Charter School Owner, State Senator and Possible Candidate for Govenor Wants more Failing Schools Like His Own.

In another fine example of a won over Democrat for voucher and charter schools:

In his quest to be the Democrats' nominee for governor, State Sen. Anthony Williams is calling for expanding educational choice and targeting taxpayer funds to charters and other schools that produce results.

While never answering the question as to why people hate spending money on public schools but love sending it to private hucksters, see if you can see a shocking conflict of interest in the following paragraph:

But the Southwest Philadelphia charter school he founded as Renaissance Advantage in 1999 and oversaw as board chairman for a decade has experienced rocky times. The school, which Williams renamed Hardy Williams Academy in 2009 for his late father, was nearly closed in 2003 because of academic and management problems.

A state senator and possible Democratic nominee for governor, Williams has a vested interest in seeing taxpayer dollars going to charter schools. Well what do you know. And it's not doing well, surprise, surprise!

According to the district, the school did not meet the state requirement of 75 percent certified teachers, had turned in incomplete annual reports, and posted low scores. Academically, the charter has failed to meet federal No Child Left Behind benchmarks for the last three years. And, despite receiving taxpayer money, the school did not file federal tax returns for five years. Last school year, the school received $9.2 million.

And it gets much worse…

Williams, whose candidacy was boosted by $3.2 million in contributions from supporters of charters and school vouchers, pledged that the school would do better. He cited … a seasoned executive and an increasing number of certified teachers. The charter, which enrolls 807 students from kindergarten through ninth grade, has posted test scores that lag the state's and the district's. In 2009, 30.1 percent of the school's fifth graders were on grade level in math and 28.9 percent in reading compared with 52.4 percent and 40 percent in the school district. Statewide, the figures were 73.5 percent on grade level in math and 64.5 in reading.

So is it still true that parents really do know best, when it comes to sending their kids to charter and voucher schools, when you see Williams Academy fail so misrably?

Nonetheless, parents sing the school's praises. "They're getting a good education," said Charlene Madison, who has four children at the charter.

Is this a harbinger of things to come? The following should dispell any doubts:

Williams said he stepped down as board chairman in the fall because he felt it was time to hand over leadership. Dawn Chavous, his campaign manager, replaced him.

Gov. Brewer Punch Drunk with Racism, Wildly Blames Everyone Else in Classic Case of Projection.

Sarah Palin's magic touch of stupidity turned the drunk at the end of the bar, Gov. Brewer, into a couragous loud mouthed loser trying to make one last dumb-ass point. She won't stop digging the biggest fiscal hole Arizona's ever going to see when it comes to tourism. Wow.

Palin has the nerve to say "we're all Arizonans now." Doesn't she wish.

"It's time for Americans across this great country to stand up and say 'We're all Arizonans now and, in clear unity, we say Mr. President, do your job, secure our border,'" Palin said, standing beside Brewer at a Saturday afternoon press conference. Palin and Brewer, both Republicans, decried plans by opponents of the new law to boycott the state in protest.

Gov. Witches Brew-er accused everyone else of, get this, playing the race card. The video clip starts with a TV News look at the banned ethnic classes, and stumble bum Brewer spits and hisses at the president:

"It's fair to ask whether he intends to be the Commander-in-Chief or the Comic-in-Chief," Gov. Brewer said.

"While the president is making wisecracks and playing racial politics, some groups have suggested that Arizona be punished for enforcing laws that our federal government has failed to enforce -- that is misguided at best," Gov. Brewer said.

She suggested those that wish to boycott Arizona businesses -- Boston, Los Angeles, etc. -- visit the state to witness firsthand the conditions that produced the law.

One commenter said:

I think Senora Brewer is suffering from Republicanbiggoterism, a mental disorder of European origin brought to the Americas by our European ancestors.

Gingrich Advocating Health Care Reform repeal at Health care industry conference, for an industry he consults. Hello!

Republicans are no longer disguising their ties and allegiance to a pure corporate America.

