Gore Vidal says that we live in the United States of Amnesia. To prove the point, one need merely examine this photograph, which comes to us by way of this conservative website. The photograph depicts a sign that appeared at a tax protest "tea" party located in Texas.Apparently, the national deficit is entirely the fault of -- get this -- Nancy Pelosi.
Can people mentally rewrite history to this degree? Yes they can. God knows that I am not Nancy's biggest fan. But blaming her for the deficit is like blaming World War II on W.C. Fields.
Until I saw this photograph, I had believed that every sentient being understood that pork spending reached unprecedented levels during the first six years of the Dubya era, when Republicans controlled all the branches of government. Most of the pork went to the red states. The blue states sent more to Washington in tax dollars than they (or, rather, "we": I live in California) received in goods and services.
And the porkiest pig of all was the Oinker-in-Chief, George W. Bush, Texas' gift to democracy.
It was George Bush's administration which removed regulation from the financial industry, a move which rewarded corruption and thus directly created our current worldwide Depression. It was Bush the younger, Bush the elder and Ronald Reagan who invented sky-high national deficits.
Bill Clinton ran a surplus.
Remember when Dick Cheney uttered the famous words "Reagan proved that deficits don't matter"? If you tell a Texan that the quote really came from Al Gore or Joe Biden, he would believe you. Texans believe anything they want to believe; they will accept any tale, however fanciful or ludicrous, that flatters their preconceptions. If you tell a Texan that Sam Houston could fly by flapping his arms, you'll be believed. Texans are so stupid they couldn't hit their own head with a hammer without an instructional video.
The Texas governor has recently made some noises about secession. Just fucking go already!
16 comments:
Bob Somerby disagrees that Perry ever said HE wanted to "secede", nor instigated the talk in the first place.
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/region/legislature/stories/04/17/0417gop.html
I would tend to agree...
this is another puffed up story designed to please. (someone)
Joseph, I know you hate links... but I've got to share this one with my facebook friends. It's just too sweet.
Willy, I think "made noises" works. (And I'll never quibble with someone using the chance to tell Texas to "just fucking go already"
OH, I don't hate links of that sort. Not at all! I'm simply not the kind of blogger who asks other bloggers "Please please please put me on your blogroll..."
Texas Democrats are usually fine people; Texas Republicans are... uh, well, Republicans.
This is one of the reasons the GOP spent no money opposing Obama. McCain took public financing. Getting rid of Clinton was their biggest priority because she would have credibility in this affair. Obama, of course, has none and he is failing to explain why we need stimulus spending. The bank bail out - well, that's something else entirely.
Obama's presidency was necessary for the right to wipe out the economic credibility that the Democratic party had. He is obliterating Clinton's financial legacy. And because of his ineptitude and corruption, he is validating a lot of the myths that the right has about Democrats. The popular thinking right now in those circles is that Obama is just spending this money to win votes for Dems in Congress in the coming elections. And because Obama has done such a piss poor job of explaining how stimulus works, there's nothing out there to really counter that notion.
I still think Obama had a deal with the GOP - get rid of clinton and they let him win. I can't make sense out of anything else that happened otherwise.
The Texas Democratic primary was so corrupted, that I don't know how I feel about them anymore. 176 complaints went to the state party about the primary. 175 were lodged against the Obama camp. Those are grim numbers.
Joe:
I have come across too many people who have conveniently forgotten that it was their "Beer Drinking" president and his cronies that sent this country into the tailspin it has found itself in.
To be fair, too many Democratic Politicians looked the other way while this "Theft" was occurring. They were too happy to take the money that Wall Street lavished on them but to suggest that it was the fault of Pelosi is stretching the truth a bit.
I presently live in Texas, but I do not consider myself a "Texan", nor will I ever.
Employment circumstances brought me here, and I would dearly love to make a quiet exit. But in this ecomony, moving would mean a huge loss. So here we sit, amongst a vast crowd of those kindly "Texas folk", none of whom trust us anyhwere near their homes and children.
But it wasn't much different anywhere else we've been.
It seems every state in the nation has its full share of non-thinking idiots that can be led around like so many pigs to slaughter by any fairly focused politican.
I blame the schools and their polices of dumbing us all down.
He did "make noises" either...
that implies that Perry brought it up on his own. He didn't. He was asked about it by a "reporter".
The link above doesn't identify WHO that reporter was so...
but whatever.
Hey, WC. Fields DID start WWII: When he said, "Go away, kid, ya bother me!" Hitler *knew* that he was really talking about expelling the Jews from society.
(Ok, now that I've said this, expect it to appear on hate sites everywhere...only not as a joke.)
