Censorship Needs to Go Away, Period!

By: Shawn Johnson

www.libvoice1776.blogspot.com

https://www.facebook.com/liberalvoice1776?ref=hl

The politically correct police are at it again.  I am getting hundreds of e-mails, posts, and offers to sign petitions to remove Rush Limbaugh, the ZZ Top guy from Duck Dynasty, and several other personalities who express racist, homophobic, or sexist opinions.  Anyone who has read my blog understands that I am completely against censorship of any kind.  I say to people, "If you don't like what someone has to say, don't listen."  I would hate to be in a position where my political commentary would get me suspended or fired from my job. Where people make a mistake is to say that the First Amendment guarantees protection from being reprimanded for what one expresses.  It simply protects people from being jailed for speaking their opinion.  Not all speech and demonstration is protected.  Just ask a member of OWS camping out in New York City.  

Now, while I will freely admit that liberals are overly sensitive to what people in the public sphere say, conservatives are even more guilty of it, and they generally try to make laws to prevent their feelings from being hurt.  If your common sense tells you what I am saying is incorrect, please "Google" Joseph McCarthy, and you will read all about the censorship effort of the Religious Right in the United States.  About four years ago, Michelle Bachmann insisted we revitalize McCarthyism in the US Congress.  People who expressed opinions during the Iraq War were promptly removed from their jobs by the corporate execs who benefited from the war.  Military veterans were verbally desecrated for speaking out against involvement in the war.  Not one conservative was outraged that Bill Maher was fired from ABC for saying that suicide bombers are not cowards.  But, conservatives had a shit-fit when Don Imus was fired for calling young women "nappy-headed hoes."  Now, I personally do not believe in censorship in any way, shape, or form.  If you don't like what someone says, don't listen to them.  It is not really that difficult.  The ability to say what you want, is more important than the upbringing of your children.  If you don't want your kids to hear what someone has to say, turn your radio dial to local traffic and weather on the elevens.  However, what liberals may think personally should not have any effect on they do politically. 

One thing liberals continue to advocate is the firing of disc jockeys, news reporters, actors, and politicians for saying things that are hurtful, racist, and homophobic.  Not only is this anti-democratic, it is stupid.  There are two ways to win the hearts and minds of voters.  The first, is to prove that you have solid ideas on how to solve problems and move the country in the right direction.  The second way, is to show that your political adversaries are knuckle-dragging Neanderthals who personally hate the very groups you are trying to get to vote for you. 

When conservative commentators say things they shouldn't, liberals organize to attack them, their show, and they pressure the advertisers to pull their ads.  It works.  Liberals have been able to relegate the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, and others to the dying medium of AM radio.  Hundreds of supporters and advertisers have jumped ship on these fools for fear of retribution from the general public. 

Now, attacking a personality who says ridiculously moronic things seems just and rational, but in reality, it is politically stupid.  

The correct and intelligent course of action is to take what Rush Limbaugh says and use it against Republican candidates.  One of the severe detriments to the Republican Party is that their base is full of rabid supporters of far-right media.  Republican radio and TV programs kill Democratic radio and TV programs in the ratings.  The Republican base is full of people who get their information from those mediums.  Progressives and liberals are more likely to get their information from other sources.  The problem for candidates is that they are hamstrung when it comes to standing against comments made by the likes of Limbaugh and Beck.  They must embrace what they say, or face the wrath of their most ardent supporters.  Therefore, instead of attacking the powerless idiots on radio, liberals need to keep them talking.  Then, they need to attribute what they say to John Boehner and defy Boehner to go against it.  He won't of course, because he is a spineless jellyfish, and that is how you turn radical ramblings of a radio show into the Republican platform.  Ronald Reagan once said that someone who agrees with you eighty percent of the time is a political ally.  This was a politically powerful position to take, but the Republican Party no longer subscribes to that line of thinking.  The Religious Right believes in absolution and ultimata.  In order to win a Republican primary, you need to embrace all of the opinions of the Right Wing.  The minute you deviate, you will be branded as a liberal or a "RINO."  These insane requirements completely derailed Mitt Romney's national campaign for president. "Governor Etch-A-Sketch" spent most of his campaign walking back much of what he stood for or implemented when he was governor of Massachusetts.   

In less than four years, Chris Christie will run for president of the United States.  Democrats seem to like this guy because he has already separated himself from the most insane rhetoric of the Tea Party.  Democrats better not take their eye off the ball.  Governor Christie will be the most conservative President we have ever seen.  The only chance the Democratic Party has to defeat him is to tie him to the Republican base.  He needs to be asked obvious questions like, "Do you believe that a dying man should lose his health insurance coverage?"

If he answers incorrectly, he will be cheered by the audience, and reviled by the national electorate.  If he answers correctly, he will be booed by the audience, and never make it out of the primary.  Either way he gets beat by the Democratic candidate.  The key is to make the media ask him the question.  If the voices of the radical Right are silenced, the question will never be asked.  In the last campaign, Republican candidates had to regurgitate the greatest hits of the lunatic fringe.  It cost them the presidency, seats in the Senate, and seats in the House.  I am convinced that the Republican Party cannot evolve or change as long as the voices they trust with all of their being control the message of the day.  

So, to my liberal friends, sit back, relax, and crack open a cold one.  When the most vile, racist things come from a blithering idiot's mouth, don't contact their show or advertisers.  Contact your local Republican Congressman or woman and ask them why they agree with that host.  Ask them why they hate women, racial minorities, and homosexuals.  If you don't get an answer, contact your local media outlets and let them know.  You win politically by getting even, not getting mad.

So, You Want Bipartisanship? Be Careful What You Ask For

By Shawn Johnson
www.libvoice1776.blogspot.com
https://www.facebook.com/liberalvoice1776?ref=hl

Perhaps the most laughable lie consistently told by Republicans is that they favor limited government.  They will tell you this just before they gain power and then proceed to create massive deficits expanding the size of government to new levels never seen before.  Worse yet, their expansion of government does not refer to the number of people they help, rather it pertains to the expansion of power and wealth to the few while leaving the masses with less and less.  Then they are promptly run out of office and Democrats are left to take the blame for their mess.  Not to say Democrats are blameless because they are complicit puppets who have the power to stop this madness but they never do.  They like it when the Republican Party implodes because it energizes Democratic voters who massively outnumber Republican voters.  If we had a one hundred percent turnout in every national election, Republicans would never hold the White House or more than twenty-five percent of the Senate ever again.  These are not data based numbers, rather my opinion, but my opinion does have some factual evidence to support it.  Republicans are consistently trying to make it harder for people to vote, and when there is low turnout, Republicans usually win.  High turnout usually means the Democrats win.  Therefore higher turnout would logically give the Democrats even more votes and more power in Congress.  The editorial in the Economist, a conservative magazine, agree with me.

http://www.economist.com/blogs/lexington/2012/09/art-voter-turnout

            Since the Republicans have such an abhorrent record on implementing limited government, we must ask what they mean when they say they are for limited government.  They certainly aren't for limited government when it comes to military expansion, illegal and warrantless wiretapping of American citizens, subsidizing farming, subsidizing Wall Street banks, subsidizing oil and the fossil fuel burning industry, subsidizing the insurance industry, marriage rights, drug law enforcement, undocumented immigrants, unlawful detainment of American citizens, and  whether or not a woman can have an abortion.  In fact, the only time they seem to support limited government is when the government is placing restrictions on their corporate polluting friends.  They don't like it when government helps and protects the environment, the poor, the middle class, the elderly, disabled people, labor, the financial markets, and the post office.  The Republican's ultimate goals have nothing to do with the size of government.  Their ideology does not have anything to do with the Constitution or the framers of said document.  The Republicans job is to maintain power and control so they can move money allocated for the good of the public to their friends in the private corporate world.  The goal of Republicans is to privatize everything that the government currently does.  Except, when private corporations need help from the government, then the Republicans are the first in line handing more of the middle class' tax dollars to the rich.

