RedEyes Rundown #PinkOut

Cost of defunding Planned Parenthood: Less healthcare for 650,000 women http://t.co/o4DGvQnuDW #PinkOut #tcot #p2 pic.twitter.com/zsBk3sVEn0

— Blue DuPage (@BlueDuPage) September 29, 2015

Alabama's Governor,  First Lady reach agreement in divorce. Move along. Nothing to see here.  Governor Bentley is free to continue with his activities, closing nursing homes and mental health facilities, denying poor women access to planned parenthood, refusing to expand medicaid, denying children access to a quality public education, destroying the environment, closing state parks,  and creating new jobs.  Oh, wait.....

So Robert Bentley is trying to convince the public that he is promoting transparency by asking for the court file to be unsealed--when, in fact, he's pulling another con on the citizens of Alabama.

Legal Schnauzer and his wife need our help.

Shuler tells us that they were current with the rent when the landlord unilaterally moved to terminate their lease. The eviction occurred before a ten-day grace period had elapsed, and despite a legal appeal that had put a hold on any eviction proceedings.
And he says flatly, "There's absolutely no question in my mind" that the eviction is retribution for his ongoing reporting about Alabama corruption--most recently breaking the story about the sexual affair of current Alabama governor Robert Bentley that led his wife of 50 years to file for divorce.
The Shulers lost most of their property in the eviction, some items were stolen by employees of the landlord. They are living in a fleabag motel with just the clothes on their backs. If you can make a donation of any size, please visit the Legal Schnauzer blog.

What's that you say? There's a mean spirit on the lose?  Who knew?

Located in rural Alabama, the Loyal White Knights claims to be the largest and most powerful KKK chapter in the country. Leaders of the Klan claim their membership rolls include politicians, teachers, hospital staff and others, saying, “Most of the majority of our people are in the military. We all have our concealed weapons permits.”
Going on, one of the men interviewed said:

“There’s going to be a great war – I won’t call it a Civil War – it’ll be anything but that. It’ll be an uncivil war. You’ll see a bunch of Americans getting killed and blown up.”

Boeher's Resignation is Bad News for Everyone

Stay tuned for a year of teabagger bullshit. I’m expecting continuous investigations of Hillary Clinton until the 2016 election, government shutdowns based on social issues, capped off with President Obama’s impeachment hearings.

And, Far Right Extremist won't be satisfied until they've burned the country to the ground.  

They truly do want to burn the house down. Just burn the whole country right to the ground. After securing John Boehner's resignation for the sin of trying to govern, the hard right is now taking aim at Mitch McConnell, and for stupid, stupid reasons.

“If all lives mattered, we wouldn’t be in the streets, right?” Mckesson said. “If black people didn’t have to fight for their rights like this, we wouldn’t be here, so we know that it is, like, an ahistorical way of thinking about justice in this country. All lives have never mattered, which is why people like Mike Brown and Freddie Gray are not here.”

As the young people say, Word.

Eye tried tell some of y'all Terri Sewell was Artur Davis in Designer Pumps, can you hear me now #Leftinbama? #Vindicated

H/T Left in Alabama

Yes, this is another Eye tried to tell some of y'all Alabama's lone democratic (and I use that term loosely) Congresswoman was Artur Davis in designer pumps post.

Remember when Congress Critter Davis was the lone member of the Congressional Black Caucus to vote against the Affordable Health Care Act ?

Alabama Congressman Artur Davis, who is attempting to become that state’s first Black governor, was the lone Congressional Black Caucus member who voted against health care reform championed by President Barack Obama, sparking local and national criticism.
“He let us down,” state Rep. Mary Moore, a Birmingham Democrat, told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “You tell someone, ‘Vote for me, and I will look out for you,’ then they vote for his or her own agenda.”
She and about a dozen people gathered in front of Davis’ downtown Birmingham office around midnight Saturday.
“We prayed for a miracle. We prayed that God would change his heart because so many people in this country and in his district are hurting,” Moore said.
Davis says he couldn’t vote for the health care reform package because it’s too big.

If Sewell  thinks she's going to be governor some day, toadying up to the white folks (H/T RD), she might want to ask her predecessor how well that turned out for him.  But I digress.

