Tuesday was not a good day at all for Democrats who are hoping to see some glimmer of hope about next year. In New York City’s ninth district Anthony Wiener was replaced by a tea party republican. This ninth district has been democratic in congress since 1922 and had sported such people as Jeroldine Ferarro and Chuck Schumer. It isn’t good. Also the democrats lost another congressional race the same day in Reno, Nevada. If Rick Perry gets elected president next year we are going to have to revive the old Barry Goldwater slogan used in 1964 only now it will go “Rick Perry in 2012, Hot Water in 2013 - - - Bread and Water 2014. Because everything we’ve seen in the way of recession till now will look like a walk in the park compared to what is coming when Perry gets elected and begins to put his massive government cuts and tax changes into play. So what is he going to do then? Blame Obama for four years of disaster? It just dawned on me today the extent of paranoia and fear and loathing they feel in certain Southern states that a Black man actually got elected president. It is something their parents told them as little kids as something that would never happen. And now that a Black man in President they think it’s the Apocralipse. So what do you do? I think that the American People have gone mad or something. Maybe it’s something in the drinking water.
You know I first used the term “Moral Melt-down” in my writings to describe the soap opera character Christine Di Mira in 1996. It’s a term that means that a person has become so depraved that they actually do things that are contrary own interests, as warped as they are. For instance there may be a project that would benefit both Mc Conell and John Boehner but they won't vote for it even though it would aleviate joblessness in their states, just because Obama is for it. L B J thought he could negotiate a deal with Ho Chi Min in 1965 to "make him an offer he couldn't refuse". But he did. I gotta say this: he has cajones. So you have the specter of republicans being staunchly against things now that they had previously been in favor of, and may even have sponsored. One man who wanted to be a Pastor one day actually turned down theological training when offered to him by his church. He didn't no learning contaminating his own innate perfection. Last year the Republicans voted for a payroll tax cut for the lower incomes. Now they want to abolish it, all because the President is still for it. And who can forget all ten candidates for the Republican nomination raising their hands saying they would turn down a ten to one budget cutting deal. Put a picture of any one of them under the definition of "Fool" in the dictionary. Now you are seeing things like Chuck Smith advising a radio caller to have an abortion and Pat Robertson saying that a husband who has a wife with Alsheimers should divorce her. Thom Hartman mentioned this today and contrasted it with his own Mom and Dad. When his father learned that his mother had Alsheimers he did everything he could to love and support her and stand by her. And when his father died his brother and his wife took her in. The marriage vow says “In sickness and in health; for better or for worse till death do us part”. On the other hand Pat Robertson is getting up there in years and maybe the wiring in his brain is getting a little frayed after all these years. Newt is certainly an expert on abandoning wives.
From a sheer moral standpoint, a President Rick Perry would be a disaster. Here is a man who describes Galileo’s work as “controversial science”. Would Perry take us back to the fifteenth century? The whole bit with the executive order and the papaloma virus vaccine seems a little strange. Apparently Perry even championed a form of the Dream act to give illegal aliens free college tuition, as the expense of citizens. But of course the event everybody is talking about is this death penalty case where Rick Perry signed off on the execution of a man he knew to be innocent of the crime. I just don’t see how America could elect a man as President who committed this act. The man was accused of burning his house down and killing his kids. But they came up with conclusive proof after investigation that he didn’t do it. But Rick Perry changed the composition of the prison board just before they were to issue a report exhonerating the prisoner. Did he do this to curry the favor of the tea party? Of course Perry likes to read the Bible. He read the passage where God declared that David was a man after his own heart though he was an adulterer and a murderer. Just between you and me, I’ll look for another God. One with better taste. Perry holds these evangelical rallies and believes you can “pray the gay away”, like washing the gray out of hour hair or something. The other Republicans are going after him now but he’s got such a juggernot going I don’t know if he can be stopped. I keep hearing people like Hartman and Randy expressing sentiments about how “we liberals have to get involved” but it’s becoming more than evident that isn’t happening. Hence I believe we’re just going to have to “learn our lesson the hard way” going through four years of Rick Perry hard economic times.
