Facing a $23.2 million cut, school builds $60 million football stadium

Last month in his second of eight State of the Union speeches, President Obama talked about the sobering fact that countries like China and India have realized the importance of educating their children earlier and longer, with greater emphasis on math and science, and they are in a much better position to compete for new technology jobs.

He also said that over the next decade, nearly half of all new jobs will require education that goes beyond a high school education, but that as many as a quarter of our students aren’t even graduating from high school. The quality of our math and science education lags behind many other nations, and America has fallen to ninth in the proportion of young people with a college degree. He said that call is the current generation’s Sputnik moment, and that we need to reach to reach the level of research and development that helped the U.S. win the space race.

“We need to teach our kids that it’s not just the winner of the Super Bowl who deserves to be celebrated, but the winner of the science fair,” he said.

Apparently, a high school north of Dallas did not receive that message.

Allen High School in Texas is building a new $60 million football stadium that will seat 18,000 people. The new stadium will feature a multi-million dollar video scoreboard, a two level press box with film deck and observation deck, home side reserved seating with seat backs and 4,500 total parking spaces.

The stadium will be paid for with a $119 million bond approved by voters in in May 2009 that won with 63 percent of the vote. But in fairness, not only will the stadium be built, but the money will also be used to build an auditorium for fine arts and a transportation service center for the district.

It seems a little strange when Texas has one of the highest dropout rates in the country and the state is facing massive cuts in education that $60 million will be spent on football. In fact, the very district the high school is a part of is facing an $23.2 million reduction in state funding in its 2011-2012 budget.

The current Texas state budget proposal includes $31 billion in cuts in response to a $15 billion to $27 billion budget shortfall. That could mean a $10 billion cut to Texas public education spread out over two years. According to the local newspaper, school staff members have already started work on a mechanism for staff reductions. That can’t bode well for education, but again, in fairness, Allen High School is among one of the best academic high schools in the state.

The President inspires with his second of eight SOU speeches

President Barack Obama laid out a clear path for continued recovery that will require sacrifice and inspired confidence in his second of eight State of the Union addresses Tuesday night.

“We are poised for progress,” he said to a standing ovation. “Two years after the worst recession most of us have ever known, the stock market has come roaring back. Corporate profits are up. The economy is growing again.”

But he said that was not enough, and that the times are long gone that, especially here in Michigan, you just showed up at the auto plant and got a middle class jobs. The recovery will be tough for some people, and the recovery will take sacrifice, just like previous generations had to.

“Thanks to the tax cuts we passed, Americans’ paychecks are a little bigger today,” he said. “Every business can write off the full cost of new investments that they make this year. And these steps, taken by Democrats and Republicans, will grow the economy and add to the more than one million private sector jobs created last year.”

The President said future success will take education and innovation as we compete with the world, and that we must encourage American innovation.

“None of us can predict with certainty what the next big industry will be or where the new jobs will come from,” he said. “Thirty years ago, we couldn’t know that something called the Internet would lead to an economic revolution.”

The President said we must act with urgency, like the space race that put the first American on the moon, and we must do that by investing in biomedical research, information technology, and especially clean energy technology that is tied to national security, protects the planet and creates countless new jobs.

“We’re not just handing out money,” he said. “We’re issuing a challenge. We’re telling America’s scientists and engineers that if they assemble teams of the best minds in their fields, and focus on the hardest problems in clean energy, we’ll fund the Apollo projects of our time.”

The President said to ensure our continued climb out of the recession, we have to reduce the national debt with things like the health care insurance reform that if repealed will add $230 billion in the first decade to the deficit. But the President stuck to his long-running theme of bipartisanship, and he said he is willing to work with Republicans to make the law better.

“Now, I have heard rumors that a few of you still have concerns about our new health care law,” he said. “So let me be the first to say that anything can be improved. If you have ideas about how to improve this law by making care better or more affordable, I am eager to work with you.”

Perhaps his biggest and boldest proposal was to freeze annual domestic spending for the next five years that would reduce the deficit by more than $400 billion over the next decade, and that move will bring discretionary spending to the lowest share of our economy since Dwight Eisenhower was President.

“This freeze will require painful cuts,” he said. “Already, we’ve frozen the salaries of hardworking federal employees for the next two years. I’ve proposed cuts to things I care deeply about, like community action programs. The Secretary of Defense has also agreed to cut tens of billions of dollars in spending that he and his generals believe our military can do without.”

President Barack Obama is the most admired man in America

For the third year in a row, President Barack Obama is the most admired man in America according to a USA Today-Gallup poll.

But he does not come close to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who was named the most admired woman for the ninth year in a row.

The USA Today-Gallup survey, conducted Dec. 10-12, is based on telephone interviews with a random sample of 1,019 adults and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Still, perhaps we should not take too much stock in the survey because former President George W. Bush was in the top five in the men’s list and half-term Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice were in the women’s top five list.

However, it’s good to see that some people have respect for the office of President, as well as for President Obama the man. But there are still people who have an irrational hatred for Obama, like the birthers.

These insane people believe the President was not born in the U.S. and has not produced his birth certificate, despite undisputed evidence to the contrary. It seems the only way they will be satisfied is if he personally knocks on their door and presents it to them, but I doubt that will even satisfy them. It’s just amazing that people still believe this.

Now, new Hawaii Gov. Neil Abercrombie wants to dispel conspiracy theories that the President was born elsewhere and find a way to release more information about President Barack Obama's Hawaii birth. The only problem is Abercrombie can’t release the birth certificate because Hawaii's privacy laws have long barred the release of a certified birth certificate to anyone who doesn't have a tangible interest.

That has just given birthers more ammo, and they are claming a conspiracy. This is so simple: if the President was ineligible to be the President, the conservative U.S. Supreme Court would have done said as much. After all, they had no problem making Bush President; they would have no problem unseating Obama.