BREAKING: ALABAMA'S 7TH US CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT DEMOCRATIC CONGRESSWOMAN, TERRI SEWELL, BREAKS WITH OTHER CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS MEMBERS, SAYS SHE WILL ATTEND ISRAELI PM BIBI NETANYAHU'S SPEECH. This action by Rep. Terri A. Sewell is an insult to President Barack Obama. (H/T ES)

“I don’t hold Netanyahu responsible,” Butterfield said. “I hold Speaker Boehner responsible, but I would hope that Mr. Netanyahu would not want to get involved. I personally think it is disrespectful.”
That was a word many members used: “It is very disrespectful to this president, and what concerns me more is that I think it’s a pattern that is starting to develop from this speaker that we’re getting more and more disrespectful of the office of the presidency,” said Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-La.). “I think it’s silly and petty.”

So, Why has Terri Sewell chosen to join the other side? Her recent votes surely indicate that her positions are far different than what her own constituents would expect.

 Friday, February 13, 2015, Congresswoman Terri Sewell (D-Selma) issued a written statement after the Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2015 was reintroduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. While supportive of the legislation’s intent, Congresswoman Sewell wants to see the legislation strengthened.

Sound familiar?

Last week, as President Barack Obama urged Congress to plow ahead even without support from Republicans, Davis said he was open to supporting a bill if certain major changes were made.
On Tuesday, he ruled that out.
"What's on the table now is a massive overhaul of the health care systems in this country," Davis said. "We can fix the problems without having to do a massive systems overhaul."

I pity the residents of the 7th district .

My worst fear has come to past. Republicans, enabled by the media (again) and the neo liberals (again) bought and paid for the only African American seat in congress (again). I'm sure they are patting themselves on the back and high fiving their "victory" this morning, but this is wrong on so many levels. For one thing it proves it's not about the people, it's about the money, the power and the influence. It's proof the residents of the 7th district didn't get to decide who represents them in congress (again).

I guess I can't blame Sewell for being afraid of losing her job..or worse...

Tea Party radio host Andrea Shea King argued recently that Democratic lawmakers — and specifically members of the Congressional Black Caucus — should be put to death by hanging if they boycotted Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Tuesday speech to Congress
“Obama doesn’t have to run for reelection again, a lot of these guys do,” King said in a clip of her radio show that was published by Right Wing Watch on Monday. “Listen, I would like to think that these guys could pay with their lives, hanging from a noose in front of the U.S. Capitol Building.”

Don't blame me, I supported Sheila Smoot.

Hump Day Hypocrisy Diary Trifecta Edition

There is so much hypocrisy going around I don't know where to start.  All I can say is the Talking TeeVee Pundit Heads must think We The People have amnesia, or, they think we are stupid enough to believe everything they tell us just because they keep saying it over and over on TeeVee. 

The TTPH's have the nerve to trot out some of the same ones who enabled Bush and Dick to take us to war based on DEAD WRONG INTELLIGENCE and NO EXIT STRATEGY,  telling us Syria is not like Iraq.

 Yeah right.

Republicans like to bomb people.  That's messed up.  House majority leader John Boehner backs President Obama when it comes to dropping bombs,  but when it comes to access quality affordable health care, public education, jobs, women's right, or sensible gun control legislation, not so much.

 How could Obama let himself be pushed into this catastrophe you ask?  IMHO, and mine only,  our President suffers from Bipartisan Syndrome,  he keeps reaching out to republicans, and they keep sawing his arm off.  What part of republicans do not like him, and will never like him doesn't he understand?  We F--king Retarded, and Professional Left tried to tell him, but did he listen to us?  Noooooooo.

 Speaking of The Left, Writing for the Huffington Post,  Frank Schaeffer says The Left and the Right Entirely Missed the Point of Obama deferring Syria to Congress.

 The pundits mostly are trying to figure out the president's tactics short term on the "next war" or "what this means politically." But Syria isn't the point. Politics isn't either. Our Constitution is. What they don't get is that irrespective of the outcome now in this case, President Obama has injected an old/new note of constitutional restraint into the American war making game that is revolutionary for our times.
It's a very big story that the media seems to be missing by concentrating on the short term situation, Syria, and politics. The real story here isn't Syria--it is presidential power. President Obama just put our country's good ahead of his power and handed a little of presidential power back to We The People. Thank you Mr. President.