            Now, the Republicans can only fool some of the people some of the time, so they need to find ways to stop the vast majority of Americans from voting.  They know the masses vote won't be for them.  In the past, conservatives had resorted to poll taxes, voter disenfranchisement, and voter intimidation.  Hence the implementation of the Voting Rights Act in 1965.  The more power and control the Republicans lose, the harder they fight.  It has taken Barack Obama winning the presidency twice to really make them go off the deep end.  Republican governors all over the country did what they could to create unfair voter ID laws, limit the availability of days and polling places, and in Florida in the last election, voters had to stand in lines for several hours to be able to cast their vote.  Well in 2012, it still didn't work, and they actually strengthened voter resolve.  Even so, the vast majority of the poor and undereducated did not cast a vote.  The vast majority of young people did not cast a vote.  Republicans are still winning to a certain extent. 

            If control of government went by popular vote, the Democrats would control the House, Senate, and the Presidency.  Republican governors have gerrymandered the districts in their state to such an extent that they can still maintain control of government while losing elections.  While Democratic governors use some of the same tactics, it isn't anywhere near the degree that Republicans do it.  Remember, Democrats need more voters to come out, not less.  I think we would agree that more people involved in the political process is a good thing.  Well, it is a good thing as long as you are not a Republican running for national office. 

            The small versus big government tagline is something that Republican voters truly believe exists.  They believe that the Democrats are trying to enact "wealth redistribution" by taxing the rich and giving to the poor.  It makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside whenever I pretend this is true.  But, facts are facts, and under the current Democratic leadership the top two percent see their wealth grow exponentially while the middle class and the poor slip further and further away.  The current Democratic President has massively slashed taxes and discretionary spending, and while we did have one tiny tax increase on the top one percent, it simply brought them back to the tax level they paid in 2002.  Never mind that one of the greatest periods of growth in the history of our country saw the top marginal tax rate at ninety-one percent.  And, guess what?  There were still plenty of wealthy people.  Everyone else simply had a chance at a reasonably comfortable life (unless you were a minority), but we can't have it all I guess.  The very wealthy have become more wealthy in every single decade in the history of this country while the middle class has seen their income and wealth at a lower level than it was forty years ago.  This trend is not only continuing under a Democratic president, it is on steroids.  In 2012, corporate America pilfered another seven hundred billion dollars from the American people.   If Barack Obama is a socialist, he is the worst socialist who ever lived.

            The American people vastly agree that they want to see Washington get together to solve their issues and problems.  They want to see Democrats and Republicans come together for the greater good.  And, while the Democrats are not the ideal liberal lions Republicans try to paint them as, at least when they come to the table their goal is not to "make government small enough so they can drown it in a bathtub."  That is a direct quote from Grover Norquist, the architect of the "no-tax pledge," a pledge that several Republican senators and representatives signed saying they wouldn't raise taxes under any circumstances even if it makes complete sense to do so.  If we are attacked, if millions of people are killed or removed from their homes, if the damn sky falls, they will still refuse to raise taxes to allow the government to operate at a sufficient level.  As liberals we must ask ourselves, why would we want Democrats for one second to try to reach out to a political party who makes no qualms about destroying the duly elected government of the United States. 

            The Republicans have been so egregious in their attack on government, in Michigan the Republican governor, Rick Snyder, has passed two laws (one was struck down) to actually allow him to appoint an emergency manager over a city or county as he sees fit.  That emergency manager has complete control over the elected leaders and the people.  They can remove any leader they wish and replace him or her without the consent of the people.  This is not just your normal power grab, it is anti-constitutional treason.  Not one Republican senator or congressman has had anything negative to say about it.  Oh, and in case you were wondering, yes, every single town where these emergency managers have been placed have been predominately African American.  Not only that, twelve of the thirteen cities where this has occurred have stayed the same or gotten worse.

            So I ask again, shouldn't we be worried when the president shows a greater effort to work with Republicans on the budget than he does the Progressive Caucus?  Why are the voters insisting that the President compromise with the same crowd who wants to give their future retirement money to Wall Street hedge-fund managers?  Why would they deem it acceptable that Democrats sit down with Republicans when their budget is designed to steal their money and property in order to make the rich more wealthy?  If there were ever a real-world application of "wealth redistribution" this is certainly it. 

            The Progressive Caucus has a budget on the table that is designed to create seven million jobs in the first year of implementation.  It is also designed to have full employment in this country within five years.  Their budget is designed to repair the crumbling infrastructure, education, the environment, and American quality of life.  It is designed to do all of these things before we cut any essential government programs.  We can live with short-term debt and deficit, but we can never pay down that debt if the country isn't working.  If America were a patient in a doctor's office, the Progressives would have the cure for America's disease, the President and moderate Democrats have the drugs necessary to keep America medicated and limping along to a slow death, and the Republicans have a gun to America's head just waiting for the President to allow them to pull the trigger.

            Looking at America like a sick patient is a reasonable analogy because America does have a long-term debt cancer.  But, it is a cancer that America can live with and still have a prosperous life.  It isn't the first time we have had this cancer, and we have kicked it before.  The problem this time is that America also has pneumonia also known as a jobs crisis.  If we don't cure the pneumonia first, America will die long before the cancer gets us.  Once America has mass employment again, then we can address the long term debt with the extra money we will have.  Because, unlike giving money to rich people, when you give it to the poor and middle class they put it back into the American economy.  They pay taxes on that money to the government.  They don't shelter it in the Cayman Islands ala Mitt Romney. 

            President Obama has compromised with Republicans on almost every single piece of legislature Congress has passed and he has signed into law.  To reward his efforts, he gets a straight party line vote time and time again.  That vote is usually preceded by an unnecessary undemocratic silent filibuster.  President Obama gave away the farm in his first two years to the same group who systematically and purposefully destroyed the American economy.  Despite their best efforts, in many ways the economic outlook of the country has improved.  But, it is still very rough for those who have nothing.  They are continuously asked to sacrifice and give for their country and fellow human being while the extremely wealthy are coddled and protected from the nasty economy.  They are protected so well, their stock portfolios are through the roof not surprisingly right after they talked many Americans into cutting and running after losing billions of dollars.  They took their homes and they took their livelihoods.  They moved their jobs overseas.  And, if that wasn't enough, they decided to lecture America on personal responsibility all while receiving over seven trillion dollars in unpaid loans and gifts from the American government.  But, no need to worry, my Republican friends have sent their favorite "small government" politician to Washington!  I am sure Lucy won't pull away the football this year. 

