More Tea Party Nastiness

If it seems that Republicans spent all of last week trying to blame President Obama for everything except the weather, they didn’t.  Actually, their Tea Party congressmen were still trying to protect the rich while abandoning those who work for a living. 

First, House Republicans passed a bill that would blunt the impact of the Dodd-Frank financial-regulation law on banks and other financial services firms.  Democrats tried to at least protect the pensions of first responders and teachers, but the Republicans rejected the effort.

Democrats then tried to replace the GOP’s plan with a system that the Security and Exchange Commission already uses to regulate Wall Street, but the Republicans refused that, too.  

In short, Republicans once again protected the people who caused many of the problems that got our nation in the financial mess we’re in, and they left those who had nothing to do with causing the problems, specifically those who protect and educate us, swinging in the wind.   

And then, adding insult to injury, they passed a bill to repeal Obamacare.  It was the 37th time they have passed a bill to repeal or decimate Obamacare.  Thirty-seventh time!

None of these bills stands any chance of getting by the Senate, of course, and they stand even less a chance of getting by the president.  

So why do the Tea Party congresspersons insist on wasting time passing these useless bills while Americans everywhere wait with growing impatience for them to do what we elected them to do? 

I don’t know why.  I can’t even imagine why.  I wish that some Tea Party type would tell us why.

-Skip

Why I Am a Liberal

The older most people get, the more conservative they become.  With me, it’s the opposite.  The older I get, the more liberal I become.

I thank Fox News and Rush Limbaugh for much of that.  I listen to both of them whenever possible because I want to test my beliefs against the best conservatives have to offer.  

And if Fox News and Rush Limbaugh represent today’s conservatism, then conservatives offer nothing (unless, of course, you consider negativism something.)

They hate Obamacare, but they offer nothing to replace it -- other than the system we had before, which denied coverage to millions of deserving people.  They hate his plans to stimulate the economy, but they offer nothing to replace it -- other than an austerity plan that has failed everywhere it has been tried and most economists say cannot work.  Look at Europe. 

But most of all they hate liberals.

And what have liberals done to cause all that hatred?

Lawrence O’Donnell Jr. answered that quite clearly when he pointed out that liberals got women the right to vote, got African-Americans the right to vote, created Social Security and thus lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty, ended racial segregation, passed the Civil Rights Act, passed the Voting Rights Act, created Medicare, passed the Clean Air Act, passed the Clean Water Act.

And what did conservatives do?   

They opposed every one of those things.  Every One!

O’Donnell adds:  “So when you try to hurl that label at my feet,  “Liberal,”  as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, IT WON’T WORK, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.”

Amen, brother O’Donnell.

-Skip