Uh, I don't think we should be thanking Mr. President for handing a little bit of presidential power back to We The People just yet. House minority leader Nancy Pelosi said she supported the president and sent a letter to fellow Democrats urging that they fall into line. But she conceded, “In my district, I don’t think people are convinced that military action is necessary.”

Booman keeps harping on it

She can feel the pulse of the progressive caucus, but she's supporting the president.
Did that last sentence make you cringe? Cause a little cognitive dissonance?
It should, because the progressive caucus, as opposed to the predominately white progressive blogosphere, has been the strongest supporter of the president. But progressives of all stripes are scratching their heads over the presentation of the evidence and the logic behind the strategy.
Nancy's right. Progressives need to see more.

I agree with the rude pundit

Across this America, city after city and state after state, the basics of daily life (and death) are being wrecked, in part, by our failure to spend on things that matter to Americans, things that actually would make this a great country. A nation that has a city that, even briefly, couldn't provide death or birth certificates because it didn't have paper is a nation that has absolutely no business spending millions, perhaps billions of dollars to bomb Syria just because the mad president there did something insane.

Fix America First because we still have a great distance to go.

Hump Day Must Read
Why I can  no longer just stay in my lane

I have not been speaking publicly about the relationship between drones abroad and the War on Drugs at home. I have not been talking about the connections between the corrupt capitalism that bails out Wall Street bankers, moves jobs overseas and forecloses on homes with zeal, all while private prisons yield high returns and expand operations into a new market: caging immigrants. I have not been connecting the dots between the NSA spying on millions of Americans, the labeling of mosques as “terrorist organizations” and the spy programs of the 1960s and ‘70s – specifically the FBI and COINTELPRO programs that placed civil rights advocates under constant surveillance, infiltrated civil rights organizations and assassinated racial justice leaders.

"For those of you who are tired of hearing about racism, imagine how much more tired we are constantly experiencing it." - Barbara Smith

TeaPublicans caught between Barack and a hard place

I wonder if John Bohner, Eric Canter and the rest of the TeaPublicans are having Freedom Fries with their Crow tonight after being forced to cave on the payroll tax extension?

So the fight is over...for two months.

 Right in the middle of campaign season.

RedEye tiptoeing away from the computer to go pray.

Welcome to the real world my child

Remember the commercial when the young man got his first paycheck looked at  and asked "Who is FICA?"  Well something similar happened when my oldest offspring saw the itemized  tax deductions on her first real paycheck, only she said, I agree with those who say no new taxes because they are eating up my paycheck.  

 They aren't talking about no new taxes on wage earners like you, I said They are talking about no new taxes on millionaires and billionaires because the Bush tax cut shifted the tax cut from the rich who could afford to pay more to the middle class who couldn't afford to pay more.

If the Bats#it crazy TeaPublicans have their way, wage earners, not to be confused with millionaires and billionaires, will have an increase in payroll taxes.  Millions of Americans will see their taxes go up at the beginning of the year and millions of Americans will see their jobless benefits end.  

republicans will do anything to win elections, but once they win they can't govern.

Pay your taxes and welcome to the real world my child.

Redeye's Week in Review~edited

Hey Mister Speaker, can we reinstate slavery yet? Because Alabama's immigration law is working. Mission Accomplished.

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) — Alabama's agriculture commissioner, John McMillan, is suggesting farmers look at work-release inmates if they are experiencing labor shortages due to Alabama's new immigration law.

Some farmers have complained that Hispanic workers who traditionally harvested their crops have left and they can't find replacement workers.

A spokesman for the Department of Corrections says there are 2,300 inmates in the work-release program and they are available for all types of jobs, including farming. But spokesman Brian Corbett says the department can't attribute any increase in work-release jobs to the immigration law so far.

Our Guvermint foiled an alleged terrist plot to this week. What color is the Terra Lert?

