integrity in this election.  Trying to use a tragedy like Libya to score political points is exactly the reason that Republicans including Romney should not get people's votes on November 6th.  Many of today's Republicans have no integrity or honesty in this election.  Never thought I would be saying that along with Republicans have put ousting Obama and their party ahead of what is good for the Country.  Unfortunately, they have done just that with their obstructionist tactics and lies they have told about Obama.    How much farther along would the recovery be if the Republicans in the House and Senate had worked with the Democrats for the American people?  Love it when the GOP trashes Obamacare which was based on a Republican plan in the 90's and Romneycare but it is so bad they had to vote over 30 times to repeal costing the taxpayers around $50M all for the purposes of grandstanding leading up to this election.

For Cong King (R-NY) to suggest that Obama had the intel documents doctored shows a gross lack of integrity and honesty.  If King wants the American people to think anyone can snap their fingers and change intel reports, he knows he is lying which make his comments even worse.  Those intel people at the highest levels are not for sale to anyone as they put America first something Republicans have forgotten in their quest to get a very flawed candidate Romney who cannot tell the truth elected.  Republicans have been morphing into pretzels lying about him and putting their credibility on the line for Romney which as we note is continuing today.  GOP has been saying for years that Obama never gets an intel briefing but that is an outright lie as I have discovered when talking to some people I have known for years who come out of that community.

Reports have indicated that despite the intelligence community’s growing uncertainty about the impetus for the attacks, “intelligence officials didn’t feel they had enough conclusive, new information to revise their assessment” and did not communicate their doubts to Rice before her Sunday show appearances. This assessment was also reflected in Obama’s Presidential Daily Briefings. 

This is simply stunning and make a lot of us who are Republicans question Republicans who have been elected in the House and Senate who put the Republican Party and its big donors over the American people.  For that alone, they deserve to lose control of the House and not take the Senate.  Democrats if they take control of the House are walking a thin line with the American voters who have had it with both parties in Congress.  Republicans promised transparency and working together if we elected them -- they didn't come close to delivering as they became obstructionist on almost everything.  What I have been seeing about Libya from Republicans in Congress is enough to know this group should never be in charge of committees in Congress.  Sad day for America when politics is put over Country.  Time both parties wake up and realize they work for the good of the American people not their parties.

Are there no Republicans with backbones willing to stand up and call out people like Peter King whose comments are so despicable -- whether you like him or not, you are talking about the President of the United States which shows with today's Republicans it is all about scoring political points as the truth takes a big hit.

SecurityGOP Jumps The Shark: Congressman Suggests Obama Doctored Libyan Intelligence To Win ReelectionBy Igor Volsky posted on Oct 22, 2012 at 12:01 pm

Republicans blamed President Obama for the killing of four Americans in Libya within hours of the September 11 attack, attributing the violence to the administration’s supposed penchant for “apologizing” and failing to lead in the region. Within days, Republicans charged that Democrats, by arguing that the deaths were caused by a YouTube video disparaging the Prophet Muhammed, were covering up and misleading al Qaeda’s involvement in the deaths and called for U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice’s resignation. During a series of Sunday show appearances on September 16th, she pointedly argued that the attackers took advantage of a protest against the video to carry out the killings. 

But now, a growing drumbeat of evidence has found that the administration’s claims were substantiated by the the intelligence community. Eyewitnesses in Benghazi initially told officials and reporters that “members of the group that raided the U.S. mission specifically mentioned the video, which denigrated the prophet Muhammad” and “found no evidence that it was ordered by Al Qaeda.” The CIA also believed that the clip acted as an accelerant for the killings, instructing both Obama and Rice that “The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the U.S. Consulate and subsequently its annex.” The agency did not change its assessment until September 22. 

The new evidence undermines the GOP’s accusations. But rather than back away from the blame game, they’re doubling down on their attacks against the administration. During an appearance on Fox News on Monday, House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Peter King (R-NY) — who led the Republican effort to use the Libya incident as a way to weaken Obama’s foreign policy credentials — insisted that Obama should have questioned the intelligence community’s conclusions and suggested that he pressured the CIA to doctor its findings to fit his re-election narrative:

KING: I want to find out why the president didn’t ask questions….Did they ask the State Department if they had any videos what occurred at the consulate that night? Why with all these threats leading up to September 11th and talking about terror attacks and how could they now be saying it was not a terror attack. I think they’re hiding behind the term intelligence community. To me shows the president did not look into what happened, did not inquire what happened, was willing to look at something face value. Why was the report at face value whether there was so much evidence in there showing it was terrorist attack. It cries out for explanation and investigation. [...] 

Who are the individuals or the ones the president claim gave him this information? And did the president steer them in that direction? Was this is mind set by the administration that said Libya was great victory and Al Qaeda was on the ropes and no longer a threat to us?