            So Mr. President, you have a choice.  You can stand by the Progressive agenda.  You can reap the benefits of large job growth.  You will be remembered as the guy who lifted up the middle class and poor.  Or, you can give the Republicans the cuts they want to Medicare, Social Security, housing, the postal service, libraries, public works, health care, police and law enforcement, energy, and labor.  And, you can do it for a few tax-loophole closings, but in the end, the American people are going to remember that they crumbled while you were in charge.  Also, you will barely receive enough Republican support to pass their own plan.  Eventually the high voter turnout will be no more.  Big bad Republicans won't be good enough to scare people straight.  The people won't care enough to cast a ballot for the next guy who says, "Change has come to America!" 

           

           

           

              

 

Sticking To Our Guns

Why America Needs To Change Our Methods When It Comes To Firearms

By Shawn Johnson:

www.libvoice1776.blogspot.com

https://www.facebook.com/liberalvoice1776?ref=hl

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. - Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

Mass shootings in Connecticut and Colorado, along with massive violence and gun death in towns and cities around the country, have caused Americans to force politicians into focusing their efforts on reducing gun violence and eliminating mass shootings. Over five hundred children die each year from being accidentally shot by another child. Many of the gun deaths are suicides. Many other western industrialized nations have found sound legislation massively reduces gun deaths in their countries. Why isn't America attempting to mimic some of what these countries are doing so successfully?

The answer is found in Congress and in the state legislatures and governorships. Democrats are in favor of gun ownership, and Republicans are so turned on by firing a weapon, their eyes tend to roll back into their heads much like a great white shark devouring a sea lion. Every single liberal argument I have heard on this subject starts out with, "Nobody is trying to take your gun." While this is factually true, I think we must ask ourselves, "Why isn't anyone trying to take your gun?"

And, for the record, I am not talking about hunting rifles, bb guns, single and double barrel shot guns. I am not even suggesting that someone shouldn't be allowed to purchase and own a collection of antique weapons and firearms. But, why do you need a handgun? Why do you need an assault weapon? Protection?

Well, according to Harvard School of Public Health, more handguns equal more death, not more protection. Here is what they had to say:

1. Across states, more guns = more unintentional firearm deaths

We analyzed data for 50 states over 19 years to investigate the relationship between gun prevalence and accidental gun deaths across different age groups. For every age group, where there are more guns there are more accidental deaths. The mortality rate was 7 times higher in the four states with the most guns compared to the four states with the fewest guns.

Miller, Matthew; Azrael, Deborah; Hemenway, David. Firearm availability and unintentional firearm deaths. Accident Analysis and Prevention. 2001; 33:477-84.



2. Across states, unsafe gun storage = more unintentional firearm deaths

We analyzed data from the 2002 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System that asked questions about guns and gun storage in the home, combined with information on deaths from the National Center for Health Statistics. Across states, both firearm prevalence AND questionable storage practices (i.e. storing firearms loaded and unlocked) were associated with higher rates of unintentional firearm deaths.

Miller, Matthew; Azrael, Deborah; Hemenway, David; Vriniotis, Mary. Firearm storage practices and rates of unintentional firearm deaths in the United States. Accident Analysis and Prevention. 2005; 37:661-67.



3. Youth killed in gun accidents are shot by other youth

The majority of people killed in firearm accidents are under age 24, and most of these young people are being shot by someone else, usually someone their own age. The shooter is typically a friend or family member, often an older brother. By contrast, older adults are at far lower risk of accidental firearm death, and most often are shooting themselves. This article highlights one of the many benefits of the National Violent Death Reporting System. Before the NVDRS, data on the shooter in unintentional gun deaths were not readily available

Hemenway, David; Barber, Catherine; Miller, Matthew. Unintentional firearm deaths: a comparison of other-inflicted and self-inflicted shootings. Accident Analysis & Prevention.2010; 42:1184-8.

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/gun-threats-and-self-defense-gun-use/



Americans are not protecting their families with firearms. They are destroying them. In order to "protect" your family with a firearm, that firearm must be readily available. But, intruders into your home are not being stopped with guns. Most intruders are stopped if there is someone home, gun or no gun. Criminals are not breaking into random homes to commit murder. They break into random homes to steal things. Hence, they will most likely do it when you are not home. Who is being stopped by firearms? Your son or daughter are stopping their friend, brother, or sister from having a reasonable chance to reach adulthood. This is not acceptable, and liberals need to say so.

Why else do you need a gun? To stop the government from a tyrannical takeover? This may be the most ridiculous argument ever posed by any person regarding the gun debate. Yes, in 1787 when the people basically were their own military, the government decided to pass an amendment to the Constitution ensuring that citizens were able to take up arms to help the government fight Native Americans, the French, slaves, and other threats to the superiority of the white Anglo-Saxon establishment. At no time did the government authorize individual citizens to take up arms against the duly elected representative government who had just committed mass treason by writing the Constitution and tearing up the Articles of Confederation.

But, just for the sake of argument, let's say the founders did intend to have an armed citizenry in case we ever had a Marxist socialist black president who decided to force Americans into a communist revolution. Do you think for one second, that the founders could have envisioned the firepower the United States military would possess in the twenty-first century? If you want to know how effective an assault weapon would be against Navy Seal Team Six, Google "death of Bin Laden," and see what you find. Our military has drones with hellfire missiles attached to them which are capable of leveling a city block. Do you honestly believe for one second your assault rifle with a one hundred round clip is going to do anything against a drone? And, even if you possess the highest level of mental delusion, and your answer is "yes," you would actually have to see it coming, which you wouldn't.

Maybe the most ironic feature of this strange "government takeover" argument is that the same people who insist the government is going to launch a civil war against its own people, are the same people who tell us that the perpetrators of mass shootings are mentally ill, and we should keep guns from the mentally ill. Why are people like Wayne Lapierre allowed to go on national television and make these ridiculous assertions without being laughed at and made fun of? I believe the first sign of dangerous mental illness is to believe that there is a massive conspiracy by the government to take you out, and you decide to arm yourself to the teeth to prevent that conspiracy.

Now, Wayne Lapierre isn't an idiot, and he realizes that his arguments don't bear any fruit. But, he isn't speaking to the guy who owns hunting rifles, and he isn't speaking to the guy who owns a shotgun locked in a case. He is speaking to the guy who has orgasms just thinking that there will be a military style ambush on his home and property. The guy who right now is at a gun range wildly firing at a target. In a month, this guy will be shooting up his former place of employment. Wayne Lapierre wants this guy to do just that, so he can appear on national television and give his Frank Luntz tagline of "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun!" Lapierre knows that the sick individual who owns a legal arsenal believes he is the "good guy with the gun." After all, he is stopping his government from a tyrannical revolution. He is doing so by wasting the lives of six year olds.

Why does Wayne Lapierre have this sick and twisted agenda? Because he is the corporate shill of the gun industry. This is a multi-billion dollar industry which needs to be fed. And, Republicans have no problem helping him feed the industry. Their imaginary target is President Barack Obama. President Obama is a right of center Democrat. As you read this book, I will prove to you that he has much more in common with Nixon and Reagan than he does with Roosevelt and Truman. His ideas are very centrist, and he has really taken the non-controversial side of most issues. The vast majority of Americans wholeheartedly agree with his policy positions. Even forty to fifty percent of Republicans agree with Obama on major issues.