Deal on tax cuts means compromise is not a bad word

I’m used to fighting and arguing with right-wingers and Republican, and I have no problem with that it because its’ really not that difficult. But I spent much of yesterday arguing with fellow Democrats over President Obama’s decision to strike a compromise with Republicans on a temporary two-year extension of all the Bush-era tax cuts, including the bailout for millionaires, in exchange for a 13-month extension of unemployment insurance benefits and a one-year payroll tax reduction for all workers.

It’s a given that Democrats have a big tent with room for lots of opinions and viewpoints, so we will never agree on everything. We’re not Republicans that march in lock step. But I agree with the President on one major point: that compromise is not a bad thing.

In a news conference at the White House yesterday, Obama defended the deal, and he made the point that this country and the greatest form of government was formed from reasoned debate and a compromise. Like liberals, I would love for the president to stand up to the Republicans and their decision to fight for the richest 2 percent that already controls almost 24 percent of income in this country, but people elected the President to accomplish things and make progress, not to engage in useless political fights.

“But I'm not willing to let working families across this country become collateral damage for political warfare here in Washington,” the President said. “And I'm not willing to let our economy slip backwards just as we're pulling ourselves out of this devastating recession.”

I understand that the American people are on our side on the issues, and that they support letting the tax cuts expire for the top earners and keeping the middle class tax cuts. But, there was too much at stake for Obama not to make the deal, including millions losing their unemployment insurance that are keeping a roof over their heads at a time when the unemployment rate is near 10 percent.

I would much rather see the rich get the tax cuts for just two more years instead of getting nothing. We could have the fight and see the unemployed lose their lifeline and see the middle class get a tax hike that will stall the climb out of the Bush recession, or we get something that keeps the economy recovering, yet it increases the budget deficit. So much for the crap about Republicans being deficit hawks and caring about the deficit.

I have heard the argument that we have the majority, so we should pass what we want. The fact is Republicans will just filibuster it, and they have used that rule more than any Senate in U.S. history.

The president was sent to the White House to govern, and he has done that. He has accomplished 80 percent of what he said he would accomplish in just two short years, but many Democrats are not satisfied. Granted, some of the things are not as strong or as sweeping as we would like, like health care insurance reform, but it’s a start.

There is nothing wrong with reasoned debate leading to a workable compromise, and when things are proven to work, we expand and improve them over time. A perfect example is Social Security. It was originally intended just for widows and orphans, but it has turned out to be one of the most popular and successful government programs ever.

This is in sharp contrast to Republicans way of governing. They have said no to everything in an attempt to defeat the President, and they could care less the harm it has done or will do to the country or the economy.

That strategy worked in the last election, and the fact is people didn’t necessarily vote for Republicans in the past election, they just didn’t vote for Democrats and stayed home. They plan to continue that strategy for at least the next two years.

They are trying to run the clock out in lame duck and make sure nothing gets done. They want to make sure the President gets nothing done or accomplishes anything. They don’t care if it means a Middle East terrorist gets his hands on a loose nuclear weapon from the former Soviet Union by sitting on the START treaty on strategic offensive arms.

They are also dragging their feet on repealing “don’t ask, don’t tell” even though 70 percent of the American people support killing it, 70 percent of the military rank and file support killing it and the military leadership supports killing it. Why? Because if it doesn’t get done, they can blame Obama, and he will lose his liberal base.

We already know many Democrats don’t like the tax deal, and they plan to fight it. But it appears that even some Republicans don’t like it, even though their base, the richest 2 percent, got more money to offshore, but because it will give Obama something.

U.S. Rep. Vern Ehlers, R-Grand Rapids, told the Grand Rapids Press that “he expects some in his own Republican caucus to oppose the deal because it would allow the Democrats to claim an accomplishment in lame duck.”

That bears repeating: “Because it would allow the Democrats to claim an accomplishment in lame duck.”

Typical.

Obama forced to negotiate with the devil to keep recovery moving forward

Sometimes it’s not advisable to negotiate with the devil, but President Obama was forced to do just that over the bailout for the rich and the extension of the unemployment benefits.

It was announced yesterday that President Obama struck a deal with Republicans on a two-year extension of all the Bush-era tax cuts in exchange for a 13-month extension of unemployment insurance benefits. It’s very hard to negotiate with someone who is only concerned with making you look bad and defeating you, is not interested in governing and is only concerned with protecting the richest 2 percent, but this crappy deal may be the best we can do.

Republicans claim that they care about the budget deficit, but the tax cuts to a group that already controls almost 24 percent of income in this country will add more than $36 billon to the federal budget deficit. It was either the tax break for people who don’t need it, or a tax increase to the middle class that will surely stall the climb out of the Bush recession.

The Bush tax cut was enacted because we had a budget surplus under President Clinton, but the tax cuts that were set to expire at the end of the month not only got rid of the surplus, but it helped create a huge budget deficit. So, Republicans want to give millions more to the rich, but nothing to the middle class.

The debunked argument they use is that if we don’t extend the tax cut to the rich, they, the alleged job creators, will not hire people. However, they are ignoring the fact that corporations are already earning huge, record profits right now with the tax cut.

American businesses earned profits at an annual rate of $1.659 trillion in the third quarter, according to a Commerce Department report released last month, so with the tax break and record profits they are not hiring. This is the highest total since records have been kept.

The growing gap between the richest 2 percent and everyone else is turning the United States into a banana republic. In fact, the U.S. now arguably has a more unequal distribution of wealth than traditional banana republics like Nicaragua, Venezuela and Guyana.
Unemployment benefits are pumped directly back into the economy, as those on unemployment use the money for basic necessities like housing, lights, gas for the car to look for work and food to feed their family. The loss of unemployment benefits will have a disastrous effect on Michigan, but Republicans don’t seem to care. At no time in our history have we refused to extend unemployment benefits when the unemployment rate was this high.