During an earlier appearance on Laura Ingraham’s radio show, King also suggested that Rice should have known that the intelligence presented to her was false and interrogated the assessments before appearing on that series of Sunday political talk shows. “She’s in the chain of command at the State Department,” he said. “Did she just take that information or did she go to the Secretary of State?”   

Read More at Security at Think Progress.

Talk to more people who think it is time for a viable third party with a center right philosophy with no social issues.  Reminder -- Contract with America in 1994 did not contain social issues.  This group of Republicans wants to do away with contraceptives being made available in addition to legal abortion.  We should be moving forward not backward in this Country.

Don't know anything about the district of Peter King but after this, he should be voted out of office,  His credibility is shot and with it the Republican Party members of Congress who have gone over the cliff with the thought of a black man getting four more years as President.   It might even be worse if it was a woman because women are to be seen and not heard or an Hispanic who some Republicans consider less than human.  

Along with Romney has come some of the most bigoted comments out of Republicans I have ever seen.  When Jeb Bush said his brother, Dad, and Reagan would not have been nominated by today's Republican Party he is telling the truth but then they probably would not have run to represent the nasty, bigoted, hard right we are seeing today.

Think the Republican Party leadership is about to get the shock of their lives when the final results are in.  If they had any core values, they would ask themselves where they lost their integrity and honesty along with class in this election.  Only then, can the Republican Party start to be put back together.  If they are not willing to take the blame for going hard right and putting their big donors over the Country, then there is no hope for the Republican Party and some of us are going to have to find a new home.

 

US Senate Debates: Arizona -- Carmona versus Flake

Romney's preferred Senate candidate is not doing so well in Arizona.  His fellow Mormon Flake learned well from Mitt on how to lie and sound convincing.  Did they go to the same school that teaches candidates how to lie and make people believe them?  I am just shocked that they think they can lie and no one will notice.  It is the same tactic as Romney -- say something in a debate and then have your staff clarify.  The dishonesty of GOP candidates is not just the top of the ticket but also now in Senate races.

Jeb Bush has been warning the GOP leadership for a long time about taking Hispanic voters for granted.  Leadership preferred to listen to the hard right with their nasty illegal immigration bills then common sense Republicans.  Now they could pay big time by losing Senate seats.  Arizona could be one of those pickups by the Democrats.  Frankly Carmona deserves to win after Flake lied last night:

Flake was for pledges before he was against them

By Steve Benen -
Thu Oct 11, 2012 1:22 PM EDT 

The U.S. Senate race in Arizona has become increasingly competitive, with Republicans increasingly concerned that former Surgeon General Richard Carmona (D) may upset Rep. Jeff Flake (R). Last night, in a televised debate, the Republican congressman didn't help his case. 

For those who can't watch clips online, the moderator asked, "Did you sign the Grover Norquist no-tax pledge?" Flake replied, "No." Asked if he would sign such a pledge, the congressman again said, "No." Flake added, "The only pledge I'd sign is a pledge to sign no more pledges." 

That's a nice sentiment, of course, but there's a small problem: Flake is already listed as one of the 238 members of the current Congress who's already signed the pledge. 

So, which is it? The congressman's spokesperson told The Hill that Flake signed an older version of Norquist's pledge, not the newest one, so technically, Flake wasn't exactly lying on statewide television four weeks before the election. "Jeff Flake has signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge in the past, but the language of the pledge was changed last year," the spokesperson said. 

OK, so which part of the new version of the pledge does Flake oppose? According to the spokesperson, the congressman doesn't like the language that pledges to "oppose any net reduction or elimination of deductions and credits, unless matched dollar for dollar by further reducing tax rates." 

That might be more compelling if the identical language wasn't in the original pledge that Flake signed. 

The congressman's spokesperson "was unable to explain the discrepancy." Imagine that.

Then there is this from the Huffington Post  on the results of a Latino polling group who just polled Arizona.  Looks like doing their own polling is about the only way they are going to be heard because some national pollsters are ignoring the Latino voters:

Mitt Romney has a problem with Latino voters nationwide, but things look particularly bleak for him in Arizona. 

A poll posted Wednesday by Latino Decisions found 80 percent of Latino voters in Arizona prefer President Barack Obama to Romney -- eight points higher than the percentage of Latinos nationwide who support the president in other surveys from the firm. 

There's bad news in the poll for down-ticket GOP candidates as well. Three-quarters of Latino voters said they prefer Democratic candidate Richard Carmona to Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) in the senatorial race. And 67 percent of those polled said they will vote Democrat in congressional races. 

Latinos make up 30 percent of the population in Arizona, which is typically a red state. 

Saying Romney has a problem with Latinos may be the understatement of the year.  If the Republican Party doesn't lose its bigoted ways which we are seeing in this election, then the GOP will not have to worry about Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Florida where you find large Latino populations who are growing.  They will shortly start dominating elections in these states which will go blue with the hatred of some members of the GOP toward minorities.  If I was a young Latino, there is no way I would join this Republican Party today with their hate filled rhetoric.  The GOP is becoming more and more the Party of the white southern male with women also starting to leave the GOP because of the GOP anti-women stance.