I'm not saying that I don't believe our government's story. I neither believe it nor disbelieve it. I know too well that the intelligence game is played above my level. It could be true. It might not be. I'm more interested in why no one asks the obvious questions. I mean, what's the motivation?

The No to Jobs republican house passed the Let Women Die Bill this week. Why any self respecting women would vote for republican man or woman is beyond me.

How did you like that crackpot anti-Choice bill Boehner and Cantor-- who claim they're too busy to even allow a vote on the president's proposed jobs legislation-- passed yesterday? They're calling it the Protect Life Act and it passed the misogynistic-dominated House 251-172. If Mitt Romney or any of the other right-wingers running for the GOP presidential nomination were in power to sign this dreck, here's some of the damage it would do:
• Allow hospitals receiving federal funds to deny emergency abortions to women whose lives are in danger due to a pregnancy gone horribly wrong.

Herman Cain leads gop candidates according to the polling pollsters and the pollsters who poll them. Translation, Cain is a Weapon of Mass Distraction from the other gop clowns. Yep, instead of talking about Niggerhead Ranch, Rommney's religion, and the fact the republicans filibustered the Jobs Bill they would RATHER talk about 666, I mean 999, and Rick Perry's wife Anita whining about how hard it is out there for a pimp, I mean gop Presidential candidate.

Reverend Jeremiah Wright returned to the noose, I mean news this week, thanks to a minister supporter of Rick Perry calling Mitt Rommney's religion a cult.
"Wright indicted an entire country," he said. "What Wright did, Wright used the old style of preaching rooted in the ways of the prophet narratives of the Old Testament. Because the nation has done wrong, God will present judgment unless you repent. This is what God will do. He indicted an entire country for the things America has done."
Wright, a black man, called out the majority, Martin said.

Can Sweet Home Alabama can turn a Paige and take our state legislature back from the red, TeaPublicans? God I HOPE so.

How important is Parnell’s campaign to the Alabama Democratic Party? Right now, the Alabama House has a 64-40 GOP majority. A Parnell win makes that 64-41. That brings Democrats within a couple of seats of being able to block a cloture vote - in other words, to being able to mount an effective filibuster against further Republican efforts to attack both the Democratic Party, and the workers, teachers, police and fire personnel, and other vulnerable constituents we represent.

It's too late to apologize. A declaration.

Obama didn't cause this mess, but he's trying to get us out of it.

Would someone please tell the GOP infused, media-enabled TeaPublicans it's not about spending cuts, it's about paying for what we've already bought?. Namely, three wars.

That's right (pun intended), the pro-war GOP wants to pay for the war on the backs of single mothers, the poor, the elderly and the disabled, while bending over backward to support tax cuts for their base, aka the super-rich.

How anyone that is not super rich can call themselves a republican is beyond me. Maybe when their social security and Medicare are cut off they will realize they've been duped. But then again, they hate democrats/liberal/Obama (in that order) more than they love themselves, which is why they can be counted on to vote against their self interest at every turn like good little sheeple.

Social Security cuts under consideration by the White House in deficit-reduction talks would drive 245,000 people into poverty and lower widows' benefits $1,200 a year by 2050, according to Social Security Administration calculations provided to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).

Changing the way inflation is measured to determine Social Security benefits is one option on the table in high-stakes budget negotiations that resume Sunday at the White House. The so-called Chained Consumer Price Index on average results in a lower inflation levels than the more common formula used to adjust benefits.

"The result would be devastating cuts for millions of American seniors and people with disabilities," said Sanders. As chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Primary Health and Aging, Sanders asked the Social Security Administration's Office of Retirement Policy to calculate the impact on poverty rates and benefits if the revised inflation gauge were to be adopted.

In 2030, according to the report prepared for Sanders, there would be 173,400 more people living in poverty in the United States. The revised formula also would dramatically lower benefits for retirees. Widows would receive almost $70 a month less in benefits, a reduction of $840 a year. People who are 70-79 would receive $49 a month less, a drop of $588 a year. Benefits for those who are 80-89 would drop by $80/month or $960 a year. Benefits for women would fall by 3.5 percent overall while men's benefits would drop by 2.9 percent.