Republicans have demonstrated time after time that they are simply not interested in governing, and their only concern seems to be getting and keeping power; no matter who is hurt. The only people they care about protecting seem to be the richest 2 percent, and they don’t need the help.

Republicans are even refusing to act on something as important as ensuring loose nuclear weapons do not fall into the hands of a Middle East terrorist, and they continue to drag their feet on the START treaty on strategic offensive arms.

This is a crappy deal, but how do you negotiate with someone who cares so little about the middle class, the economy and will stop at nothing to make you look bad and defeat you?

The Senate and House Democrats have not signed off on the deal, and frankly, I’m not sure they should. No doubt it’s a crappy deal. But the fact is Republicans don’t care if unemployment benefits are cut off during the Christmas season, and they don’t care if taxes are raised on the middle class.

I can live with this deal. I don’t like it, but I understand how little Republicans care.

Only under a Democrat is TSA security a violation of civil rights

One thing we have learned in the last two years is that any idea or action proposed or implemented by President Obama the right will say is awful or disastrous, even if it’s their idea.

The recent enhanced security at airports implemented by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) involving new full-body scanners and pat-downs has got Republican talking heads going crazy and screaming about the violation of civil liberties.

It’s ironic that the testing of body scanners at airports and the implementation of widespread use began during the Bush administration, but the really ironic part is we had no problem with this kind of security the many times the Bush Administration shredded the Constitution.

It was just a few years ago that any one who complained about security after 9/11 was called a traitor or a terrorist who had something to hide. Its’ also ironic that to get out of the extra security, they want us to truly violate other peoples’ civil rights and use racial profiling; something the courts have clearly said is a violation of civil rights. They want to do it even though there is no reliable profile of a terrorist.

But the Rude Pundit really said it best, so I will let him say it. This has always been a PG rated blog, but the Rude Pundit uses language that may be offensive to some people; that is, after all, why he is called the Rude Pundit. So, if you are easily offended, stop reading.

“Well, welcome to the privacy party, motherfuckers. Come on in to the constitutional protections rave. What took you so long to get here? Oh, yeah. Holding people indefinitely without charges? Who the fuck cares. Wiretapping Americans without a warrant? Oh, blow us. Torturing confessions out of innocent people? Sometimes ya gotta spill a little blood to make security stew.”

It’s clear that if this was a Republican Administration doing this, we would be told to man up. In this environment, what else can we expect? Other countries have been doing similar procedures for years. If someone has a better idea to ensure the safety of airlines, let’s hear it. I’m not crazy about it either, but I can only imagine how much screaming we will hear from the right if an airliner is brought down because of terrorism.

“Yep, all it took for some of the citizens of this country to actually make a stink about civil rights was a black president, a Democratic-controlled Department of Homeland Security, and the fear that barely-trained, underpaid airport security people will see what your Mama's tits look like in a government-ordered x-ray body scan. Or, even worse, that if you refuse having your dick or slit on display, you'll get an "enhanced pat down," as it's being called, just like the extra-special interrogation techniques used at Gitmo or a special new cereal, like corn flakes but now with nuts.”

Passing a Growing Michigan on to the Republicans in 2011

Tuesday’s election made no sense when you consider that President Obama and the Democrats lifted the country out of the Bush Recession – the longest and deepest since the Great Depression – that created by the Republicans.

Time after time voters said their No. 1 priority was jobs and the economy, and federal Republicans said their No. 1 priority was defeating President Obama in two years. The only good news is we finally have job growth, although not fast enough for voters, but Republicans are already trying to take credit for it, despite blocking every single effort to improve things.

To combat that and so we don’t forget, I am reposting this post from the Muskegon Critic over at Blogging for Michigan called “Passing a Growing Michigan on to the Republicans in 2011.”

As we move into a Republican controlled...well...everything in Michigan, it's important to take a stand on various narratives.

One narrative I'm personally keen on keeping on the burner is that job growth in Michigan began a full year before many of the Republicans in 2011 even got elected in 2010.

From March 2000 on, Michigan lost jobs almost continuously until 2005. From 2000 to 2003 under Governor Engler we lost 283,000 jobs before Granholm even took office.

Job growth picked up in 2005 and 2006 and then the massive recession hit in 2007 and we lost jobs for 37 consecutive months until January 2010 when many of Granholm's efforts to diversify our economy and lure new industries here began to bear fruit.

In the first nine months of 2010, Michigan added 65,204 jobs. The largest January to September nine month jump in job growth since 1997 when we gained 68,535 jobs in the same time frame during the Booming 90s. The largest economic expansion in American history.

Michigan's Democratic leadership combined with a sound partner in the White House helped pull Michigan from the brink and restore us to job growth in 2010.

Ford is making record profits and is hiring again in Michigan.

General Motors is hiring again, setting up a factory in Lansing to make, get this, small price and feature competitive Cadillacs.

Advanced battery manufacturing plants are opening in Michigan, employing thousands.

General Electric is hiring 1100 people in its new R&D facility near Detroit.

So when the Republicans move into Lansing...they're moving into a state that's already growing...already on the mend...already creating jobs.

Hey Republicans! Try not to SCREW IT UP!

New contract on America is just old failed polices in a new package

With the mid-term election some six weeks away, Republicans are finally unveiling their alleged plan today with a new contract on America, and, as expected, it’s all the same failed Bush-era polices that created the worst and longest recession since the Great Depression.

