Starve the beast, redux

In a NY Times article, "Republicans’ Deficit-Cut Pledge Lacks Specifics," David Leonhardt provides a level headed assessment of various Republican deficit cutting schemes. Some of which include phasing out Social Security, or raising the eligibility age, and modifying Medicare to become a voucher program with caps on benefits. All include tax cuts for rich people, and increased health care, transportation, energy expenses -- effectively, tax increases -- for middle-class and poor people.

The Republican Party does not have middle-class interests at heart. They are bought and paid for by corporations who seek fewer regulations that limit financial exploitation of the middle class and poor, and destruction of public land, water, and air for private profit. If you consider yourself middle-class or impoverished, the Republican Party is playing you for a fool.

A bunch of chumps...

photo: LA Times

An article in the NY Times this morning, "Hidden Under Tax-Exempt Cloak, Political Dollars Flow" (September 23, 2010) outlines the machinations of political organizations created by Republican Party hacks on behalf of their corporate puppeteers. It's pretty much what you would expect: these guys work for corporations that rip us off with overpriced health care and drugs, ship our manufacturing jobs overseas with their private equity fund leveraged buyouts, and rape our public lands for cheap coal that they resell to us as toxic energy. It's easy money for these capitalized rich guys, and they want to keep it flowing. To do that, they put misleading ads on TV that cater to the fear and anxiety of an ignorant, poor and middle-class electorate who think because these guys can talk the talk (guns, abortion, prayer in school -- family values), they must be OK. These voters are chumps, and they are being played as fools. Below are some choice bits from the article in the Times (which, of course, these same voters have been convinced is the mouthpiece of the Devil). Here you go:

So, a bunch of rich guys get together and form this "business league," which collects "membership dues" and then produces TV attack ads that are meant to ruin Democratic candidates with false accusations and slander. A fine use for their money, since these "business"-"men" can't ever seem to run a business without favorable Congressional legislation to crush their competition, or give them access to a captive pool of customers -- think "Payday Loans" or riverboat casinos.

So, they start up this organization called "Americans for Prosperity" that is really only interested in the prosperity of those few Americans that give them money, and happen to have the same investments in common -- not interests, but investments. These guys don't give a damn about the interests of wage earning Americans at large. And, it turns out, "Americans for Prosperity" is a front for Karl Rove's American Crossroads, and a subsidiary (once removed -- Karl is careful not leave fingerprints) of Crossroads media, "whose other clients include the national Republican Party, the Republican Governors Association and American Crossroads."

Crossroads Media is run by Michael Dubke and David Carney, who along with several business groups helped start Americans for Job Security in 1997. Mr. Carney had been political director for President George Bush, and Mr. Dubke was the first executive director and then president of Americans for Job Security until April 2008, when Mr. DeMaura, recruited by Mr. Carney, took over.

...

“I work with them closely on a day-to-day basis, but we don’t discuss our work or coordinate anything,” he said. “It’s firewalled off.”

Mr. Dubke, too, denied that the agenda of Americans for Job Security was driven by the political interests of his firms.

“Nothing is ever done in coordination with another campaign,” he said. “I’m always trying to follow the letter of the law.”

...

It's all good, and then along comes a rich guy with a fishing lodge in Alaska. You know, out there in the unspoiled wilderness, which Republicans are always trying to spoil if they can make an easy buck doing it. Unless of course, their fishing lodge happens to be in the midst of the spoiling. In that case... (BTW, Pebble Mine would trash the environment, but that's another story.)

The group (Americans for Prosperity) ended up in Alaska through Mr. Dubke’s work for opponents of the proposed Pebble Mine, led by an Alaska financier, Robert Gillam, whose private fishing lodge could be affected. The opponents said the mine would endanger commercial fishing and pushed a ballot initiative aimed at imposing clean-water restrictions on it; its backers said the mine would create jobs.

Mr. Dubke’s work for Mr. Gillam was called Operation Trenchcoat, documents show, and involved finding out who was behind a pro-mine Web site called Bob Gillam Can’t Buy Alaska. Mr. Gillam testified that he spoke with Mr. Dubke about Americans for Job Security, and decided to join by giving $2 million in “membership fees,” and that he “had high hopes” the money would be used to oppose the mine. (The ballot initiative ultimately failed.)

...

Americans for Job Security eventually paid a $20,000 settlement without admitting guilt and agreed not to help anyone make anonymous contributions in an election in Alaska — with the condition that its pledge “does not apply to any other jurisdiction which may have laws dissimilar to the state.”