Then there is the interview with the Vice Presidential candidate Ryan who once again gets it wrong but sticks with the narrative if you live in the inner city, it is your fault if you get shot.  Latinos/blacks in Phoenix will be glad to know they are responsible for getting shot because of lack of character according to Paul Ryan:

The clean-cut, VP candidate that Romney thought would be good at crunching numbers and keeping his mouth shut seems to be growing closer and closer to a Y-chromosomed version of 2008 Sarah Palin every day.

On Monday, Paul Ryan illuminated the real reason that some U.S. inner city areas are posting murder rates higher than Kabul’s and Mexico City’s. Public school systems buckling under the weight of austerity cuts and useless teacher tracking programs? Nope. Poverty and unemployment caused by a capitalist system hell-bent on exporting every available job overseas? Nope. A lack of gun control that allows firearms to find their way into the hands of young children? Definitely not. 

The real reason, Ryan asserted in an interview with a local Michigan reporter, is the “character” of those living in inner city neighborhoods. 

“The best thing to help prevent violent crime in the inner cities is to bring opportunity in the inner cities. Is to help teach people good discipline, good character,” Ryan said.
In other words, it’s the immoral and inferior culture of inner city (read: minority) neighborhoods that creating all this crime downtown, which is a disaster for the upstanding (read: white) citizens from the suburbs who just want to enjoy a basketball game at the stadium every once in a while. 

OK, perhaps the last part was an editorialization of his statement, but the racial undertones of his words are undeniable. The idea feeds into the well-developed propaganda about the “culture of poverty,” the idea, first pushed under Reagan, that the inferior ethics of the inner city is what keeps its residents impoverished.
This theory entirely disregards chronic unemployment, failing schools, institutional racism, political disenfranchisement and the dozens of other structural forces that create chaos and crime in swaths of the country that capitalism has effectively abandoned. To hear such a dangerously misinformed statement coming out of the mouth of a vice presidential candidate less than a month before the election is terrifying. 

Then again, it should come as no surprised in what has been one of the most racialized election season in recent history. From the President’s birth certificate to the controversy over “Obama phones,” from Romney’s disparaging comments about the 47% to Gingrich’s suggestion that janitors in inner city schools be replaced by nine-year-old students , both the fringe and the heart of the GOP has been spewing thinly-veiled, blame-the-victim criticisms of African Americans left and right. (It’s also an offensive they’ve used against another large percentage of the American population--women--throughout the election season, but that’s another story. ) 

Laura Gottesdiener is a freelance journalist and activist in New York City.

The comments get more bizarre every day from Romney/Ryan and Republican Senate candidates who are going hard right to play to their new base.  

Are Hard Right Republicans Fit to Lead the Country? This Republican Woman Says NO!

This collage of comments against Romney is good for a laugh to see how the GOP takes back their words in order to turn into pretzels to support Romney.  Simply amazing but then we are seeing it from some of the same Republicans who trashed Akin and now support him holding a fund raiser for Akin hosted by Senators DeMint, Graham, Coburn, and Inhofe.  Seems getting a Senate seat to flip from Democrat to GOP is more important then any integrity.  Akin has a war on women that is ongoing and Romney has a war on the 47% -- neither should be elected to any office.
If Republican Senators are willing to support someone like Aiken, what kind of an agenda would Republicans have if they took over the Senate, House and the White House?  Would it be a hard right agenda where abortion is outlawed and women would be getting backdoor abortions with no medical care?  What grinds me to no end is this group of white guys being the determining factor on women's health in their minds.  They don't know what women go through or the issues they are facing -- they just want to enforce their agenda on the rest of us and many women including Republican women are not buying their koolaid.
The latest to come out of the hard right wing of the GOP is that all the polling is wrong as too many Dems and leaning Dems are being counted which will depress the vote.  News to those pundits and GOP leadership, there are a lot of Republican women who will NOT vote for a white male Republican this time with their neanderthal thinking starting with Romney.  How many Republican women are going to vote for Scott Brown now when they don't even like Warren?  Would say the percentage is dropping with his rhetoric he can tell by looking who is an Indian and who is not.  What is in the water in the Republican side of the Senate to act like a bunch of jerks this year who are alienating women along with a lot of men with their hard right stance?  
Bottom line is that women are a lot smarter than the white males of the GOP leadership want us to be.  A lot of us have quit swallowing their koolaid of the right and are starting to think for ourselves on who we are going to vote for on November 6th no matter the party.  If there is a women running for office on my ballot, she has my vote after what I have been witnessing.  I don't care the party after seeing the GOP support a man like Akin in MO who doesn't believe in equal pay for equal work.  Aiken also calls student loans a cancer, but when you have a candidate like Romney who says ask your parents for the money for college or to start a business, you know you have candidates who could care less about middle class or the poor.  Guess it is our fault for not being born with a silver spoon in our mouths.  
The GOP stands to lose a lot of women over this election along with minorities and males who don't want to be associated with this type of thinking where women and minorities are supposed to be inferior to the intellect of the white male Republicans like Rush Limbaugh and others.  That is exactly how today's Republican Party is coming across to many in this Country.  The GOP attacks on benefits of our veterans and military, senior's social security and medicare, civil service pay and retirement, teachers, fire, and police along with wanting to destroy all unions seems to be the orchestrated agenda of the wealthy Republicans IMHO.  When the wealth donors say jump to Republican members of Congress, they seem to be asking "How high?" as they are doing everything in their power to keep tax cuts and loopholes for the wealthy.  
This group of Republicans in leadership seem to have little empathy for people as a whole and buy into the 'every man for themselves' ignoring that we are all in this together as We the People.  My prediction for November 6th, 2012, election is that the GOP is going to lose big with their narrow mindedness and refusing to heed Jeb Bush's advice that we have to reach out to minorities -- bet he never figured they would be attacking women too!   
You know it is bad when you are watching a political show of left leaners and they are praising George W Bush for his compassionate conservatism or listening to Nancy Pelosi say that GW was very nice and respectful when she worked with him.  Says a lot about the class of George W Bush who was trashed by the likes of Limbaugh and others on the right.   He had class which we are not seeing out of Republicans in leadership today including Romney/Ryan along with some Republican male candidates for Senate like Akin, Brown, Thompson, and others.  They really don't like running against women for Senate if their comments  debate are any indication.  Yet they want women to vote for them?