House Republican leaders are scheduled to discuss their contract on America at a lumber yard in Sterling, Va. today. The old, failed ideas in a new package are basically a crackdown on government spending, repeal of the healthcare reform law and extension of all the expiring Bush tax cuts that helped squandered the budget deficit Bush was handed and left a deficit for President Obama.

The bottom line is that these those old, failed policies that created the Bush recession, the longest and deepest since the Great Depression, almost killed the economy, and the polices put in place by President Obama and the Democrats have the country going in the right direction and ended the recession.

A better name for this old plan in a new package might be a contract with rich Americans that promises to eliminate all taxes on wealthy Republicans.

Former President Bill Clinton put it best on CBS News when he said this hole was dug over eight years, their argument is we, the Democrats had 21 months to get out their hole, so throw us out and they can do what they did again that dug the hole.

This new “contract” basically stays away from social issues like GOP platforms of years past in an effort to divide and rule by fear, but it does include the promises to “honor families and traditional marriage.”

Unlike the 1994 contract on America, this campaign tactics will not be signed by GOP officials and does not call for term limits or a balanced budget amendment.

The choice in November is even more clear: go with the failed GOP polices that created the worst recession since the Great Depression, or go with the party that averted a depression and a collapse of the financial system and got us out of the Bush recession.

Hysteria absent from back to school speech this year

What a difference a year makes.

At the start of last school year, Republican teabaggers were in hysterics that President Obama was going to address students on the first day of school on the importance of education, staying in school, working hard and perseverance. Parents threatened to boycott the schools, and some even threatened recruit “other parents to keep their children home on fall student count day if the district aired the speech.”

This was the height of the Astroturf teabagger movement, and they falsely claimed the President telling the kids to study hard, stay in school and work hard was “socialist indoctrination.” Rightwing talk radio hosts even tried to organize a "Keep Your Kids Home." That crap led many districts allow student to opt out, tape it to show later instead of live and some even ignored it.

On Tuesday at 1 p.m. President Obama will deliver his second annual Back to School speech on at Julia R Masterman Middle-High School in Philadelphia, PA. The President’s Back to School speech will be streamed live on the White House web site, and schools can also view the speech on CNN which has said it plans to take the event live.

Despite all the false rhetoric and outright lies from the right and the Republican noise machine, the news about this year’s speech has been extremely quiet. Apparently, right-wingers are too busy trashing the 1st Amendment to worry about this annual event by all U.S. presidents.

A picture is worth a thousand words

With apologies to mod rocker Rod Stewart, but it is true that “Every picture tells a story, don’t it?”

This offensive and disgusting billboard in downtown Mason City, Iowa was paid for something called the “North Iowa Tea Party.” It depicts the President of the United States with photographs of Nazi leader Hitler and communist leader Lenin beneath the labels "Democrat Socialism," "National Socialism," and "Marxist Socialism."

It was roundly criticized, even by fellow teabaggers. The billboard was quickly taken down today because of that criticism, but not before the American people got a good glimpse of what the teabaggers are really like. They are beginning to realize how racist and hateful the fringe teabaggers really are.

Republicans do everything they can to kill economic recovery

An award winning writer with a doctorate in English can better sum up the Republicans effort to stall and kill the economic recovery just to make the President look bad just so they can capture power much better than I can, and syndicated columnist Gene Lyons did just that with a column called “Americans still captive by the 'zombie lies'.”

This column ran in the print edition of the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus, but not online. The U.S. Senate Republicans filibuster on a bill that will allow a six-month extension of unemployment benefits and Medicaid funding is even more proof of Republican desire to stay in the Bush recession.

But Lyons said it best:

“It's not simply about making the Obama administration look bad. Many Republicans actually love economic recessions. No better means of disciplining the labor force has ever been devised. That’s the real message behind the GOP's Senate filibuster denying extended federal benefits to roughly a million long-term unemployed.”

Lyons quotes our own U.S. Senator, Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-East Lansing.

“In consequence, several hundred thousand cops, teachers, firefighters and other public employees are sure to be laid off due to state budget cuts. Fat lot of good that will do the economy. But working stiffs will be keeping their heads down, won't they?
Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., whose state has the nation's second-highest unemployment rate (13.6 percent), put it forcefully: "The Republicans in the Senate want this economy to fail. In cynical political terms ... they want our country to fail to win an election, and they're willing to take the people of this country with them."

It amazes me that anyone who makes a living from a pay check would vote for a Republican. But they have made a science out getting people to vote against their own self interest. The billons of dollars spent on rightwing think tanks has been a long term investment that has been worth every penny to the rich and Republicans.

“But that's only part of the story. One of the enduring mysteries of American life is how Republicans keep succeeding by failing. The presidency of George W. Bush ought to have inoculated American voters against GOP economic theories for a generation. Tax cuts for the wealthy led not to greater prosperity, but runaway budget deficits, a doubled national debt and the weakest job creation since World War II. See-no-evil financial deregulation damn near destroyed the world banking system. By the time President Obama was inaugurated last January, the economy was bleeding 750,000 lost jobs a month; the Congressional Budget Office had already projected the FY 2009 deficit at $1.3 trillion -- a budget written by the Bush White House. After taking over in 2001 with a healthy budget surplus and some economists warning against paying down the debt too fast, Bush doubled it to over $10 trillion in eight short years.”

Republicans had no problem with deficit spending by the likes of Bush and even Reagan, but now when we are trying to dig out of the worst recession since the Great Depression, they have a problem with it.

“New spending by the Obama administration -- mainly the economic stimulus and auto industry rescue -- is dwarfed by Bush's spending on the Iraq and Afghan wars and the unfunded Medicare prescription drug benefit. If Democratic attempts to stimulate the economy have proven less than adequate, that's because they've both been hostage to GOP obstructionism and restrained by the fiscal straitjacket Republicans left behind.”