Until I hear from the President's mouth instead of some "White House official" I'm not going to rush to judgment on the Medicare and social security rumor because at this point that's all it is. For all we know Harold Ford (DINO) could be the source. Let's wait and see what the President says and not what some unnamed White House official says.

IF, and I mean IF, the rumors are true and cuts to Medicare and social security are on the table why did John Boehner stomp out of the meeting? I mean, that is what they wanted isn't it? Me thinks the republicans are caught between Barack and a hard place. They are damned if they insist on cuts to Medicare and social security and damned if they don't.

Laurence Lawerence says We shouldn't be talking about deficits.

That's the worst part about the entire debate. And from that fundamental problem all others follow. In the midst of the most tenuous of recoveries from one of the most severe recessions, we should be talking about jobs and mortgages and stimulus. We should be talking about reinventing our economy to be green not lean and mean. We should be talking about the Republicans as depraved agents of regression and extremism. We should not be talking to them as if they are willing to negotiate in good faith. We should not be talking to them as if they are capable of making sound decisions on policy.

I don't know what part of the republicans are trying to destroy you President Obama doesn't understand.

The reality is that the Republicans know that for one of them to return to the Oval Office, and for their party to retake one or both houses of Congress, this presidency must be perceived as a failure. The consequences to the country of this presidency actually being a failure are irrelevant to them. They want it to fail. They work for it to fail. They know that any successes by this president undermine their party's chances, so they will do their best to prevent any successes, in any ways they can. The Republicans are a party that impeached a twice-elected president for lying about sex. There is no depth too low, and no sewage too rank, for their pernicious partisan wallowing.

So now that we know the republicans are mean and immoral are we going to let them win?

The last time the U.S. government shut down in the mid-1990s, it was Newt Gingrich who tried to capitalize politically on stories about closed signs in front of the Lincoln Memorial. Of course it backfired, since Bill Clinton was reelected in 1996 in a landslide and Gingrich ended up resigning as House Speaker in an ethics scandal.

This time, however, if an agreement cannot be reached to keep the government operating, millions of poor people will suffer enormously when the Social Security checks stop coming and Medicare and Medicaid won’t pay the hospital bills. Yes Wall Street will crash again, and even the middle classes will lose their retirement. But that’s not even the worst of it.

If an agreement is not reached by August 2, the Dog Days of Summer will take on a whole new meaning. Many poor people will simply die.

Don't be distracted by the media hype, we have bigger problems than the Casey Anthony verdict.

What's the greater moral outrage: the guilty going free or the innocent wrongfully convicted? The death of little Caylee was a tragedy, but her mother's case went through the system, and the system worked as it is designed to do. Don't let the media attention and hyped "moral" outrage distract you from the real challenges to U.S. civil rights and liberties. The next innocent victim could be you!

I'm just saying...

We Won A TeaPublican Gang Banging

Comment of the week;

Even more frustrating is the fact that, once again, the republicans are driving the debate. Two years in and it is obvious that this president is either 1-A bad negotiator or 2-A Capitulator of major proportions. No wonder he's lost the excitement of the majority of folks who got him elected.

Obama Caved Once More and Right-Wing Bullies Will Continue to Hold the Nation Hostage Again and Again

When I was a small boy I was bullied more than most, mainly because I was a foot shorter than than everyone else. They demanded the cupcake my mother had packed in my lunchbox, or, they said, they’d beat me up. After a close call in the boy’s room, I paid up. Weeks later, they demanded half my sandwich as well. I gave in to that one, too. But I could see what was coming next. They’d demand everything else. Somewhere along the line I decided I’d have a take a stand. The fight wasn’t pleasant. But the bullies stopped their bullying.

Deja Voodoo all over coming again in May

Congressional Republicans are vowing that before they will agree to raise the current $14.25 trillion federal debt ceiling — a step that will become necessary in as little as five weeks — President Obama and Senate Democrats will have to agree to far deeper spending cuts for next year and beyond than those contained in the six-month budget deal agreed to late Friday night that cut $38 billion and averted a government shutdown

The Real Speaker of the House is the Tea Bag Gang

“John Boehner is having a difficult time in his caucus ….” Oh, really? Then someone should tell him that He’s in charge and stop trying to appease the Tea Bag gang in his caucus, take them to school and tell them to shut the hell up and go pound sand, or they don’t get a second term on the Hill. Period.