So, the Republicans invented a different Obama. They tag him with labels like, "the most liberal President ever, and communist, socialist, Marxist, and Leninist." The say things like, "He isn't one of us." And, ultimately, they end their inane tirade with, "He is coming for your gun!" And, this line of dialogue is very effective. When Obama was elected in 2008, gun sales and bullet sales skyrocketed. Never mind the fact that Obama had said almost nothing about gun control when he ran for President. In fact, no Democrat since Al Gore had raised the issue of gun control in a Presidential election. As I explained before, Democrats like guns. These facts do not deter Republicans or the NRA. They continue to subliminally instruct fear laden individuals with access to firearms to fight for a cause which does not exist. It is nothing more than militant McCarthyism. And, for the record, the number of tyrants taken down by the citizenry in the history of the United States is zero. The number of American lives which have been lost to gun violence since 1968 is a little over 1.3 million. More American lives have been lost to guns since 1968 than have been lost to wars during the history of the United States.

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2013/jan/18/mark-shields/pbs-commentator-mark-shields-says-more-killed-guns/

The Second Amendment does not give Americans the right to bear any arm they desire. Only because of a perverted, distorted view of the Supreme Court does the Second Amendment give average citizens the right to own a gun without being part of a well regulated militia. The Second Amendment does not prohibit the government from regulating and controlling these firearms. So what can we do as a government and as a society?

By reading what I have written, one could make a solid argument that I am advocating for law enforcement to walk into a person's home and remove his or her firearms at will. That is certainly not the case. In fact, I don't believe that the simple act of making guns illegal will stop all gun violence or even reduce it to a great enough degree.

For example, making drugs illegal does not stop the sale, production, and distribution of said drugs. It only makes it so drug users must commit other acts of criminality in order to obtain and utilize these drugs. So, no, I don't advocate making a law which states that nobody gets a gun anymore. What I do advocate is treating firearms much in the same way we treat other dangerous legal possessions.

One possession which comes to mind is the automobile. An owner of a vehicle, in order to purchase, operate, and store that vehicle, must have a valid license which is obtained by completing a regulated driving course and taking a driving exam. The owner must also secure insurance in case he or she does any harm with that vehicle. The owner is also prohibited from owning certain types of vehicles such as tanks, and certain owners of vehicles like semi-trailers must obtain special licensing and follow special rules in order to operate those vehicles. There are databases of every single licensed driver, and in many states licensing information is made available for public information. All drivers must follow the rules of the road, and every driver and passenger of a vehicle must wear a seatbelt at all times. And, last but not least, there are several public campaigns designed to inform the populace about vehicle safety. All of these provisions and laws are seen as reasonable and responsible by a mass consensus of citizens. These things are not seen as liberal or conservative.

We need to treat firearms the same way. And, please do not attempt to use the Second Amendment to distinguish the difference. Cars were not around when the founding fathers wrote the Constitution. Therefore, the assumption that they would not have placed provisions in the Constitution regarding the ownership and use of automobiles is null and void. We cannot say what the founders would have or would not have done. What we can say is that the Supreme Court has given the federal government the right to treat guns the same way they treat cars and the federal government has the right and responsibility to do just that. Wayne Lapierre, the NRA, the Republicans and Democrats, and the twenty-one percent of Americans who own firearms need to come to the realization that what we are doing is not working, and arming every single American will not make us safer. They need to stop advocating on behalf of the gun manufacturers and start advocating on behalf of the next five hundred children who will die accidentally this year, the next thirty-two five year olds who will perish at their school, the next crowded theater, the next political figure, the next victim of gang violence, the next husband, wife, father, and mother. It is time this country takes a stand against one of its most deep-seeded evils.

President Obama Part II

By Shawn Johnson www.libvoice1776.blogspot.com, wpayton5599@aol.com, https://www.facebook.com/liberalvoice1776 - click on the links to comment and let me know where I went wrong...

Note: I am still writing my book, with a chisel and hammer which is why it is taking me so long, but I did not go away!  This blog is directly from my new book, but it has a direct effect on this weekend so I wanted to share!  Please comment!


As I am writing this section, the President of the United States is currently being sworn into office for his second term. I am very confused how other people, who write books, get those books out in such a timely manner. As I expressed in earlier chapters, I am a very common person with a common profession, and I fully admit that sometimes playing Angry Birds gets in the way of me finishing this book. Ok, where were we now? Oh yes, the direction of President Obama's second term in office.

As you are probably sensing by now, the theme of this chapter is going to be about pulling Obama to the left in his second term. He is out of excuses now. He understands what liberals told him about Republicans from day one. In a 2008 debate, Hillary Clinton pointed out that she understood the Republicans in Congress and he didn't. She was right. The Republicans were soundly rejected in the last election. The Democrats not only took more than fifty percent of the vote in the Senate, but also in the House. Due to gerrymandering districts around the country, the Republicans found a way to lose an election, and still maintain control. So the country is stuck with leaders they do not want, and the numbers show it.

The kickoff to Obama's second term will be his inaugural address.  When President Obama gives his inaugural address on January 22nd, he has two directions to follow. He could stay the course. He could do what he has done in his State of the Union Addresses. He could lay out his second term as to not appear controversial. He could concentrate on being a faux "uniter." He can give the people exactly what they want to hear with his magnetic voice and style. The viewers (mostly Democrats) will give him rave reviews. The few right-wing media forced to sit through and assess the speech will claim it is the most liberal, one-sided address in history. Both opinions will be unbelievably incorrect, the right-wing opinion being not only false, but also psychotic.

Or, President Obama could make history and big-time news. President Obama could come out and tell America where it is going wrong. And, granted he will do that on guns and immigration, but it will end there. The President could have a dialogue with the country that no president since Jimmy Carter has been willing to have. He can look America in the eye and tell them that we need to push out racial and sexual bigotry completely. He can tell the story of racial inequality which still exists heavily in this country today. We need to transform our energy policy, not incrementally, but harshly and swiftly. We need to address that his first four years have been devastating for the poor and especially the African American and Latino poor. He can call for reinstatement of the war on poverty and show where it worked. He can call for an end to disease and despair by finally passing a public option for health care. He can address the illegality of drone strikes and vow to find another way to defeat Al Qaeda without carpet bombing countries. He can tell the country that the over-bloated military budget is not necessary, and we could cut it in half tomorrow and still properly protect our country. He can vow to order the justice department to arrest and try Wall Street bankers guilty of heinous economic crimes. He can speak to the country about our obsession with greed. . He can speak about a country which has no honor or ethics. He can chastise, people who lie about who they are and what they have done. And, he can invoke Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to justify what he is saying.

And lastly, he can look squarely in the face of each person watching, and ask them to sacrifice. Sacrifice something for your fellow human beings. Help an elderly neighbor. Help an inner-city child graduate high school. Give up something for the greater good. Tell people that paying taxes is not a punishment or an attack on your economic class. Tell them it is patriotic. You love your country enough to make sure that the government has what it needs to function properly and efficiently. Tell them that spending more money on education, gun reform, immigration reform, health care, science and invention, environmental protection, space exploration, help for the poor and needy, support for labor, and infrastructure will improve all of these things. And, you need to look no further than the United States military to prove it. We spend twenty-six times more on the military than any other country in the world, and our military could annihilate the entire world if we really wanted. When someone tells you that "throwing money at a problem doesn't make it better," retort by saying "Tell that to the soldiers who fought at Iwo Jima. But, to accomplish great things takes great people who are willing to sacrifice. Let the American people know that this is their presidency now. We will not accept a dying empire anymore. We will lead the world again, and we will do it through the same liberal ideals Republicans and Democrats used throughout the twentieth century when America really was on top.