GOP and Romney/Ryan Dishonor Our Military and Veterans

When I read this article while looking up articles for Memorial Day this past May, I said it couldn't be true as the Republican Party I know would NEVER let this happen to dishonor Veterans.  Let me say right here and now that I was wrong.  I now believe the article is correct and that this Romney Republican Party puts defense department donors and social issues over the men and women in our military and our veterans.  Romney chose Paul Ryan to be his Vice President and supports his budget on the Department of Defense which is devastating to our veterans.  I have excerpted the article which details the facts:

GOP Dishonors Veterans Excerpts:

When most Americans today are honoring veterans’ sacrifice, Romney is six months into promoting giving veterans vouchers for their healthcare benefits to enrich the health care industry, and it informs where his true loyalties lie. Instead of increasing funding to care for the men and women who served in the military, Romney hopes to cheat them out of the benefits they earned. Romney’s hero and Republican’s courageous fiscal guru’s budget that passed in the Republican House of Representatives cuts $11 billion from veteran’s spending, or 13% less than President Obama proposes in his budget. In fact, in the nearly 100-page Ryan Path to Prosperity budget, the word veteran is not mentioned one time. Romney’s privatization scam would “be inadequate, and become more so over time, so that veterans who don’t make enough money to top them up would fail to receive essential care” according to noted economist Paul Krugman.

Republicans are warmongers who love sending America’s soldiers into harm’s way, but are ill-inclined to care for them after their service is over. Bush underfunded the Department of Veterans Affairs by approximately a billion dollars in 2005, and it took Secretary of Veteran’s Affairs, Jim Nicholson, begging Congress to pass emergency supplemental spending until they finally acted just to keep the doors open.

On this Memorial Day, it is important to remember our service members’ sacrifice by more than flying the American flag or saying “support our troops.” America promised its veterans to provide health care after their sacrifice and service, and the GOP dishonors them by cutting their benefits and promoting privatizing their health care. However, more than anything, a leader, or potential leader must think long and hard before sending them in harm’s way and it should only be as a last resort and not because a Mormon thinks he is a latter day American Israeli defending god’s chosen people or to secure oil. It is telling the Republicans will increase defense spending to start wars and kill Muslims, but when it comes time to care for the brave soldiers who fight their wars, they claim fiscal responsibility and slash their benefits and propose giving them vouchers that are insufficient to fund their health care.

President Obama is a staunch supporter of our military and especially veterans, and his reluctance to send them in harm’s way for no apparent reason has garnered condemnation from Romney and Republican warmongers who dishonor their commitment by slashing benefits and pushing for more wars. America owes it to its service members to support them during and after their service, and to employ them only to defend our nation; not to enrich the oil industry, Haliburton, or the defense industry. It is incumbent on all Americans to thank the brave men and women who defend our liberty every day by ensuring that we choose leaders who use their service prudently, and that after they have served, to fulfill the promise of providing the care they need; anything less dishonors their service and commitment. Republicans have shown they have as much contempt for veterans as they do for every other American, and it demonstrates they do not support the troops before, during, or after they send them to another needless war.