That kind of leadership was the reasons the public respected Tip O’Neill and Nancy Pelosi. Their caucus knew who was in charge.

Avoiding the Government Shut down was good....for John McCain

President Obama has brokered a deal between the Democratic-run Senate and the Republican-run House that avoids a shutdown of the federal government, while also stripping the bill of issues such as Planned Parenthood funding and decisions about the EPA’s authority.

Yet somehow, I’m seeing from some – particularly Ezra Klein, who should honestly know better – that this was a bad deal for the President

Curtis Abby at Progressive Electorate takes us Professional Lefty's to task

But look at all the venom now that we're reaping the results of our big loss last fall. Everyone wants to focus on the President, but what did we do last year?

What more could we have done? That is the question.

What could we have done is more of the question instead of what did we do. We did our part. We voted. We blogged. We organized. We wrote letters to the Editor. We went door to door. We contributed. What more could we have done?

THIS is what President Obama should have said

"Look, I'm not thrilled with how this came together, but I was negotiating with rabid conservatives and didn't want a shutdown. If folks wanted a better outcome, voters shouldn't have elected intemperate children to run the House of Representatives. Don't blame me for your bad decisions."

That's how you handle Bully's Mister President, Sir.

Deal or No Deal?

Well it's the morning after the Knockout-Dragout, Thrilla in D.C. but it's hard for me to to tell who won and who lost. I'm beginning to think it was we the peeps who lost.

President Obama discussed the significance of the deal in his weekly address.

“This is good news for the American people. It means that small businesses can get the loans they need, our families can get the mortgages they applied for, folks can visit our national museums and parks, and hundreds of thousands of Americans will get their paychecks on time – including our brave men and women in uniform. This is an agreement to invest in our country’s future while making the largest annual spending cut in our history.”

Oh really? I wonder what part of the banks aren't making loans to small business doesn't the President understand? I wonder what part of families aren't applying for or getting mortgages because they have NO JOBS? I wonder what part of families can't afford to visit our national museums and parks because they have NO JOBS? Investing our countries future is one thing but what about investing in the present?

The President stressed that some of these cuts would be “painful” as programs people rely on will be cut back and certain infrastructure projects will be delayed. However, President Obama urged that a tightening of the budget is necessary for the future:

Ya think it will be painful to Seniors when they can't afford heat and cool their homes? You think it will be painful to head start children? You think it's going to be painful for Medicare and Social Security recipients? You think it's going to be painful for low income families? You think it's going to be painful for public school teachers and unions?

“And beginning to live within our means is the only way to protect the investments that will help America compete for new jobs – investments in our kids’ education and student loans; in clean energy and life-saving medical research.

Living within what Effing means?????!!! What Effing new jobs????!!!! Our kids already have student loans with NO JOBS to pay them back!!!!! What good is life-saving medical research if you can't afford to get sick because you have NO JOB?????!!!! What part of that don't you understand?

Reducing spending while still investing in the future is just common sense. That’s what families do in tough times. They sacrifice where they can, even if it’s hard, to afford what’s really important.

Uh, NO Mister President, Sir. Reducing spending while Americans are suffering is dumb, stoopid and mean. Families are sacrificing, strike that families are struggling every day just to survive.

The TeaPublicans won last night.

I have to rescind my assessment last night that John Boehner got nothing out of the late negotiations on the 2011 budget. Apparently, he won the restoration of a ban on the District of Columbia spending its own money to help poor women attain abortions. President Obama and the Democrats had lifted that ban earlier in his presidency, and now it is back. Boehner also won funding for the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, which spends federal money on private schools in the District. In addition to these concessions, there is another rider that was left unresolved. Will the DC government be able to spend money on a needle-exchange program? The answer will come out of negotiations between the House and Senate. So, it appears that DC Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton's fears have been realized; as the District took the hit for a budget deal. It's one more example of why they need voting rights and autonomy. For a ninety-percent Democratic city to have to suffer the indignity of being governed by a bunch of conservative Republicans (even in part) is intolerable. Having said all that, I am not impressed with the interpretation many progressives are taking on these negotiations.