I am pretty sure that Obama's speech will be the former and not the latter. Obama believes that it is ok to sputter along watching liberty die while corporate interests control more and more of what used to be ours. Liberals have had their voice shut out. Liberals triumphed in the last century and it has only taken thirty years to undo over two hundred years worth of work and sacrifice. It is time for the most powerful voice in the nation to get us back on the track moving left.

Sorry, But I Think You Are Stupid...And, So Does Your Candidate

By Shawn Johnson

http://www.libvoice1776.blogspot.com/

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I have been ripped by my Republican friends for lumping Republicans in with the uneducated, ignorant, and stupid.  Despite the evidence I have supplied, they continue to insist I am stereotypically lumping them in with the lunatics and morons I see rallying for their side.  Now, I can claim victory in the following statement...Republicans are not only stupid, they believe that being stupid is a better way to live, and they actively pursue a life of stupidity and ignorance.

Shawn, how dare you say such things about fine upstanding people like Joe the Plumber (who isn't a plumber, name really isn't Joe, never made $250,000 annually, and votes against his best interests)?  Well, I am sorry, but Rick Santorum, a presidential candidate mounting a serious bid to be the Republican nominee, agrees with me.  Mr. Santorum claimed that President Obama is a "snob" for wanting people to go to college.  He went on to claim that going to college causes you to lose your faith and allows you to be indoctrinated by liberal professors.

Now, since we measure intelligence by I.Q., I can use that as evidence that college graduates are usually fairly intelligent (most MENSA members have college degrees).  So, by Santorum's own admission, they should all be liberal atheists.  Using Rick Santorum's own logic, smart people are liberal atheists and stupid people vote for Rick Santorum.  Thank you, Mr. Santorum for clearing that up for us.  Although if I "Google" your name, I should really call you Mr. Frothy Ass Juice.

If you are running against intelligence, I can only assume that you support and promote stupidity.  As Republicans you have to be either stupid, ignorant, clinically insane, or the largest group of liars ever to live.  I truly believed that it was the latter, but I was giving you way too much credit.  I am so glad that Rick Santorum cleared that up for me.

There is good news for you Republicans.  This country is overwhelmingly stupid as well, so you really have a fighting chance in the upcoming election.  Democrats are naive.  They actually believe that Obama is magically going to raise over a billion dollars and that their fellow Americans couldn't possibly vote for the boobs running on the Republican ticket.  They actually think that you hear the same things they hear.  They think that you both speak the same language.  They think when a candidate says, "I love poor people, they taste like chicken," he is out of touch with America and not very funny.  You go and load your shotgun and tell Maw' to "set the suppa table!"

I am so glad that Rick Santorum had the audacity to point out a very unpopular opinion.  Stupid people don't go to college; therefore they keep their faith, become more conservative, and vote for him.  This is a simple enough line of thinking.  I think that Rick Santorum has actually encouraged more people to go to college now than Barack Obama ever could.  If you are an 18 year old in the United States, you may hear what Rick Santorum said and say to yourself, "My god, I need to attend college!"
 
Now, if you take a look at sheer numbers, there may be some evidence to back up Santorum's claim.  About twenty-seven percent of Americans have obtained a college degree.  About twenty-five percent of Americans are non-theists.  It is almost complete indoctrination.  Why would the act of simply going to college destroy one's faith? 

It may be rooted in the fact that having the ability to read critically might seriously upset the "historical" findings of the Bible.  You may be compelled to believe that a man didn't live in a whale for three days or start an ark collecting two of every known species on the earth. You may not accept that the world is 6,000 years old or than a man was born of a virgin, walked on water, turned water into wine, and healed a blind man by telling him he could see.  Learning may drive up your skepticism just a little.

If you are still reading this, and you have attended college, you will probably realize that I am being facetious.  But, you have to admit, looking at the glass as half-empty as Republicans always do under an Obama presidency,  Rick Santorum is directly taking a shot at his own voters.  And, they are too stupid to see it.  He is simply running against intelligence which is increasingly becoming a Republican position.  More so it has been the position of various religions for centuries.  The message is simple.  Stop the spread of education because education will destroy the church.

In this respect, Santorum is hitting on a key tenet of religion (actually, survival mechanism of religion is probably more appropriate).  Religion is oppressive, and it requires a great deal of obedience from its followers.  Yes, Santorum is telling his own voters in one single sentence that they are sheep of the church.  Education, which is President Obama's game, will cost you your faith.  "Liberal" professors will fill your head with heretical thoughts, just like the apple from the tree of knowledge.  What Santorum doesn't tell his voters is the real reason that religion is not for the thoughtful. 

Thinkers root out corporate scum.  Religion is full of corporate hacks who make a buck off of people's fears and indiscretions.  You know, capitalism as we understand it today.  We don't actually make and export products anymore so our markets have taken on a religious like form.  The stock market goes up and down because of how the country "feels."  Better buy shit you don't need, or you will be responsible for a tanking economy.    

Just like corporate profiteers, religion uses fear of the afterlife to make money.  Please make a donation to the church so you will go to heaven.  But, one fact keeps getting in the way of religion's pro-business message.  The Bible is animatedly against capitalism, the Old Testament warning against false idols (metaphor for money) and the New Testament championing the poor and those without.  Religion is so hypocritical it attempts to mask the very doctrine that it condemns others for not adhering to. 

American capitalism bucks religious doctrine.  In biblical times when kings ruled the earth, things were much simpler.  You are the common man, and you need not, want, or worry about money and riches.  Leave that to the king.  Hence, what's Caesar's is Caesar's.  But, America, founded on an ideal of representative democracy, cannot escape the fact that ordinary Americans can indeed become rich (despite what my previous blogs would have you believe).  The American Dream is anti-religious.  There is even a commandment against the American Dream.  However, there is no commandment against slavery.  There is no commandment against oppression of women and minorities.  Apparently, these things slipped God's mind. 

So, religion, in the name of self-preservation, did what it always does.  It threw its basic principles right out the window to support its hunger for wealth.  The once anti-wealth fable has been distorted to support the ruling class.  Simply take a look at the Vatican and you will see it does not coincide with the message of the founder.  And, keep in mind, religion has never been anti-wealth or anti-power for itself.  It has always been anti-wealth and anti-power for its followers.  And, that is why, if you are not a follower, you must be destroyed. 

That entire line of thinking is where Mr. Santorum's demonization of collegiate educated Americans comes from.  But, he is too narrow-minded to realize it.  The only thing he realizes is that it is another opposite position he can take from Barack Obama. 

At the end of the day Rick Santorum is another backwards small mind who appeals to the least of us as Americans.  The fact that he is gaining so much steam in the Republican primary says so much more about Mitt Romney than it does about Rick Santorum. 