Washington Post: Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said he believes there is a 50-50 chance the federal health care reform bill will be fully repealed in 2013, if President Obama is defeated … he said that if a Republican majority takes over the House or Senate, he would advise them to defund the initiative and stop reform effort.

"Remember, you don't have to repeal the bill," he said. "You can just have an appropriations rider that says no money can be spent to implement it."

What a plan. It's so unfair to take insurance company profits and lower them for the benefit of…the people. Who's government serving anyway, an ideological theory of free private markets, or government by, for and of the people? Oh, you think this is just me ranting liberal socialist dogma again? Sorry, but the following sentence pretty much says it all about Republican interests.

Gingrich's comments came at a health-care industry sponsored conference held by Center for HealthTransformation, a project of his consulting firm.

So not only is Gingrich cow-towing to the health care industry interests with talk of repeal, he's consulting with them. Is that what the founding fathers were talking about?

The Republican Parties Myth Machine Sputters

At Smirking Chimp, Barry Eisler wrote this perfect analysis of "small government" Republicans:

The GOP as the Party of Small Government. Republicans -- not just Republican politicians, but ordinary Americans who are registered and vote Republican -- still believe the GOP stands for small government. And yet the small government party created an additional $5 trillion in national debt during its last turn in office. When George W. Bush became president, the national debt was under $6 trillion; when he left, it was close to $11 trillion. I guess you could argue that Democrats are even worse, but even if that were true, an accurate description of what Republicans stand for would be something more along the lines of "slightly less big government."

But it's not true: just look at this graph, or at this chart. To find a notably fiscally responsible Republican president, you have to go back to Eisenhower. So at this point, if fiscal responsibility is an important measure of one's adherence to big or small government, the small government brand ought to attach to Democrats.

True, the national debt has continued to spike under Obama. We could argue about why -- whether, for example, the economic meltdown that occurred during the Bush Administration, for which Bush created the initial $700 billion TARP program during his last months in office, requires further fiscal stimulus to avert another depression. But even if you think Obama is even worse than Bush, that's a pretty thin basis on which to believe in the Republican small government brand.

Moreover, we're focusing here only on fiscal matters. If a new party entered the fray on a platform of torture, federalization of end-of-life decisions, federalization of marriage, imprisonment of suspects without trial, use of the military for domestic law enforcement, prohibition of drugs and SWAT raids into family homes to catch people smoking pot, empowering the State Department to strip Americans of their citizenship, and a trillion-dollar-a-year, million-and-a-half-man, eight-hundred-overseas-bases military, would you naturally feel, "At last! A party of small government!"? Yet these are all Republican policies. Again, Obama's record so far on war spending and civil liberties is as atrocious as (and in some ways worse than) Bush's, but Obama doesn't purport to be from the party of small government. Republicans do.

I suppose you could argue the Republican small government brand persists because the theory of the GOP is small government, with the problem being the corrupt way successive Republican administrations have implemented that theory. Maybe. But on that argument, shouldn't Communism continue to enjoy a solid brand, too? After all, "From each according to his ability; to each according to his needs" is a great theory, and was simply corrupted by Lenin, Stalin, and the various other heads of the Soviet Union. It's still a great idea, no?

That the GOP is still known as being more effective on national security -- the "daddy party" to the Democrats' "mommy party' -- is also impressive. If a Democrat had been in office on 9/11, or in 2006 when North Korea became a nuclear power, or if a Democrat had bungled Iraq and Afghanistan or let bin Laden escape from Tora Bora the way the Bush Administration did, it all would have been perceived as evidence, even proof, of Democratic fecklessness on national security. Instead, all of these events happened on the GOP's watch, with no apparent damage to the GOP's brand.

The GOP's reputation among the rank and file for sexual probity is also impressively resistant to contrary facts. There have been enough closeted Republican homophobes, outed Republican philanderers, and thrice-married matrimony traditionalists to form a parade, and yet the party still manages to wrap itself in a brand of "family values." And yes, you can point to Elliot Spitzer and John Edwards as counterexamples, but again, we're talking about brands -- particularly the power of certain brands to stay afloat despite being riddled with holes through repeated contact with contrary reality. What makes Republican sexual behavior remarkable -- in a way that Democratic sexual behavior isn't -- is that Republican behavior is contrary to the party's brand, yet seems to have little or no effect on it. Mark Sanford's own reputation for integrity was destroyed by revelations of his serial infidelity, but for some reason even an unending stream of Sanford-like sagas does nothing to diminish the GOP's ability to present itself as the party of family values.