Gene Lyons is syndicated political columnist and co-author with Joe Conason of “The Hunting of the President: The 10 Year Campaign to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton. He graduated with a Ph.D. in English from the University of Virginia in 1969. He taught at the University of Massachusetts, University of Arkansas and University of Texas before becoming a full-time writer in 1976. He has written hundreds of articles, essays and reviews for such magazines as Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine and The New York Review of Books. He is a winner of the National Magazine Award for Public Service.

GOP false talking points and lies on BP oil spill continue

The thousand of gallons of oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico from the BP oil well didn’t take a break for the 4th of July holiday, and neither did Republican lies in an attempt to blame President Obama for the response to it.

A perfect example of that appears in a letter to the editor in Sunday’s edition of the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus by someone named Randy Knibes called “Leadership lacking on Gulf oil spill.” It contains every single false Republican talking point the party of BP has put out. I’m not sure if the letter is part of the Livingston County Republic Party’s letter writing campaign or it’s a case of the Republican strategy of if you tell a lie often enough people start to believe it, and this guy has bought into it.

First, there is no such person as Randy Knibes. However, there is a Randy Kniebes, a Brighton Township Republican.

From the opening sentence we see that Kniebes is full of crap and we see we are going to get a bunch of GOP talking points when he writes, “President Barack Obama's lack of leadership, gross incompetence and self-serving decisions on this oil-spill situation in the Gulf of Mexico have been appalling.”

There has been no lack of leadership, no incompetence on the President’s part and I have not seen a single “self-serving decision.”

Right after that we get the first false and debunked talking point:

“Shortly after the original oil spill began, 17 foreign nations and four international groups with expertise in controlling oil spills offered their help to Obama to contain this large spill. This included the Dutch, who offered Obama the services of an entire fleet of the world's most advanced oil skimmers. He told them all "no."“

Simply not true. According to Factcheck.com, “

To date, 25 countries and four international organizations have offered support in the form of skimming vessels, containment and fire boom, technical assistance and response solutions, among others. A chart provided by the State Department shows that as of June 23 offers from six foreign countries or entities had been accepted. Fifty more offers were under consideration — including multiple offers from a single country or entity. One offer had been declined: France offered a chemical dispersant that is not approved for use in the United States.”

But here is the big lie that is on the lips of every single Republican:

“Why? Because Obama was unwilling to waive the Jones Act, which regulates foreign-vessel operations in U.S. waters, ever mindful that he did not want to upset his union cronies. Former President George W. Bush waived the Jones Act after Hurricane Katrina to speed recovery efforts, but President Obama apparently decided his personal political relationships were more important than protecting America's shoreline.”

This follows the GOP strategy, if you’re going to tell a lie, you might as well tell a big one,

“Some critics have charged — falsely — that Obama’s refusal to waive the Jones Act has kept foreign vessels from assisting in cleanup efforts.”
“In reality, the Jones Act has yet to be an issue in the response efforts. The Deepwater Horizon response team reported in a June 15 press release that there are 15 foreign flagged ships currently participating in the oil spill cleanup. None of them needed a waiver because the Jones Act does not apply. The Jones Act is a trade and commerce law that was enacted in 1920 as part of a larger Marine Merchant Act. It requires all trade delivered between U.S. ports to be carried in U.S. flagged vessels constructed in the United States and owned by American citizens. The law states its purpose is to develop a merchant marine for national defense and commerce.”

Then Mr. Kniebes takes a few shots at the president for not talking to the BP CEO, claming:

“For 56 days after the spill, President Obama could not find the time to even talk with the CEO of BP — although he did find the time for multiple fundraisers, Earth Day celebrations, golf games, vacations, hosting various sports teams, shooting hoops and attending concerts by big-name entertainers.”

Apparently, Mr. Kniebes has not heard about President’s Obama’s securing of a $20 billion escrow account from BP to pay for the clean up and compensate Gulf Coast residents who have lost their livelihoods and way of life. He talked to him when it counted.

Mr. Kniebes then has a problem with the moratorium on offshore drilling. Apparently, he’s unaware that there is no plan or technology to stop another leak. But his facts are all screwed up on production. He claims “ Oil production from the Gulf represents nearly a third of U.S. domestic production.” Now, that may be true, but oil production in the U.S. only accounts for about 12 percent, and it all goes to the world market.

Then Mr. Kniebes the President of “trying to use this environmental tragedy to advance his previously doomed "cap and tax" legislation.” The “cap and tax” is a talking point from GOP linguists. After the latest oil spill, it makes you wonder what it’s going to take to start the process of getting us off a dirty, dangerous and fast disappearing energy source. Here is one of the most ridiculous claims among many, “Since the scientific evidence for global warming has been widely discredited.”

Nothing could be farther from the truth. The simple fact is global warming is without a doubt man-made and a threat.

GWB is not the worst U.S. President in history; only the fifth worst

There is little doubt that George W. Bush was one of the worst U.S. Presidents in history. The only debate is whether he is actually the worst or just one of the worst, but the Siena College Research Institute’s (SRI) Survey of U.S. Presidents only puts Bush as the fifth worst U.S. President, ahead of such greats as Andrew Johnson, James Buchanan, Warren G. Harding, and Franklin Pierce.

The SRI has conducted the survey five times since 1982. More than 200 presidential scholars ranked the 43 U.S. Presidents on six personal attributes - background, imagination, integrity, intelligence, luck and willingness to take risks- five forms of ability - compromising, executive, leadership, communication and overall - and eight areas of accomplishment, including economic, other domestic affairs, working with Congress and their party, appointing supreme court justices and members of the executive branch, avoiding mistakes and foreign policy.

Franklin D. Roosevelt has been ranked No. 1 since the survey began, and this year the top five includes Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. In fact, in nearly 30 years, the same five presidents have occupied the first five places with only slight shuffling, despite decades of new research on former presidents and the accomplishments or lack thereof.