I Am Allowed To Bitch, You Are Not!

http://www.libvoice1776.blogspot.com/

 

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Attention Republican voters...don't for one second think that you and I have something in common just because we are both critical of the President.  What you don't understand is I can hold the President to a higher standard, and you cannot.  Remember, you are the mentally handicapped boneheads that saddled this country with George Bush.  You had your chance to hold your President accountable, and you failed miserably.  You are the guy who spilled milk everywhere and now you complain about the methods that the cleanup crew uses to dissipate your mess.  I voted correctly, and you didn't, so shut up.  Now that the bus is in the ditch, the bus driver shouldn't be bitching at the tow truck. 

 

Let's start with your biggest hypocrisy, which is your constant whining about liberals blaming George W. Bush for everything.  The reason that you are a hypocrite is because you complain about everything that happened under Bush as well.  You just conveniently attribute those grave mistakes to Obama.  You have blamed Obama for the bank bailouts, national debt increases, expanding federal powers, food stamp increases, creating a deficit increasing health care plan, and leaving the military underfunded.  These are all things that George Bush did and Obama did not, or at least did to a much greater extent than Obama. 

Secondly, you attribute things to Obama that are simply untrue.  You lie to try to prove your talking points because the facts get in the way of your archaic ideas.  You run around yammering on and on about how tax-increases are killing jobs never once owning up to the fact that Obama has done nothing but lower taxes.  By your own goalpost, the economy should be booming, but it isn't.  It isn't booming because tax-cuts directly cause a net loss of jobs.  But, the spending measures that you abhor have created job growth for 24 consecutive months.  Even with spending measures you lie.  It is a fact that George Bush had larger discretionary spending than Obama, but you call Obama the "tax and spend liberal."

You live in a damned bubble where you have created a Muslim, foreign-born, radical Marxist who does not really exist.  You blasted Obama for raising the debt-ceiling when Bush raised it seven times, and Reagan raised it seventeen times.  Never mind that raising the debt ceiling was the right thing to do.  Now, Obama had voted against raising the debt-ceiling when he was a Senator, and he was wrong.  He said, "I was young and wrong."  You see, admitting when you are wrong instead of insanely and hypocritically justifying it, is a good thing. 
 
Another example of your lunacy is that you actually believe Obama is weak on foreign policy and terrorism.  He keeps having one success militarily after another.  The guy you voted for had one military failure after another.  The guy you voted for in the last election supported all of those failures.  I have legitimate concerns about the President's illegal use of drone attacks, illegal wiretapping of American citizens, and illegal detention of suspects without due process.  Not only are you not concerned, your argument is that he is weak for not doubling down.  Then you call yourself a "Constitutionalist."  If "Constitutionalist" is a euphemism for idiot, then I agree with you.     

Let's take a look at a few facts from the Bush Administration's record and what the Obama Administration did about it.

Fiscal Responsibility:

First, George Bush started two wars and didn't place them on the federal budget.  The wars became unfunded mandates that threw the country into massive debts coupled with idiotic, idealistic tax-cuts and deregulation measures which resulted in a net loss of jobs and a housing and banking crisis akin to the Great Depression.  Obama placed the wars on the budget causing the deficit to skyrocket in 2009, but this was money already spent.  Putting them on the budget ensured that we would start to pay for them, and now this spending must be voted on by Congress along with several other spending measures.  The wars are no longer unfunded mandates.  As a result, you blamed Obama for the out-of-control budget that wasn't his.  When Obama put forth $4 trillion in budget cuts, the Republican congress refused to vote for it because it included tax increases on the very wealthy.  You vote for idiots that take a pledge to Grover Norquist rather than statesmen who took a pledge to uphold the Constitution. 

Also, George Bush initiated the financial bailouts, and did not require anything of the financial institutions receiving the bailouts.  Remember, Henry Paulson was running around screaming about how we need to give them this money right away!  As a result $350 billion was spent without any knowledge of where it went, what it was spent on, or even if it helped.  When Obama took office he immediately appointed Elizabeth Warren to watch and allot the remainder of the bailout money.  Along with TARP, the government was able to recover much of the money given to the banks.  He then signed Dodd-Frank into law which doesn't go nearly far enough, but it is a step in the right direction.  As a result of this, you blame Obama for the financial bailouts. 

When Bush was elected, a recount was in place that may have proven Al Gore to be the winner of the presidency.  The recount was unfairly and illegally stopped by the partisan hacks on the Supreme Court.  As a result you Republicans flew into action screaming and yelling about the democratic process being compromised.  Except, you waited eight years to do it, and it was maniacal ranting regarding where President Obama was born. 

When Obama took office, the economy was hemorrhaging 750,000 jobs per month.  The economy had dropped by 9% of GDP.  Obama's Investment and Recovery Act saved three million jobs, and according to the CBO was "the primary source of economic growth in 2009."  As a result you blame Obama for not reducing unemployment below 8% because that was what the Obama Administration predicted.  Except it wasn't what the Administration predicted, it was what the campaign predicted, and it was based on figures that had the economy dropping by 4% of GDP.  The only problem with the Investment and Recovery Act is that it was too small and it included needless tax-cuts that your Congressmen demanded.  But, you conveniently take those facts, and skew them to support your position that government spending is bad.

Iraq:

George Bush had one foreign policy disaster after another with regards to the Iraq War.  Administration officials purposefully lied about WMD's in Iraq.  Donald Rumsfeld said, "We know where they are. They're in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad and east, west, south and north somewhat."  The truth is Rumsfeld had no clue if Iraq even had WMD's.  He flat out lied to take us to war, and he wasn't the only one.

Also, let's discuss the "fiscal responsibility" of your beloved "conservative" President.  Nearly $9 billion was "lost" in Iraq.  The money was supposed to be used for reconstruction.  Again, Barack Obama is much more fiscally responsible than George Bush.  Don't let those facts stop you from running head-first into a wall with right-wing talking points though. 

We now know that the Bush Administration used illegal torture to drum up most of the information that led to their "findings" about Saddam Hussein and WMD's.  They sold the lie to the American public and you idiots ate it up.  I took a ton of criticism and shit from you moronic right-wingers with your "Christian values" when I said that I didn't believe this crap for one second (I mention Christian values because I cannot find the values that place a rubber stamp on war and torture).  This buffoon that I used to work with guaranteed me that we would find the weapons.  We didn't.  I was right, and he was wrong.  But, that didn't stop him from labeling me as "unpatriotic."  And, it isn't stopping any of you from claiming that Obama is "weak on terror."

Valerie Plame:

Karl Rove under the orders of Vice President Dick Cheney outed a covert CIA agent to Robert Novak of the Chicago Tribune, and then encouraged Lewis Libby to commit perjury, which he did.  Libby was convicted, and Bush conveniently commuted his sentence.  What was the reason?  The CIA agent's husband was asked to investigate claims that yellow-cake uranium was being sold by Niger to Iraq.  He wrote them a memo telling them there was no truth to the claims.  What did you Republicans do?  Scream for investigations.  Not of this incident, but of Obama for being born in Kenya (which you made up).

Osama Bin Laden:

George Bush said, "I truly am not that concerned about him," while he proceeded to prove it by shifting focus to Iraq.  Obama killed the son-of-a-bitch.  Your reaction, blame Obama for not giving George Bush credit and then subsequently giving credit to the failed Bush torture policies.  Even Bush administration officials called "bullshit" on you.