All you had to do was watch the GOP Convention to know that the military and our veterans didn't count.  Big freaking deal that Romney went to speak at Veteran's organizations busing in 200 people to be cheerleaders.  Did he tell those veterans he agreed with Paul Ryan's budget in cutting $11 billion from veteran's spending or 13% less than Obama proposed in his budget?  Bet not or they would have run him out of the hall.

Right after the GOP Convention, Bill Kristol went after Romney and the GOP for ignoring our troops fighting the war in Afghanistan.  He was right to go after them.  Wonder what he thinks now with Romney's comments to Fox yesterday:

September 07, 2012
Bonus Quote of the Day

"I only regret you're repeating it day in and day out. When you give a speech you don't go through a laundry list, you talk about the things that you think are important and I described in my speech, my commitment to a strong military unlike the president's decision to cut our military."

-- Mitt Romney, in an interview on Fox News, on why he didn't mention Afghanistan or praise U.S. troops in his convention speech last week. 

My guess is that Bill Kristol is going through the roof about now with what has happened to the Republican Party he once knew because it no longer exists as we witnessed at the GOP Convention that was about white America when you looked at the delegates.  That Convention didn't reflect America of today with less than 2% of the delegates being minorities.  Then your discover that the Romney outreach is now to white voters to attract their voters.  I am Anglo as you can get, but I find that campaign outreach reprehensible and disgusting.  We all Americans no matter where you came from and for Romney/Ryan to single out ONLY whites for votes has my blood boiling almost as much as their ignoring our military.


Can imagine that Senator McCain is rethinking his support of Romney after the GOP/Romney/Ryan Convention ignored our men and women fighting in Afghanistan along with our veterans.  Is this ignoring our military and the quote above what brought out the full opposition research on Romney given to Buzz Feed?  Read the details and you will discover that Romney has no core values but comes down on the side of where he thinks he can get the most votes.  Romney has been doing that since 1994 when he ran against Ted Kennedy for Senate and was all over the place about where he stood on issues.  He had a problem in 1994 answering questions with direct answers that has continued until today.  The Republican Party has nominated Romney to be President who has problems with the truth preferring to lie if it benefits him while dissing fact checking.

Romney, the GOP candidate,  IMHO is someone with 'zero' core values on issues as he is all over the place when asked questions that is, if he gives a straight answer.  Why did Romney get shoved at the GOP primary voters with rules changed, etc.?  Was it so he could self fund his campaign with all the donors he knew?  Then Romney adds Ryan as his sidekick and it goes from bad to worse as Ryan wants to cut $11B from veterans spending when we have more veterans today then ever who need those benefits.  Romney not only agrees with Ryan on the veteran's cuts but wants to add dollars to the DoD which they don't want.   Seems Romney/Ryan and the Congressional Republicans think the DoD needs more tanks which the DoD does not want but why stand in the way of what a big donor wants?

When a GOP Convention, which has always stood in modern times for our military, cannot even mention our troops serving in Afghanistan in dangerous conditions and then nominates a candidate who said that getting Bin Laden is a waste of money, you are going to lose the support of the military, veterans, and their families.  Did the GOP Convention even mention that Bin Laden was dead?

Don't know when the Republican Party turned on the military and the veterans but this is the same Romney and his group who wanted to use our military in Iran to take out the nuclear power plants sending our pilots into harm's way without thinking twice.  That mission would have been a suicide mission.  This group of saber rattlers like Romney consider Russia our biggest geopolitical threat.  Romney and his advisers are scary about how they would use our military.

Been around the military most of my adult life as I have stated on here many times. We have veterans in our immediate family including my daughter and her husband who is a retired disabled veteran -- both were in the Navy, my Dad was in WWII, my grandfather died from mustard gas from WWI, we have letters from family members who fought in the Civil War, and records of ancestors fighting in the Revolutionary War.  My Grandfather died when Dad was five years so he never really knew him.  It left a hole that never completely healed.

Today there are many families across America whose sons, daughters, husbands, fathers, mothers, brothers and sisters did not come home from various wars we have fought.  There are others of our veterans who came home severely wounded who will need help the rest of their lives while others are partially disabled who need the help of the Veterans Administration.  Then there was the Vietnam Veterans who were treated badly when they came home and only in recent years have been recognized the same as our other veterans.  I had two high school friends who were killed in Vietnam and know countless others who had major problems.

This year on Memorial Day, President and Mrs. Obama honored those who served in Vietnam:

Published: May 28, 2012 at 6:34 PM 

WASHINGTON, May 28 (UPI) -- U.S. President Barack Obama called on Americans Monday to "truly honor and support" Vietnam War veterans on Memorial Day. 

This year's Memorial Day coincides with the 50th anniversary of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, Obama wrote in an op-ed column in Stars and Stripes. 

"After Vietnam, our veterans didn't always receive the respect and thanks they deserved. At times they were neglected and even shunned, which was a national shame," Obama said. "We've pledged many times since Vietnam that we would never let that happen again, and that we would give our veterans, especially our Vietnam Veterans, the respect and honor they deserve. This 50th anniversary is our opportunity to do it right." 