The Republican Budget Plan to Kill Medicare Gets Vote Next Week

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan proposed a budget plan for 2012. It's scheduled for a vote next week. Among its features: Ending Medicare and gutting Medicaid.Ryan calls his plan "The Path to Prosperity." For who? No surprise here: it calls for further tax reductions for corporations and wealthy individuals. He claims to be saving Medicare, notwithstanding his plan would push tens of millions of people over the financial edge.

A government shut down was averted last night, but was that a good thing?

It's the stoopid WAR, Stoopid!

What part of the reason we are broke is because we are spending BILLIONS of dollars per month fighting W-ars in Iraq and Afghanistan don't our *cough cough* elected officials don't understand?

What part of the reason our counties, cities and states are broke is because we are spending BILLIONS of dollars per month fighting W-ars in Iraq and Afghanistan don't our *ahem* elected officials not understand?

What part of all war all the time and giving the rich a tax cut are the reason we are broke don't our elected officials understand?

What part of you can't fit a square peg into a round hole aka balance the budget *snark* by waging W-ar on the middle class (working poor), labor (working poor) and the disenfranchised (poor) don't they understand?

What part of we the people are sick and tired of being lied too don't they understand?

Wisconsin is Ground Zero. Despite the lame stream media spin, Wisconsin isn't about balancing the budget. It's about putting organized labor in it's place. Thank goodness Wisconsin democrats have a spine.

What GuyinMilwaukee said;

Yeah, I love how the Teabaggies are always screaming about how Obama and the Dems are shredding the constitution, but damned if they can come up with a coherent example of it. Someone else exercises their ACTUAL constitutional rights, like the right to peacable assembly and redress of grievances, and they get all pompous about "the people have spoken" etc. Somehow that didn't apply to them when they were disrupting (and sometimes, not peacefully) the townhall meetings. They were mum about the obstruction of the Senate process by the secret holds and requiring everything to get a super majority. Where was the tut-tutting of the corporate media? I don't remember any. But now we get the Villagers, the know-nothings that follow Beck, Limbaugh, Fox News and the Astroturfed mythology of the teabag cult weighing in with their fictional talking points, saying the unions don't even have a right to assemble. Assholes.
The hypcrisy of it all serves to underscore its real purpose: the corporate take over of government, aka fascism.

If President Obama, John Boehner and the TeaPublicans are serious about cutting spending, stop spending our tax dollars on stupid wars! They need to put up or STFU.

Tea-baggers, Republicans, and Blue-Dog Democrats in Congress use their convoluted “values” and the deficit as excuses to slash and burn social safety net programs ... witness Planned Parenthood. Social Security and Medicare appear to be next on the chopping bloc, never mind that “we the people” have actually paid for these “entitlements.” So, I suggest we actually test their resolve and commitment to reducing the deficit by demanding they implement a “Deficit Reduction Tax.” It goes something like this:

All elected and appointed officials of the US Government will have 10% of their gross monthly earnings deducted and paid towards the deficit reduction.

All retired elected and appointed officials of the US Government with federal retirement benefits exceeding the US median household income (approximately $50K) will have 10% of their federal retirement income in excess of the US median income deducted and paid towards deficit reduction.

The TeaPublicans don't have a problem spending tax dollars rebuilding Iraq and Afghanistan, but they want to cut spending in America. Go figure.

The new tea party-backed freshman class came to Washington to cut spending. Period. And they’ve joined forces with old-line conservatives in the Republican Study Committee to form an immovable bloc on the issue.

As a whole, that dominant faction of the GOP doesn’t like government much. So if the choice is to keep the same government running at the same rate or to shut it down briefly, some are sure to pick shutdown.

Orange Boehner is finding it takes more than a big gavel to heard cats. Snickering

Cats are scurrying all over the damn place…and rumor has it they turned the GOP legislative plan into a litter box and told Speaker Boehner to put his fucking gavel to use and get to scoopin’!

Bring our troops and our tax dollars home. Cut spending on all war all the time.