Even Dr. Levy can be fooled by someone like Rick Perry- - don’t even ask me how. I thought it was the Jewish people who asked all the hard questions. Texas is number one in percentage of minimum wage jobs. Texas is 44th in health care, and this is just fine with Perry. Texas is obviously first in capital punishment executions. I have heard Texas was third in the amount of Obama stimulus money it received. States like Texas ten to run a plus 130% where states like California run a 78$ figure, as far as how much money the state gets back from the government. This government redistribution of funds has favored the red states for a long time. Red states have an inordenant representation in the US Senate as compared to their population. This is how the senate was able to block so many good House bills in the first two years of the Obama administration. I told you that before. And you know there was no “Texas miracle” that Dr Levy seems so impressed with. It is by no means a matter that cutting taxes equals more corporations relocating in your state producing more jobs. A lot of the jobs Texas added were government jobs. And Rick Perry balanced the state budget, as did many State governors, by taking the Obama stimulus money intended for infrastructure and enabling teachers to keep their jobs, and instead used that money to balance the state budget to make their accounting look good. It’s no secret that oil sells for a high price today and increased drilling produces jobs. And we won’t even talk about all of the military contracts Perry got from the Bush administration. So when you look at Rick Perry’s legacy it is a house of straw. There is nothing about the man Rick Perry that would recommend him for the office of President of the United States.
Randy Rhodes was criticizing the idea of one who views God as a man who is “Making a list and checking it twice”. Hey, don’t dis the Santa! We all know the lyrics to “Here Comes Santa Clause”. Santa is one of the good guys. Randy disparaged the idea of a god who insists on “personal accountability”. This is taking a step tword the light and not the darkness. The trouble with these Neo Cons is that they are devout worshipers at the altar of the Church of John Calvin, and we know that Calvin was in a sense a “classic determinist” in a bad sense, in that for him responsibility is not even “on the table” for him. He fancied a sort of utopian theocratic community where everybody is perfect, at least hypothetically. And heretics are burned at the stake “To teach them not to blaspheme” to paraphrase St. Paul. I have in certain postings lately reflected on shall we say “certain metaphysical implications of Calvinism”. Henry VIII may have come up with the “Divine right of Kings” but Calvinism is worse. As to the idea of God not being a “Santa Clause”, yes, I’ve heard that one before. I’m also heard the sentiment that God does not judge you on your deeds either for good or for bad. Some of the people who have said this to me are real assholes. My problem with the Christian community is that they are liars, cowards, and hypocrites. A true progressive has always believed in moral accountability. Indeed many of the people we saw films on in school were social crusaders who had a strong sense of personal moral drive and accountability. I am pretty sure Jim Morrison believed in some sort of Last Judgement. As to God himself either being a Liberal or a Conservative, I don’t believe you can “Pray the tea party away” any more than you can Pray the Gay away. Everything that happens to us is a natural result of scientific laws and causes that- - - oh yeah, God set in motion. Many people who say that “God is a giving god” you have to watch. Some of these religions despots, and whether Rick Perry is one I’ll leave to history- - but no matter what Blessings from on high are bestowed on these people it never seems to be enough. Gene Scott with all his blessings God gave him- - - still saw a deficit between God’s generosity and Gene’s avarice- - and that deficit had to be covered by his congregation- - and the slavish people who call into the show on command to donate money. Jesus of Nazareth said “Ye shall know them by their fruits”. Some like Jim Jones when they started out didn’t seem all that bad. For some people the seeds of evil within them seem to take a while to germinate. Like “Gus” the boy-toy servant of his “Madam” on “Days”. Like all of the people I have talked about in this file what they are destined to become in the end, is not always apparent in the beginning. But we Americans have the chance not to put an end to the political carrier of Rick Perry before he can do any real damage to the nation. I hope we are morally insightful enough to muster the fortitude to be up to the task.
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