Obama visited the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington Monday to meet with "Vietnam veterans and their families for a ceremony to begin this 50th anniversary." 

"As this anniversary proceeds we will also continue working to ensure that our Vietnam Veterans -- and all veterans -- receive the services, respect, and support they have earned. 

Our efforts on behalf of Vietnam veterans are part of our larger effort to make sure our nation is serving all our veterans as well as they served us," Obama said. "And because no veteran who fights for our nation overseas should have to fight for a job when they come home, this country has made it a priority for businesses to hire veterans and provided resources that make it easier for veterans to find a job. 

"This Memorial Day, let's remember all those who've put on the uniform, served far from home, and laid down their lives so we can live ours in security and freedom," Obama said. "And let's take this opportunity to truly honor and support all those who served and sacrificed in Vietnam. That's what we'll be doing when we gather today at The Wall, and that's what we can all do together in the months and years ahead."

Read more at  UPI 

As someone who lived through the Vietnam War years, I can truthfully say it was about time that Vietnam War Veterans were recognized with the Wall that contains the names of those who gave their lives that was dedicated on November 13, 1982 by President Ronald Reagan, an American President who always honored our men and women who served along with our veterans.  Now on the 50th Anniversary of that War, President Obama chose to go to the Vietnam War Memorial to honor those men and women and meet with Vietnam Veterans and their families.

President Barack Obama has earned my respect along with his wife, Michelle, for their continued outreach to our military, veterans, and their families.  Didn't realize until this week about the outreach of Vice President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, into the military and veterans communities.  All four as I have discovered have been honoring men and women with visits and encouragement that are not detailed by the news media unless you search for the details.

On November 6, 2012, this wife of a veteran will be casting her vote for Barack Obama who supports our military and our veterans.  It will be my first time voting for a Democrat for President but Obama has earned my vote and my respect.

Has this Presidential Election Become about Race?

The New York Times covered in detail the Romney camp plans to use Welfare and Medicare against Obama even though on Welfare their ads and comments have been declared completely false and on Medicare half false.  What kind of a campaign uses outright lies which have already been proven as lies to attack another candidate?  A campaign that is losing big is the only answer to take this risk.

The Washington Post fact checker is used by both parties for fact checking  ads.  Earlier in the summer the Washington Post fact check went after an Obama ad giving the ad four Pinocchios.  From what I can tell, they are non-partisan and only looking for the facts:

The Washington Post’s fact checker, Glenn Kessler, gave the welfare ads his lowest rating, four Pinocchios. The Tampa Bay Times’s Politifact was equally harsh, describing the ads as “a drastic distortion” warranting a “pants on fire” rating. The welfare commercial, according to Politifact, “inflames old resentments about able-bodied adults sitting around collecting public assistance.” 

Politifact described the Medicare ad as “half true”:

Romney’s claim gives the impression that the law takes money that was already allocated to Medicare and funds the new health care law with it. In fact, the law uses a number of measures to try to reduce the rapid growth of future Medicare spending. Those savings are then used to offset costs created by the law — especially coverage for the uninsured — so that the overall law doesn’t add to the deficit. We rate his statement Half True.

Politifact also rated a claim Romney made later on the stump — that “there’s only one president that I know of in history that robbed Medicare, $716 billion to pay for a new risky program of his own that we call Obamacare” — as “mostly false.”

Even though Romney has been hit with using false facts, his campaign intends to continue on this road of lies and deceit.  Is Romney also going to keep inferring that Obama is not a real American with a real birth certificate like he has been doing?  I find that line of attack offensive along with a lot of other people.  The Romney ticket is quickly driving people from the Republican Party who are not part of the hard right culture into supporting Gary Johnson, the former two-time Republican Governor of New Mexico, running as a Libertarian, or actually supporting President Obama for re-election.

There is a real problem in the Republican Party and this Convention is not going to heal the split when seven of the speakers are birthers who have made comments against Obama about his birth certificate and not acting American which includes Romney.  From the GOP Platform, the Rules, the Credentials, and seating of delegates, the evidence has piled up that this GOP Convention is going hard right which is going to drive even more Republicans to either stay home or vote for other candidates.

This may be the year that the split in the GOP is permanent and a new party arises from the ashes.  Too many Republicans with common sense don't like the direction of the party with the attacks on minorities and immigrants that we are witnessing.  Jeb Bush has warned them numerous times alienating minorities especially Hispanics but the GOP Platform is using the AZ Immigration Policy which means this Platform Group led by Gov McDonnell (R-VA) is not listening to the more reasoned voices of the Republican Party.