The difference between individual brand vulnerability and institutional brand vulnerability is telling, I think, and I'll return to it in my conclusions.

A Christian Nation can promote religious freedom but isn't big government? The Religious rights Head Spinning Logic.

The Christian right has tried for years to convince everyone that this is a Christian nation. The ultimate purpose was to promote religious doctrine through the power of the federal government. Screw the state by state efforts. In the continuing effort to project the illusion big government control of religion is "religious freedom," I found the following article amazing:

Christians World View’s Chuck Colson wrote this about recent feature:

From General Motors to health care. From bank bailouts to national anti-obesity campaigns. Government is becoming more and more involved of every aspect of American life. T.M. Moore has written for us a fantastic study called “Kudzu Government: The Lust for Autonomy and the Roots of Statism.”

Check out the following bizarre statement. (By the way, Nazism did not silence the church, but created a state church to gain unlimited power by speaking through it.)

The statist worldview is particularly dangerous to religion. So statist regimes either silence religion altogether (a la Communism and Nazism), or, just as insidiously, co-opt religion to use as a tool for government power and policy.

If anyone is using religion for its own political purpose, it’s been the Republican Party. The religious right has been co-opted for decades by right wingers over wedge issues ranging from abortion to defining marriage. But oddly, in their world view, liberal religious neutrality is the tool to empower government.

Colson even lists the religious wedge issues used by the right. This amazing paragraph promotes a government mandated religious doctrine rife with employment discrimination and conscience clauses that allows the medical community to ban drugs and treatments based on religious belief.

Look at the situation in America today. I’ve talked many times about the threat of abortion and gay marriage to religious freedom. Revoking non-profit status, laws about anti-discrimination in employment, revoking medical or pharmaceutical licenses—these are all “soft” ways that government can seek to force religious individuals and institutions into conforming to government policies.

For Colson, religion needs the force and advocacy of big government, under the guise of religious freedom.

Global Competition Solution? GOP Succeeds in Slashing Thousands of Teachers in Every State. Brilliant!

The Republican mantra of privatizing public schools with vouchers and charters is resulting in the slow conversion of many Democrats and minority community leaders to the idea. Watch the video below. Like the Blue Dog converts to the free market ideal, the one that crashed the global economy, we're about to see the same Democratic sellout and educational collapse in the not to distant future.

The research studies are there for everyone to see, the ones that prove the voucher alternative is worse or no different than public schools, but no one seems interested in looking at them. Not even the news media. So for the GOP, it's time to accelerate the dismantling of the unions that represent our best educators, so they can simply gain a political advantage at the ballot box while cultivating an uneducated working class for low wage jobs.

If you've had children in school, than you know how important it is to know who might be teaching your kid the following year. You can learn an awful lot from their proven track record and parental feedback. Those days are gone folks. Welcome to the skeleton crew.

northjersey.com: Gov. Chris Christie, a vocal critic of the teachers union, has said drastic cuts were necessary to save the state from going broke after years of mismanagement. He withheld $475 million in state aid to schools this year and cut nearly $820 million in aid for fiscal 2011. Many of the cuts were necessary because the state ran out of federal stimulus funds, he said. Schools in Connecticut, New York and other states are also facing major layoffs.

Union leaders and other critics questioned how the Christie administration could talk about its mission to raise test scores and boost achievement while decimating school staffs.

School districts across the state are in the thick of the painful process of handing out pink slips to thousands of teachers to meet a Saturday deadline for telling them about hiring plans for the next school year. Big districts and small are enduring this ordeal. In Paterson, for example, school leaders began handing out 858 layoff notices on Wednesday, including 421 to tenured staff. Paramus gave out 19 on Wednesday, and Englewood handed out 88 earlier in the week. Bergenfield will give out 25 in coming days. The City of Passaic will send out about 130.