Bush had entered the survey at 23rd when the study was last conducted one year into his first term in 2002. Today, just one year after leaving office, Bush has sunk to the bottom five at 39th where he belongs. The survey found he rated especially poorly in handling the economy, communication, ability to compromise, foreign policy accomplishments and intelligence.

Although it’s far too early to judge his Presidency, President Barack Obama was ranked as the 15th best President, earning high marks on imagination (6th), communication ability (7th) and intelligence (8th). However, he scored poorly on background, family, education and experience. While I can understand scholars rating him low on experience, I’m baffled at what is wrong with his background, family and education.

My Republican critics on the blog like to point to President Jimmy Carter as the worst president, and Carter is rated low at 32ns; dropping from 25th in 2002. However, as long as GWB is around, there is no danger that Carter will ever be ranked as the worst U.S. president.

GOP saint Ronald Reagan dropped two places from 16th overall in 2002 to 18th today, and that puts him behind Bill Clinton who basically switched places with Reagan, rising from 18th in 2002 to 13th.

New documentary on teabaggers is the new Psycho

AFI lists Psycho, Jaws, The Exorcist and the Silence of the Lams as some of the scariest movies of all time; they have not seen "The Rise of New Right," a documentary with Chris Matthews.

In the documentary aired earlier this month, the MSNBC anchor summed up all the tea bagger nonsense that began almost two years ago with his opening statement.

“A raging hostility toward the elected government of the U.S.,” Matthews said. “Their common enemy, the President of the U.S., Barrack Obama.”

He highlights the extremisms of the teabaggers, including birhters, the Michigan Militia, secessionist groups and white supremacists. Matthews offers a crisp timeline, and a quick moving pace. Teabaggers and my rightwing critics on this blog will dismiss it because Matthews is a host on MSNBC and because of his past political affiliation. The problem is he used the teabaggers own words. How do you deny them?

We have rightwing extremist Alan Keyes, for example. I had the misfortune of hearing him speak when I covered the local anti-choice dinner where he was the guest speaker. The Maryland Republican is one of the early so-called leaders of the birther crowd. Keyes has an obvious hatred of Obama because Obama creamed the carpetbagger in the 2004 Illinois Senate election.

“Obama is a radical communist,” Keyes said. “We’ve got to stop him, or the U.S. will cease to exist.”

That’s a sane man? Funny, he calls Obama a communist, but the co-hosts of my favorite radio show have ignited a debate by calling Obama a corporatist who has tacked to the center on every issue. Even if Keyes’ insane rantings were true, the U.S. is stronger than just one man.

The documentary talks to teabaggers and shows photos of their racist signs, including the Gadsden flag that the first Marines used in 1775; just one of many symbols teabaggers have misused. It is displayed at the fake Astroturf “tea parties,” anti-health care rallies, militia events and even by Republican members of Congress playing to the extremists that control the GOP.

“The flag flew as a warning to the occupying foreign oppressor,” Matthews said. “Now, the enemy is not a foreign king, but the government chosen in an honest election by the American people.”

The documentary also talks to the Michigan Militia; a fringe, anti-government hate group. They are now trying to claim a legitimate role, but this is the same anti-government hate group that wants to overthrow the government by force of arms that went into hiding after the Oklahoma City terrorist attack in 1995. They were always there, but only the diehards stayed when people discovered what they were really all about in 1995.

Now, they are trying to clean up their image, but the mission and beliefs are the same as they were the last time we had a Democrat in the White House. But they have done such a great PR job hiding what they are really all about and the fact that the fringe element has taken over the GOP that their membership has tripled since Obama was elected President.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the documentary was the look back at the last tine the extreme right held away in this country, the McCarthyism of the 1950s and the rightwing John Birch Society. The language and rhetoric are eerily similar. Those people played on the fears of people just like they are now.

When you watch, “The Rise of New Right” make sure the lights are on, and you do not watch it alone.

Senate Republicans would rather bash the President than stop the Asian Carp

LANSING – The massive BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has reaffirmed a few things about Republicans: that it will criticize President Obama just for waking up in the morning, and they hate government and say the private sector can do everything better until the private sector causes a disaster and they call for government help.

A pair of resolutions introduced and approved in the Senate on Thursday reinforced those two principals. They attacked the President and tried to blame him for the BP oil spill.

On Wednesday researchers confirmed that at least one Asian carp had been discovered in Lake Calumet, above the locks at the Chicago River, and that led Republicans to introduce and approve Senate Resolution 166 and Senate Concurrent Resolution 47 on Thursday.

Senate Democrats objected to the partisan language in the resolution that said,

“A resolution to call the Obama Administration to task for its failed leadership on preventing Asian carp from invading the Great Lakes and call again for immediate actions to prevent further carp movement into the Great Lakes.”

Last February, the Senate unanimously passed two similar resolutions that urged the U.S. Congress and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to take immediate actions to prevent the Asian carp from entering the Great Lakes and to develop long-term strategies to address this problem. But this time the Republicans thought it more important to take shots at the President than address the problem.

Last winter the federal government launched a new $78.5 million plan to prevent Asian carp from entering the Great Lakes. However, Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm deemed the proposed measures insufficient, and she directed Republican Attorney General "Manoogian" Mike Cox to seek a legal solution. He filed a motion to the U.S. Supreme Court for an emergency order to close the locks connecting the Chicago Sanitary and Shipping Canal to Lake Michigan. However, the conservative court rejected the motion. I guess we need a better AG if he can’t even win in a friendly court.