Since the Ron Paul supporters have been placed in the nosebleed section, and a lot of their delegates who won fair and square have not been credentialed from the caucus states, I would expect a lot of them will be going to Gary Johnson to support him after the Convention.  That is a chunk of people deserting the ticket.  Note that Ron Paul did not endorse Romney at his rally with 10,000 supporters.  Many of his supporters are mad at his son, Sen Rand Paul, for endorsing Romney earlier this summer and are not sure they would back him if he ran for President.  The chances for a split in the Republican Party between the hard right and the rest of us is growing with all the splinters to the Party.

Many Republicans in the last four years have essentially been told to sit down and shut up or leave as the Party has moved hard right.  The door might have to be widened after this election.

This article from the New York Times details what is happening with the Romney campaign and the Republican Party.  When I first posted sometime ago from former Florida Governor Jeb Bush about his worry on today's Republicans not reaching out to minorities especially Hispanics, that article drew a lot of negative emails telling me to leave the Party.  Before this election is said and done there is a good chance they will get their way.  The way minorities unless they are part of the Hard Right are treated today is an embarrassment to long time Republicans who have worked to make the GOP the home of the big tent going back to the years of pushing for the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Act legislation.  Maybe my problem is that I come from the North having grown up in Ohio.

Now some in the GOP have called for abolishing those acts starting with the Texas Convention who voted for an overturn the Voting Rights Act.  Then you had an amendment submitted in the House to use no federal money to enforce the Voting Rights Act in the states which turned out badly for Republicans:

Lewis (D-GA), who marched with Martin Luther King Jr., took to the floor to denounce Broun's amendment. 

"It is hard and difficult and almost unbelievable that any member, but especially a member from the state of Georgia, would come and offer such an amendment," Lewis said, recounting the history of struggles over voters' rights. "It's shameful that you would come here tonight and say to the Department of Justice that you must not use one penny, one cent, one dime, one dollar to carry out the mandate of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act." 

“People died for the right to vote -- friends of mine, colleagues of mine,” Lewis said. "I speak out against this amendment."

Broun (R-GA), chastised, gave in. "I apologize to my dear friend from Georgia if he's gotten angry with this amendment. It was never my intent to do so, and I'm going to ask unanimous consent to withdraw the amendment," he said.

What was Broun thinking?  I find the whole debate about race in 2012 to be incomprehensible.  It is like returning to the 1950's, but then we had a President Dwight D. Eisenhower who supported Civil Rights and integration of colleges and schools which at that time Southern Democrats were very opposed to his policies on Civil Rights for minorities along with Voting Rights.  Is this part of the problem in the Republican Party today that some of those southern Democrat bigots, KKK, and their families became Republican?

All I know is that this not the Republican Party that I grew up in and supported all these years.  I don't recognize the hate I see daily out of the GOP ticket and this group of hard right against a black President especially since it is clear he is not some hard left President.  His biggest mistake IMHO was listening to then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi instead of the more reasoned Majority Leader of the Senate Harry Reid.

Obama in the past few years has reached out more to the more reasoned voices of the Republican Party as he did on the budget deal and has been trying on the farm, jobs, and infrastructure bills which are being blocked by the Hard Right in the House and Senate.  No one wants to go against them and face a challenge in their upcoming elections.  How about some Republicans in Congress grow a backbone and actually do what is best for all Americans not just the hard right?

This article takes a look at how race is driving this election and how white the Republican Party has become with their march to the Hard Right.  One thing the author missed is how this Hard Right shift by the GOP has disenfranchised women voters in the Republican Party.

Vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan says that he personally believes that rape is just another “method of conception” and not an excuse to allow abortion.   Why would common sense Republican women, support a ticket with a Vice Presidential candidate that calls rape a "method of conception?"  The answer is  we will NEVER support Romney/Ryan.  In fact, we  will work to defeat such ideology aimed at women that is repulsive.  This comes on top of the attacks on minorities, veterans, teachers, fire, police, and white collar Federal Civil Service by this Republican ticket and the hard right that the GOP has become today.  So who is going to vote for the Republican ticket besides the hard right and the gun clinging white males who support the anti-illegal immigration laws -- tougher the better even when it affects children?  

This article confirms what a lot of us have been hearing about the Romney/Ryan campaign that they are going to get dirtier and nastier against Obama to get more white voters to go to the polls.  Two hours ago it came out that the Romney camp is aiming to get 61% of the white vote now and will be pushing the whiteness of the ticket.  Despicable and repulsive is all I can think of to describe this current thinking out of Romney/Ryan.    Looks like the real Romney is emerging as his Mormon Church he grew up in did not allow minorities to become full members.  This article from the NY Times is correct:

August 27, 2012, 12:43 am
Making the Election About Race
By THOMAS B. EDSALL 

The Republican ticket is flooding the airwaves with commercials that develop two themes designed to turn the presidential contest into a racially freighted resource competition pitting middle class white voters against the minority poor. 