Hundreds rally in support of school voucher bill

Gun Toting “Average Law Abiding Citizens” Kill over a Peeing Dog and Paranoia!

And so the stories about open carry gun laws start pouring in. I wonder if it’s only going to get worse?

The following examples of gun carnage should be a warning of all the senseless, sad, head shaking deaths to come:

rightpundits: Charles Clements, 69, a retired bus driver and former Marine, is being held on a $3 million dollar bond after allegedly shooting his neighbor. Joshua Funches was shot to death on Mother’s Day after his puppy urinated on Clement’s grass. Joshua Funches was walking his 5 month old Fox Terrier, Gucci, on Sunday when the puppy decided to lift his leg and pee—on Mr. Clements’ grass. Charles Clements and Joshua Funches exchanged words over the incident and Funches allegedly walked away. Funches’ mother said that Charles Clements followed her son home, pulled out a gun and shot him once in the stomach. Some witnesses say that Funches said the following when he saw the gun–“Next time you pull out a pistol, why don’t you use it?” Police found Joshua Funches on the ground, bleeding, in front of a vacant home a short distance from the Clements residence.

Officers found Charles Clements in his open garage, waiting for them. He had changed his clothes and told officers: Joshua Funches mother,along with other residents of the well kept neighborhood, are unable to comprehend the loss of a life over a desire for yet another award for best lawn.

Joshue Funches was a bus driver and had 2 children, ages one and four with a third child due the end of summer. He was scheduled to marry his girlfriend in a few weeks.

It’s a mindnumbing loss over a well kept lawn. Here's the video news story below recounting the tragedy.



The one thing I have noticed about open and concealed carry advocates is their preoccupation the evils of society. Their fear and paranoia is an overwhelming influence in their lives, so much so they they are willing to recklessly kill others based on a hunch:

jsonline: A Milwaukee man, Jesus C. Gonzalez, who filed a civil rights lawsuit over his arrests for openly carrying a gun into stores has been charged with fatally shooting one man and wounding another outside his south side home over the weekend. Coincidentally, a federal judge had dismissed his civil suit Tuesday.

Gonzalez but indicates that he called police about 12:30 a.m. to report that "I just had two individuals try to assault me when I was going outside to move my car." He tells the dispatcher that he shot out the window of a car, and one of the men fell down, but he wasn't sure whether he hit either or both of the men, and that he ran after firing the shots. When the dispatcher asked if the men had a gun, Gonzalez replies, "I don't know what they had, but they must have thought that I was not armed."

Police found Danny John lying on the sidewalk around the corner, in front of his black Honda Civic, which was idling and had gunshots to the windshield. A cell phone was outside the driver's door, ringing.

We can thank our short sighted AG for not considering how unarmed citicizens would react to open carry:

Attorney General J.B.Van Hollen issued an advisory stating that so-called open carry, by itself, was not cause for a charge of disorderly conduct, and in the year since, open carry advocates have held picnics and other public events around the state promoting the practice.

I pray my own life will never have to deal with the horror and sense of loss caused by some inadequate insecure frightened bully showing the world safe it is to carry a gun.

GOP and Frank Luntz Collude with Big Oil! Where are the Tea Party Protesters who want to take our government back?

Why hide fund raising from Big Oil on the morning the House interviewed Big Oil about the disaster in the Gulf? Not only that, spin meister Frank Luntz was their to help spin the case for Big Oil, and the GOP henchmen under their control. Chris Matthews explains:



I thought this would have been a bigger story.

Arizona not about to hide Racist Intent of Laws. First they Came for the Mexicans...

The attempts by Arizona officials to legitimize banning only Chicano/Mexican studies in public schools is not only an example of big government interference (what are small government Republicans thinking?), but continues to make them look worse with every racist word out of their mouths. Doug Nick, the Federal Liaison to the Arizona Department of Education, fears the current studies may encourage Mexicans to re-conquer Arizona and maybe even the country.