"It is true that some information that came from normal interrogation approaches at Guantánamo did lead to information that was beneficial in this instance. But it was not harsh treatment and it was not waterboarding."

The Bush Admin official that said this...Donald Rumsfeld. 

The Tea Party:

The Tea Party was formed to buck the Wall Street bailouts.  They soon were taken over by the Dick Armey, Koch Brothers money machine (Dick Armey being a good slogan for the entire Republican Party).  They duped stupid people into fighting for their corporate war against the country, and it almost worked.  Their first attack, Social Security.

The Koch Brothers paid "think-tanks" like the Cato Institute and Heritage Foundation to falsify findings that Social Security is going "bankrupt."  Then they used right-wing politicians and Fox News to repeat the lie over and over again.  You idiot Republicans believed it, and now most of you are in favor of privatizing Social Security, the most successful government program in history.  Social Security is currently running at a $3 trillion surplus and it will pay one hundred percent of benefits for the next thirty years. 

Don't believe me, check it out for yourself.  Bernie Sanders exposes the Koch Brothers:  http://front.moveon.org/bernie-sanders-exposes-the-koch-brothers-three-biggest-lies-about-social-security/

Now, I am pissed at Barack Obama for not drawing a line in the sand when it comes to Social Security.  I have a legitimate gripe.  You call him a socialist. 

The second Tea Party attack, "Obamacare!"  Actual things said about Barack Obama's health care plan included:

• Job killing legislation.
• Massive governmental bureaucracy.
• Death panels will be created to kill Grandma.
• Destroyer of Medicare
• It will bankrupt the country  

Never mind the fact that all of these things are provably untrue.  You Republicans plow ahead with your governmental conspiracy theories.  You remind of the picture of Grandpa Simpson screaming up at the sky and the caption reads, "Old Man Yells at Cloud."

When President Bush created a massive federal expansion of health care known as Medicare Part D and Medicare Advantage, both of which removed large sums of funding from Medicare and gave it to private corporations who run the insurance and drug markets, there was no Tea Party, no protests, nothing from the right-wing.  You Republicons were inexcusably silent. 

The CBO says that Obama's health care bill added twelve years of solvency to Medicare while taking tax payer money away from Medicare Advantage, which is for-profit private health insurance. The CBO says that repealing Obama's health care law will add $200 billion to the deficit. The health care law is filled with middle class tax-cuts to help people afford private insurance, yet you call it a "government takeover" of health care. The thing that you hate the most about the law, the individual mandate, is a Republican idea. It is a law demanding that people who get free medical care from a hospital help pay for that very care. It is as conservative as can be. But again, don't let the facts stop your psychotic ranting and raving.



The third Tea Party attack is the most insanely hilarious one of all.  The notion that Barack Obama is taxing everyone back to the stone age.  You know as well as I do that your taxes and mine are lower now than they were under George Bush.  In fact, taxes are as low as they have been since the 1950's.  I have problems with these massive tax-cuts because they cause major budget shortages.  You insist they don't exist.  Again, you are not dealing with reality.  And, you continue to support the party that insists on further tax-cuts when the Bush era tax-cuts are chiefly responsible for massive deficits in the first place. 

The Financial Bailouts and Auto Bailouts: 

Both of these bailouts began under President Bush.  President Obama simply made them work.  He added to the auto bailouts and created TARP which is a successful unpopular program.  The auto bailouts were wildly successful garnering a four to one return on our investment.  Not only do you hate the auto industry bailouts, you wrongfully attribute the bank bailouts to President Obama.  Wrong again idiots.  My problem is that we had no bailouts for poor people losing their homes.  Again, I have a right to complain and you don't.  

Who tried to stop the bank bailouts?  Not the Tea-baggers, not the Republicans, not the Democrats.  Michael Moore and a group of liberals stood before Congress and demanded that the bailouts be stopped.  Again, I have a right as a liberal to be pissed.  You as a conservative have no right to do so.  You should have voted correctly. 

Your new front runner for the GOP nomination said that going to college indoctrinates children and causes them to lose faith.  While I wholeheartedly agree that learning things causes you to think critically and therefore you tend to question the existence of Santa Claus, er' I mean god, the GOP frontrunner has an MBA from a public university.  He also attended Penn State which is a Catholic public university.  Not an admitted Catholic university, but they follow the same guidelines. 

But, you morons who vote Republican eat this crap up.  Oh, you know Obama, the black elitist Harvard Law graduate.  Yes Mr. Sanatorium, learning does make you reject faith.  That is another great reason for obtaining an education.  Never mind that the President of the United States also graduated college and still has faith.  Again, I have a problem with my President believing in fairy tales.  You just make up lies about him being an "avowed Muslim" as one Sanatorium supporter claimed.  The very definition of "avowed" means that you are vocal about it. 

There are so many other things you Republicans are so willfully wrong about it staggers the imagination. I am sick and tired of your righteous attitude about everything when you are so wrong about everything. You are mad because you say Obama "apologized for America." Once again, you are making things up. Obama never apologized for America, but I think he should have. And, the only reason he should have is because of stupid right-wingers in the Bush Administration. In fact most of the dark black marks on American history were not only supported, but perpetrated by conservative right-wingers. Whether it was slavery, segregation, pollution, crony capitalism, workplace safety violations, and a host of military crimes (although I will admit military crimes do not fall on the shoulders of right-wingers alone), there was a liberal standing in your way who you demonized.
When you whine and complain that your religion or your freedoms are being attacked by a liberal, I say "tough shit!" It is justified payback for your racism, homophobia, fear-mongering, and chauvinism. Your latest attack was on women's reproductive rights. Again, the President offers a sensible solution to the issue trying as best as he can to respect religious points of view, and you take a shit right in his face, yammering on about how he will destroy the Catholic Church. You know, the same church that says its clergy has a right to rape little boys as long as they don't use a condom.  I only wish he was the socialist you claim him to be. 

In conclusion, if you have made it this far, the criticisms that I have for the President are true, and they align with my values as a liberal.  The things you criticize him for are either things other Republican presidents did, that you were completely silent about, or they are things that do not exist.  Please do not vote this year.  Instead get help.  Seek it immediately.  Find out what in your past makes you hate everyone who isn't like you.  But, most of all, stop your complaining!  Leave that department to me.  

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

The State of the Union - The Liberal Rebuttal

By Shawn Johnson

http://www.libvoice1776.blogspot.com/

The Liberal Voice on Facebook

Ok, after the State of the Union, I normally rewrite the President's speech to say what he really meant to say.  After his speech last evening, I have to say that Obama the campaigner is back.  He blasted Republicans up one side and down another.  I am very happy with the tone of his speech.  He left no doubt as to which party the blame should be levied on for the inaction in Washington. 

That being said, since Teabaggers get to trot Herman Cain out to give his rebuttal by throwing feces at a dart board made of Godfather's Pizza, I have decided to give the liberal rebuttal to President Obama's address.

So here it goes....

Tonight you heard the President finally take a step to the left.  He attacked the banks, oil companies, Mitt Romney (without mentioning his name), and gave the middle class kudos for picking up the slack left by the rich.  The President no doubt believes that this will silence his critics on the left.  We will forget about the last three years and press on as though nothing has happened.  We will fight for him as hard this year as we did in 2008.