Senate Majority Leader Mike Prusi, D-Ishpeming, introduced an amendment to strike out the partisan language, but the Republicans would have not of that, and it failed along party lines. Prusi said the President was taking the recommendation of the Army Corps of Engineers, and the resolutions should single out them and not the president. At the very least there is no reason to make it a partisan attack.

“They have been the ones who have been delaying and studying and perhaps giving the President some bad advice on how to resolve this issue,” he said. “But I don’t think that it will serve us well if we just point the finger at the President, making this into a partisan issue.”

It makes no sense to ask some to do something, and then attack them at the same time. The resolution also attacks the President for the BP oil spill, despite the fact that the oil-friendly Bush Administration stripped out regulations and allowed BP the permit to drill when they did not have adequate safety measures in place or a real plan to address an oil leak.

“Whereas, The Obama Administration already has one ecological disaster on its watch. The administration should not allow another disaster with longer-term consequences and within its power to prevent from coming to fruition.”

Sen. Liz Brater, D-Ann Arbor, noted the irony of the Republicans scramming for government help now.

“I would like to welcome my colleagues on the other side of the aisle to the belief that the government needs to be strong and vigorous in its mission to protect the people from harm and to help us address harms in the environment that we cannot address on an individual basis,” she said. “I think it is wonderful that we have bipartisan agreement on that issue today. I hope that we remember it when we have other environmental issues come up in the near future.”

Brater also said she hopes the Republicans sudden concern for the environment continues. She said Republicans can’t continue to call for smaller government, refuse to pay the true costs of environmental protection to keep invasive species out of our ecosystem and prevent other harms to the environment, refuse to regulate industries that cause environmental harm and then blame the person who happens to be in the White House when a disaster that has been brewing for decades finally comes to a head.

She called on the Republicans to start moving bills in the Legislature to protect Michigan from ecological disaster that they have been blocking.

“Sitting in the natural resources committee right now are bills to prevent mercury from circulating in our bloodstream; bills to prevent bottles which contain petroleum plastics from being wasted and instead have a deposit and to be recycled; and bills to protect our water and air,” Brater said. “Most interestingly, a bill that would prevent the spread of invasive species in our ecosystem, introduced by the good Senator from the 32nd District (Prusi), is languishing in that committee.”

In the end, the majority of Democrats, unlike Republicans, put partnership aside, and the resolutions passed by a vote of 31-3.

“We should work with the federal government to provide the resources to prevent more of these invasive species from entering our ecosystem at our ports and through our ships that are circulating, and many other ways that we should be working together to prevent Asian carp and other invasive species from destroying our ecosystem,” Brater said.

We have Barton’s apology but still waiting for the apology from the rest of the House Republicans

Some times the Republicans' actions are so out there that even the conservative corporate media can’t ignore it, and the editorial in Tuesday’s edition of the Livingston County Daily Press & Argus on the right’s apology for the massive oil spill and wrecking the Gulf coast ecosystem is one of those times.

You will recall last week that of U.S. Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, the ranking Republican on the House and Commerce Committee, apologized to BP for its treatment by the President and having to pay for the damage they caused. He called the President’s Obama’s securing of a $20 billion escrow account from BP to pay for the clean up and compensate Gulf Coast residents who have lost their livelihoods and way of life a “shakedown.”. Barton was quickly forced to apologize for the apology, but make no mistake about it, that is the official position of a number of House Republicans.

That is also the official policy of the Republican Study Committee, the caucus of House Conservatives with some 117 members, including Barton. Its membership also includes Michigan Congressman Dave Camp, R-Midland; “Mad” Thad McCotter, R-Livonia; and “Twitter” Pete Hoekstra, R-Holland.

The editorial got it right:
“Remember when conservatives were nearly fainting in horror when Obama made civil gestures to foreign nations early in his administration? Why, he was apologizing to foreigners. That was silly, but that was the claim.”
“So one would think that there would be praise for a president who negotiated a minimum $20 billion escrow account from BP. Instead, Barton went overboard, publicly criticizing our nation’s president while abjectly apologizing before a foreign business leader.”

Good job conservative editorial board. We also need to remember this in November.

Republicans roll out false talking points over BP escrow account

The latest Republican talking point on the BP oil spill and worst ecological disaster in U.S. history is that President’s Obama’s securing of a $20 billion escrow account from BP to pay for the clean up and compensate Gulf Coast residents who have lost their livelihoods and way of life is that it’s unconstitutional.

Like everything else President Obama does, the Republicans will criticize him no matter what he does for any reason, and they are throwing around words like “tyranny” and “strong-arm” to describe the President’s move to ensure Gulf residents are properly compensated, unlike the victims of the Exxon Valdez disaster where victims waited years to be properly compensated.

I saw rightwing tool and TV pitchman Ben Stein was on the Larry King show pushing the lie that the escrow account was unconstitutional. Considering BP voluntary created the fund, I have no idea what constitutional principal was violated.

Drug addled gas bag Rush Limbaugh has already criticized the President for not doing enough and then doing too much recently made the ridiculous charge that the fund was “Organized Crime in White House.”

But the worst remarks were those of U.S. Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, the ranking Republican on the House and Commerce Committee, apologized to BP for its treatment by the President and having to pay for the damage they caused. Fellow Republicans ran away from him as fast as possible, and Barton apologized for the apology within minutes, but that’s how Republicans really feel.

Here is the scary thing and what voters need to remember in November: if Republicans controlled the House, Barton would be the one regulating oil companies like BP, and people in the Gulf who have lost the way of life they have enjoyed for generations would get nothing.

Birther officer denied his circus performance

Apparently, Terry Lakin, an active-duty Army surgeon and poster boy for the discredited birther nonsense that is claiming President Obama is not a natural born U.S. citizen, is upset that the Army is not allowing him to make a circus of his court-martial.