Ads that accuse President Obama of gutting the work requirements enacted in the 1996 welfare reform legislation present the first theme. Ads alleging that Obama has taken $716 billion from Medicare — a program serving an overwhelmingly white constituency — in order to provide health coverage to the heavily black and Hispanic poor deliver the second. The ads are meant to work together, to mutually reinforce each other’s claims. 

(snip) 

The Romney campaign’s shift of focus toward welfare and Medicare suggests that his strategists are worried that just disparaging Obama’s ability to deal with the struggling economy won’t be adequate to produce victory on November 6. 

The importance to the Romney-Ryan ticket of two overlapping constituencies — whites without college degrees and white Medicare recipients — cannot be overestimated. Romney, continuing the Republican approach of 2010, is banking on a huge turnout among key white segments of the electorate in order to counter Obama’s strengths with minority voters as well as with young and unmarried female voters of all races. 

There is extensive poll data showing the depth of Republican dependence on white voters.
On August 23, Pew Research released its latest findings on partisan identification, and the gains that the Republican Party has made among older and non-college whites since 2004 are remarkable. 

Just eight years ago, Pew reports, whites 65 and over were evenly split in their allegiance, 46 percent Democratic, 46 percent Republican. In the most recent findings, these voters are now solidly in the Republican camp, 54-38, an eight point Republican gain. Elderly women were 9 points more Democratic than Republican in 2004, 50-41, the opposite of where they are now, 51-42 Republican. Older men, who were 51-41 Republican in 2004, are now 59-33 Republican. 

Similarly, white voters without college degrees, of all ages, have gone from 51-40 Republican in 2004, to 54-37 in 2012, according to Pew. 

Most importantly, the Pew surveys show that 89% of voters who identify themselves as Republican are white. Faced with few if any possibilities of making gains among blacks and Hispanics — whose support for Obama has remained strong — the Romney campaign has no other choice if the goal is to win but to adopt a strategy to drive up white turnout. 

The Romney campaign is willing to disregard criticism concerning accuracy and veracity in favor of “blowing the dog whistle of racism” – resorting to a campaign appealing to racial symbols, images and issues in its bid to break the frustratingly persistent Obama lead in the polls, which has lasted for the past 10 months. 

The result is a campaign run at two levels. On the trail, Paul Ryan argues that “we’re going to make this about ideas. We’re going to make this about a positive vision for the future.” On television and the Internet, however, the Romney campaign is clearly determined “to make this about” race, in the tradition of the notorious 1988 Republican Willie Horton ad, which described the rape of a white woman by a convicted African-American murderer released on furlough from a Massachusetts prison during the gubernatorial administration of Michael Dukakis and Jesse Helms’s equally infamous “White Hands” commercial, which depicted a white job applicant who “needed that job” but was rejected because “they had to give it to a minority.” 

The longer campaigns go on, the nastier they get. Once unthinkable methods become conventional. 

“You can tell they” — the welfare ads— “are landing punches,” Steven Law, president of the Republican super PAC American Crossroads, told the Wall Street Journal. Law’s focus group and polling research suggest that the theme is not necessarily going to work. “The economy is so lousy for middle-income Americans that the same people who chafe at the rise of welfare dependency under Obama don’t automatically default to a ‘get-a-job’ attitude — because they know there are no jobs.” 

As the head of a tax-exempt 501(c)4 independent expenditure committee, Law cannot coordinate campaign strategy directly with the Romney campaign. Nonetheless, he is sending a warning. The welfare theme, Law said, “needs to be done sensitively. Right now it may be more of an economic issue than a values issue: In other words, more people on welfare is another disturbing symptom of Obama’s broken-down economy, rather than an indictment of those who are on welfare or the culture as a whole.” 

Will the Romney campaign heed Law’s advice to keep it subtle? The principle media consultant for the pro-Romney super PAC Restore Our Future, which will be running many of the anti-Obama ads over the next ten weeks, is Larry McCarthy, who produced the original Willie Horton ad. 

Thomas B. Edsall, a professor of journalism at Columbia University, is the author of the book “The Age of Austerity: How Scarcity Will Remake American Politics,” which was published earlier this year.   

Excerpt:  Read more at the NY Times

Why would anyone be surprised at what a person from Karl Rove's Crossroads would have to say about this line of attack knowing it is based on lies?  Rove, himself, is not Mr. Honesty.  The fact that Fox News treats him like a non-partisan when he comes on the air to discuss the election, should also tell you all you need to know about Fox News.  Karl Rove is a partisan hack who used George W. Bush to get to where he is at so he can take out people he doesn't like , e.g. Rick Perry in the primary, with all the millions that have been donated to his two organizations one of them where donors are kept secret.  

Republicans are using Super PACs and non-disclosure donor non-profits to spread the lies so I ask you "Why would anyone vote for the ticket of Romney/Ryan if you believe in honesty and ethics in elections?"  Will the hard right shift this election of the Republican Party be the final nail in the coffin?  The jury is still out.