None of the above corruption by dissolute rich people disappoints me as much as the gullibility of the poor and middle-class chumps who support these guys by voting for their candidates, and then have their jobs, health care, and healthy environment snatched away. Happy elections!

Hot F*cking Tuna!

 

So, after receiving a petition from The Center for Biological Diversity, the National Marine Fisheries Service were persuaded to consider listing the Bluefin Tuna as an endangered species. Hoo-rah! Somebody thinkin' And not a moment too soon. Folks who know have been saying these things are in peril for years and years. Anyway, here's the story from the New Orleans Times Picayune: Atlantic bluefin tuna may become endangered, thanks to Gulf oil spill

Now, don't go out and celebrate with a sushi dinner, alright?

Keep Alaska's Landscape Clean

Tundra wetlands along the Nigu River -- NPR-A

Earthjustice sent me an e-mail asking me to send a comment to the Bureau of Land Management on its new management plan for the National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska (NPR-A).

American Geological Institute

Earthjustice provides lots of sample text, but theirs seems a little too verbose for me. Here's what I wrote:

As the Bureau of Land Management develops a new management plan for the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, I urge the BLM to consider the notion that the value of wildlife, wilderness, subsistence and recreation might exceed the value of the oil and gas in this region.

Why trash it? And it will be trashed. Habitats will be destroyed, the soil and water will be marred and polluted. The place will never be the same again. And you have the power to prevent this needless desecration. Use it. Stop oil and gas development in the NPR-A before it starts.

Think beyond short term profits for oil and gas companies. This is more important than that. This region's health is more important than anyone's personal enrichment.

We don't need this oil and gas. Improved efficiency and renewables can take their place, using existing, proven technology.

Thanks!

Utukok Uplands -- NPR-A, Richard Kahn

Now, you should pop over to Earthjustice and send a comment (https://secure.earthjustice.org/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=1033) to the BLM, too.

Otherwise, their gonna do what the oil and gas companies tell 'em to do. And you know how that'll end. Like BP's perfectly safe drilling operation in the Gulf of Mexico.

Tea Party Express -- Supporters Do Well While Doing "Good"

"Mr. Russo’s group, based in California, is now the single biggest independent supporter of Tea Party candidates, raising more than $5.2 million in donations since January 2009, according to federal records. But at least $3 million of that total has since been paid to Mr. Russo’s political consulting firm or to one controlled by his wife, according to federal records."

...
"But the campaign finance records for the Tea Party Express also showed payments totaling more than $10,000 for stays at casino hotels, as well as bills for meals at expensive restaurants near Mr. Russo’s offices, including nearly $5,000 at Chops Steak House, which former staff members said the Tea Party Express frequented after work."

...
Mr. Russo disputes that there was any lavish spending. 'There have been a lot of cheap shots taken,' he said. 'This has not been a profitable activity for us. We have plowed every penny back into this thing.'"

"G.O.P. Insider Fuels Tea Party and Suspicion," NY Times, September 19, 2010

The Tea Party Patriots movement sure has some fine folks bankrolling it, like proud mobster parents buying new uniforms for the little league team their kid plays for. Like Mr. Russo, who gathers up contributions from guileless followers, and pockets 57%. That's Republican grassroots if I ever saw it, even if it goes by the Tea Party nickname. And then there's the grassroots Koch brothers, of oil refinery and formaldehyde fame, and all the other upstanding, patriotic millionaires who stood up to defend the working man with wads of cash:

"Reports indicate that the Tea Party Movement benefits from millions of dollars from conservative foundations that are derived from wealthy U.S. families and their business interests. Is appears that money to organize and implement the Movement flows primarily through two conservative groups: Americans for Prosperity and FreedomWorks."

"Tea Party movement funding," sourcewatch.org

It seems all those rabid, enraged, citizens who take to the streets in the name of liberty and justice for all under the banner of the Tea Party Patriots are dupes for a bunch of overfed, cigar-smoking, back-room deal-cutters. Sleazy back-room dirty-dealers who scheme for an easy buck gutting our manufacturing sector with their private equity funds, and sending our jobs to overseas sweat shops; or extracting and selling resources from public land, and leaving behind oceans of pollution for taxpayers to clean up; and then dodging  corporate taxes on their record profits in Cayman Island phantom headquarters. All this while dropping the bill for national defense, education, highways, and Medicare on working stiffs. The same working stiffs who take to the streets in the name of liberty and justice for all... and rich, tax-dodging, crooks.

God love 'em, as VP Biden likes to say.