Lakin is being hailed as a hero by the discredited birthers for disregarding his oath of office and announcing he intends to disobey all orders from his commanders and not deploy to Afghanistan until President Obama produces a birth certificate proving he is a U.S. citizen, even though the birth certificate has already been produced.

According to a press release by the rightwing “American Patriot Foundation” that is funding the circus, “the Army on Tuesday officially denied the request …for the testimony of Dr. Chiyome Fukino of the Hawaii Dept. of Health, and all of that agency's records that exist concerning the president's birth. That request was formally denied yesterday. Lakin had also requested the testimony of the custodians of records of, and the records relating to Obama's admission and financial aid that exist, of the Punahou School, Occidental College, Columbia University and Harvard Law School.”

Fukino is the Health Director of the Hawaii State Department of Health, and she has issued numerous statements trying to reason with unreasonable people and put the witch-hunt to bed. She issued another statement last July that said President Obama was indeed born in Hawaii and is a U.S. citizen. He also issued a statement before the election in October 2008 that he saw the original birth certificate, and again in July. In fact, Hawaii is so sick of the nonsense from birthers that just two months ago that the Hawaii legislature officially passed a measure that “would allow state officials to legally ignore each month's dozens of repeated requests by persons or organizations seeking to see the infant Obama's actual birth certificate.”

“I ... have seen the original vital records maintained on file by the Hawaii State Department of Health verifying Barack Hussein Obama was born in Hawaii and is a natural-born American citizen," Fukino said in a brief statement last July. "I have nothing further to add to this statement or my original statement issued in October 2008 over eight months ago."

Factcheck also put that no birth certificate myth to rest in August 2008, but it has not slowed down the crazies like Lakin and his supporters. Apparently, they believe there is a 47-year conspiracy involving the State of Hawaii, a couple of daily newspapers and the doctor and nurses present at the President’s birth.

Here is perhaps the funniest line in the press release, “…the President refuses --even in the face of mounting evidence to the contrary-- to prove his eligibility under the Constitution to serve as President and Commander-in-Chief.”

The only “mounting evidence” points to how crazy Lakin and the rest of the birthers are.

According to the pres release, “the preliminary hearing, called an "investigation" under Article 32 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, will proceed on June 11, 2010 at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. at 9:00 a.m. in room 134 of Building T-2.”

A final decision is made by Lakin's Commanding General, Major General Carla Hawley-Bowland, whether to refer the charges for the show trial the birthers so crave. That final decision is expected later this summer.

More fake outrage and lies over President Obama and Memorial Day

Just when you think the ridiculous fake outrage from Republicans over President Obama’s decision to mark Memorial Day at a ceremony at Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Ill. Instead of at Arlington National Cemetery can’t get any more bizarre, it does.

Apparently, right-wing loon blogger and Anne Coulter-wannabe Pamela Geller has embellished a story that there was a “skirmish” between the Secret Service, representatives of Louis Farrakhan and the press pool during the Memorial Day weekend. She also claims that the press pool was held hostage by Farrakhan’s “Nation of Islam paramilitary” group until it was ended by a “Rev. Gary Hunter, a Baptist minister in Motown who writes and blogs for the Detroit Times.”

I have no idea who Gary Hunter is, but there has not been anything called “The Detroit Times” for more than 100 years. Geller has made up some truly outrageous and slimily lies about Obama in the past, and she has continually tried to connect Obama and Farrakhan and paint Obama as a Muslim.

This is just one more attempt to push that debunked lie.

We know what a slim ball Geller is, but it’s sad when other people pick up on it, like Michigan’s busiest rightwing blogger - the so-called “Blogprof.” You would think a guy from Michigan would know there is no such thing as the Detroit Times, but he has never let a few facts get in the way of a good smear.

It’s sad that a guy who claims to be a Christian engages in these kinds of false smears, but that is just as outrageous as his claim to be a professor. No one can put out that much copy without it being their full-time job. I know some good, motivated reporters who don’t put out that much copy in a day. Granted, it’s easier to write fiction than actual factual stories, but it still leaves little time for anything else.

He knows he can put out these fairly tales and never be challenged because the first time anyone does, he bans them.

Reagan to skip Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery

Reagan to skip Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.

Actually, I stole that headline from Michigan’s busiest rightwing blogger - “the Blogprof,” and I just substituted Reagan for Obama. Both headlines are accurate.

But the Republican noise machine has picked up on it to try and paint President Obama as anti-military. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

According to the AP, “The White House says Obama and his family will travel to their hometown on Thursday and stay through the weekend. It will be their first trip back home since a visit for Valentine's Day weekend in February 2009.
On Monday, Obama is scheduled to participate in a Memorial Day ceremony at Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery in Elwood, Ill.
In Obama's absence, Vice President Joe Biden will participate in the customary wreath-laying ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery outside Washington.”

Wow. His first time home in 15 months. How many times were Presidents Reagan and Bush II at their ranches clearing brush? I guarantee they never stayed away for 15 months. But, the Republican noise machine ignores that fact to falsely attack the President, just like it ignored the fact that at least two other Republican Presidents had their Vice-President or a proxy lay the wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

In 1983 Deputy Secretary of Defense W. Paul Thayer laid a wreath at Arlington Cemetery during the Memorial Day ceremony, according to a May 31, 1983, Washington Post article. The AP reported that President Reagan attended a "summit meeting in Williamsburg, Va., with leaders of the industrialized democracies.

Vice President Dan Quayle laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day, according to a May 26, 1992, Boston Globe article. The Globe reported that President George H.W. Bush attended a wreath-laying ceremony and made brief remarks at an American Legion hall in Kennebunkport, Maine, where he also played a round of golf.

I guarantee this; Soldiers, Sailors and Marines killed in battle are not just buried at Arlington, and their ultimate sacrifice is just as great as those buried at Arlington.