On a serious note, let's not forget that some years ago, it was Obama who sued the lenders to try and force them to provide loans to risky lendees. They deliberately lost in order to give themselves legal cover. That's also why those same lenders all backed him in the election: having him in the White House gives them top-level political cover as well as making that same legal cover bulletproof.
As far as secession goes, it is and always has been illegal (based on established legal principles), and I'm sure that Perry knows that; I interpret what he was doing as trying to push back against any "liberal" reforms
as well as stir up anti-Obama sentiment (in order to either garner more stimulus cash or gain Rep. seats in 2010, or both).
Sergei Rostov
Bill Clinton ran a surplus.They always forget that. I remember people in DC fighting over what to do with the Clinton surplus.
That's not a problem anymore.
Hillary had to be stopped so the Bush2 looting could continue....hecks, and there is social security to steal yet....
much to do!
let's not forget that some years ago, it was Obama who sued the lenders to try and force them to provide loans to risky lendees. They deliberately lost in order to give themselves legal cover. Sergei, this is news to me. In what capacity COULD Obama have sued anybody? Can you point to any information explaining your comment to this effect?
I have seen most, and any and all manner of accusations against Obama, but never this one before.
XI
Well, ok, that didn't take long to track down.
However, usually one member of a team of 8 litigators involved in representing a third party is not normally considered to have themselves personally sued the other party.
He/they would have been providing legal counsel to the party doing the suing, and that party was ACORN. ACORN sued CitiBank, and Obama was on the team for the firm representing them.
Even had Obama been lead counsel on that team (which I haven't seen to this point), it would be a distortion to consider HIM as the one suing CitiBank, which is instead the call of the client who is the one doing the suing.
This would be still more the case if he were a junior member of the legal team, which seems most likely in this instance.
Would you consider that Hillary Rodham (as a junior legal staffer on the impeachment inquiry) herself was the party bringing the impeachment inquiry, or isn't it rather the Congress that did that, using various support staff?
XI
ANYONE who has ever known texans, dems or repugs, has experienced an altered reality/parallel universe of unbelievable stupidity and narcicism, comical except for the loud sucking noise they make as they consume your heart, soul and good will. I say boot them to the curb, bloodsuckers every one!
emmag
XI:
Obama's law firm got the case due to Obama's connections with ACORN (examples: he partnered with them on Project Vote in 1992, three years before the suit, and they deliberately sought him out for their "motor voter" case in the same year as the suit), so it was really "his" case, regardless of his official rank on the team.
And by 2008, Obama was so thoroughly tied to ACORN - he was one of their trainers, taught leadership conferences for them, gave them big money, and then used their people as 'volunteers' for all his campaigns for office, etc. etc. etc. - that the big lenders knew that if they managed to get him into the White House, they could hold his presence on the legal team over his head as 'insurance' to keep him from taking any real substantive action against them (which as we see he hasn't; in fact he's done the opposite and not only subsidized their losses at taxpayer expense, but given them tons of money to boot).
Sergei Rostov
Oh, a p.s:
XI:
I have seen most, and any and all manner of accusations against Obama, but never this one before. Surprising, since it's been all over the anti-Obama sites - and in various small MSM outlets - for well over a year now. (I've even mentioned it here a couple of times in the past six months, and you did in fact comment on one of my comments referring to it).
Sergei, this is news to me. In what capacity COULD Obama have sued anybody? Using your own reasoning - i.e. people and organizations do the suing, not lawyers - Obama could have sued pretty much anybody in his capacity as a person. (At least, *I* believe Obama to be a person...perhaps you believe otherwise.)
In any case, whether it was ACORN or Obama who brought the suit in the technical/legal sense is irrelevant for the purposes of the lenders obtaining legal 'insurance' against the consequences of making those loans by way of 'losing' said suit, and then later political and legal 'insurance' against any real and substantive action against them by backing Obama in the election. In other words, for their purposes, they consider it to be Obama who brought the suit; that interpretation has worked out very well for them - and very badly for us - which in the end is what really matters.
Sergei Rostov
(Of course, I could be wrong about the big lenders' purposes/plans and Obama's motives as regards his actions towards them -i.e. it could all be one huge set of coincidences - but in that case Obama is either so incompetent that he thinks doing what he's doing - bending over backwards to give them political and legal cover (i.e. keeping them from jail, federal suit, more regulation, etc.); subsidizing their losses at taxpayer expense; and directly giving them more money on top of that, making them even richer - is actually a good thing for the country, or he is being a corrupt corporate crony on his own intiative...either of which is certainly worse.)
Post a Comment