Well, I for one am not buying it.  I am at best a skeptical optimist.  The Republicans are so far to the right that they actually think that the President was making a liberal speech, but they have no idea that he was actually just a little to the left of center.  I am expecting his speech to get pretty sound approval numbers. 

Mr. Obama has failed in several areas, however.  First, he made not one statement with regards to the poor and disenfranchised in America.  Travelling the same road as the other Democrats, the focus is on the middle class.  Why is it important to talk about the poor?  Because they make up about 15% of the population now.  That is a larger percentage than African Americans in the United States.  And, those are the poor at or below the poverty line.  That does not count the multitude of middle class and working poor that are one health issue or one great financial loss in their life away from being impoverished themselves.  The President, like millions of Americans, have decided to ignore the poor.  Democrats realize that most poor people actually consider themselves middle class.  So by doing for the middle class, they believe that it will suffice the poor.  So, why should we help the poor?  Because children make up the largest group that is impoverished.  Because helping the poor is the right thing to do, and we have the ability to do so.  Because if our children, our parents, and our friends were poor and starving, we would do everything in our power to make sure that they did not endure one more minute of suffering.

Now, the President rightly took aim at the unfair tax code, but while doing so, left the door open to future cuts in Medicare, Social Security, and Medicaid.  The President indicated that he is willing to compromise with the Republicans on cutting benefits to these programs which are so vital to the poor and middle class.  He should have looked straight at the Republicans and said,

I will never agree to cuts to Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. These programs are paid for by the very people they benefit. I will slash every bit of spending Republicans like, before I take one dime away from the beneficiaries of these programs. 

He didn't do that though.  Instead he used code words like, "entitlement reform."  This is nothing more than saying that he will cave, if necessary to secure middle class tax cuts and tax increases on the wealthy.  He will allow the Republicans to realize their dream of destroying the middle class safety net.  Once the ball gets rolling downhill, you can forget about ever turning back. 

Secondly, those running for president and Republicans in Congress love to bring up the falsehood that 47% of Americans don't pay any taxes at all.  This is simply not true.  The President said nothing to defend those that pay Social Security taxes, Medicare taxes, sales tax, property tax, and a host of other taxes they really can't afford.  They pay these taxes while making next to nothing, and they do it proudly because they know when they turn sixty-five, at least some of the money they paid in will be there to take care of them.  Medicare and Social Security are regressive taxes as well, meaning that the middle class share the greatest burden of paying these taxes.  If we want a fairer tax, I propose taxing Mitt Romney more than the 13.9% he paid last year.  Now, I will agree that the Buffet Rule is sound tax planning to start out, but it doesn't go far enough.  We eventually must repeal all of the Bush tax cuts.  We certainly don't need to pass another payroll tax cut which drains money from the Social Security fund. 

Also, the President eluded to having a fairer tax system so our military could be stronger.  I want to know how much more money it is going to take to make it "stronger."  With a Pentagon budget of $800 Billion each year, and enough nuclear capability to blow up Jupiter, I have to ask, how much stronger does it really need to be?  Shouldn't we all agree that the ability to anihilate an entire planet is plenty strong enough?  

The President spent a lot of time praising what the military did to kill Osama Bin Laden and beat Al Qaeda overseas.  Why didn't he mention the great successes we have had right here in this country stopping terrorist attacks with sound police and FBI work?  Why didn't the President use those examples to show how we can be "safe" without attacking other nations?  How can the President say that our military has caused more nations to like us?  How can the President say that "all options are on the table" in regards to Iran?  Are they really?  Are we really going to attack Iran and create another quagmire we can't possibly win with already taxed soldiers? 

The President should have told the truth.  We keep other countries in line by buying them off, like Pakistan and Egypt.  We prop up dictators that are friendly to our business interests and destroy ones that are not.  Our military decisions come from the directives of our corporate owners in this country, and it is wrong. 

And, how can we sit here and justify the blinded defense of everything Israel does?  We aren't empowered by our relationship with Israel, as the President suggested.  We are hindered by it.  We are hindered by our relationship with a ridiculous foreign leader like Benjamin Netanyahu, who has done nothing to curb or stop Israel's oppressive policies towards the Palestinians.  Israel refuses to curb its dividing rhetoric, and they continue to insite violence and destruction in the region.  We should treat Israel no different than any of our other allies.  If you suggested right now to Congress that we defend France against attacks from their neighbors, about forty percent would be against the idea regardless of the reason.  I can tell you of which side of the aisle they would be seated.    

Why isn't the President talking about reducing the size of our military?  He could use a statement like, "The era of big military is over!"  Mr. Obama should be sending a signal to the rest of the world that we are not your policeman.  Instead, he is doubling down on the empire we have created in order to feed the military-industrial complex that repugnantly permeates our society and makes us a less moral nation. 

Why didn't the President call on Congress to execute his executive order to shut down Guantanamo Bay?  Why didn't the President defend the merits of the American justice system, and defend the right to a fair trial?  Why hasn't the President made indefinite detention without trial illegal for anyone, no matter how bad they are?  The President has actively continued Bush era military tactics that go against the fabric of our Constitution.  We cannot call this a nation of liberty and justice for all when it clearly does not apply to "all."

With regards to energy, the President continues to push the idea of drilling more in the United States.  He believes that he can regulate our way into making it safe.  We are drilling more now, and it is only a matter of time until we have the next spill that destroys our ecosystem.  We needed the President to talk about permanently eliminating the use of fossil fuels for energy.  We needed the President to warn us about the dangers of nuclear power and use the events of the past three years as a mandate to shut down nuclear development.  The President did a wonderful thing by shutting down the Canadian Pipeline.  Why didn't he talk about it?  Why didn't he talk about moving us toward energy independence through less harmful and damaging means like solar and wind?  The President was wrong about drilling before the Gulf spill, and he is wrong now.  Our energy package should not include archaic forms of energy like oil, period. 

Lastly, the President should have laid out in front of the Supreme Court members in attendance the damage they caused with their ruling in the Citizens United Case.  He was right to attack them when the ruling was made, and he would have been right to say, "I told you so."  The President did mention money in politics, but he failed to acknowledge that he was one of the largest beneficiaries of Goldman Sacchs.  It is hard to trust the fox in the hen house. 

Overall, the President has made some progress in moving the country slightly in the right direction, but it isn't nearly enough.  The wealth gap in this country continues to increase, and we continue to lose our civil liberties every single day.  I sympathize with him that he cannot do it alone, and he is up against an unfair Congress.  They don't care what happens to this country and he does.  They are "hostage-takers" as he has stated in the past.  They won't care about America until they control it, and even then, they only care about the very wealthy. 

I would like to finish tonight by saying how proud I am of the Occupy Wall Street movement.  You had no big funding organization behind you, like the Tea Party.  You had no leadership that spoke for you.  You had no help from those in Washington.  You just got sick and tired enought to take to the streets.  You enacted your democratic right to protest.  In under a year, you completely changed the debate in this country.  The debate is now where it should have been for the last thirty years.  It is on wealth inequality and fairness for the middle class and the poor.  Keep up the good fight, and maybe Obama's inaugural address next January will be the type of speech that moves the country back to the liberal foundation that created the middle class.  Hopefully he keeps channeling Roosevelt, Kennedy, and Johnson.  We must never stop and never surrender. 

Thank you, and good night!