Nick brings up the tired old MLK quote about people being judged by their content and not skin color blah blah blah...is so Aryan and so discriminatory that it's breath taking. Fortunately, Chris Matthews guest Professor Marc Lamont Hill shreds the white supremacist comments by Nick.

NJ Voucher Bill "drains too much state aid from public schools" and excludes poorly performing schools.

The inadvertent slip of honesty below, written about school vouchers in New Jersey, should tell us how flawed the voucher argument is.

NJ.COM: The bill to establish a school voucher program in New Jersey got off the ground yesterday with a unanimous vote in committee … Outside, children in Catholic school uniforms chanted in favor of the vouchers. Many of their sister schools have closed recently, and their own parents often strain to pay tuition. The voucher bill would address both problems.

And like most voucher programs pushed by the states, testing and accountability are rarely a consideration. Neither are studies that have given failing grades to religious vouchers schools. You'll be surprised (maybe not) at how bad the voucher bill is:

The bill has flaws that should be repaired. It drains too much state aid from public schools that lose students, and should instead follow the model of financing charter schools. It also lacks a mechanism to exclude private schools that are performing poorly.

Isn't it odd how proponents bash the public schools for holding on to "so many" bad union teachers that can't be fired, yet seem willing to allow poorly performing voucher schools to continue to rake in taxpayer money?

This is what the voucher argument has been about forever. And this tiny little story at nj.com is a reminder.

GOP Trick: Make it seem like Dems Support Porn and Sex Offender Amendments to Bills? What a bunch of Dumbasses.

So you want the Republicans back in power because…of the transparent tricks they're pulling on Democratic bills in congress? Good God are you crazy.

AP: Democrats had to pull the bill after half their members voted for the GOP measure that, in addition to severely shrinking the technology bill, put them on record as supporting the firing of government workers who view or download pornography on the job.

It was the second time in a week that Republicans used such a tactic to their advantage. Last week they brought about major changes to the Cash for Caulkers bill to subsidize people who buy energy-efficient products for their homes by attaching a provision barring building contractors from hiring child molesters.

Hey, we trust the Republicans now don't we. Nothing more grown-up than pranking important job creating legislation attempting to grow the emerging future green economy:

The original bill would have approved some $85 billion over five years to double funding for basic research at the National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy's Office of Science, extend grants and loan guarantees to small businesses working with emerging technologies, and promote science and math education in schools.

Besides the pornography provision, their motion shrunk the bill from five years to three, eliminated all new programs in the bill and froze spending for existing programs.

Independent and swing voters are favoring the Republicans in the upcoming midterms because…what the hell are they thinking?

This is exactly what Republicans did in Arizona when they banned ethnic Chicano/Mexican studies. Notice how they loaded the issue with the first two outrageous points of the ban. Schools cannot...

1. Promote the overthrow of the United States government.
2. Promote resentment toward a race or class of people.
3. Are designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group.
4. Advocate ethnic solidarity instead of the treatment of pupils as individuals.

How could you not vote against the first two and last item? Taken alone, item 3 would never honestly be banned from schools. Arizonians are fools to be taken in by this GOP tactic.

Arizona Governor & Sup. of Public Instruction the New Face of Racism: Banning Chicano/Mexican American Ethnic Studies.

If you weren't clear about how racist Republicans were in this country, and proud of it, Arizona has decided to stand front and center by banning Chicano/Mexican American studies exclusively.

This CNN Anderson Cooper interview pretty much sums up the true intentions of conservative white supremacy in Arizona and America right now. The same arguments used to do away with affirmative action are now used to deny ethnic studies in our public schools. After all, it's crazy to think there's discrimination in America. With the election of our first black president, we should be celebrating our post racial future. Horne's use of Martin Luther King Jr.'s words "we should be judged by the content of our character and not the color of our skin" is out of context and typically used by the right as a way to deny racism exists.

Sup. Horne's insistence the Chicano/Mexican American studies programs is divisive is xenophobic enough to get him elected as the states next attorney general.




LA Times:

A bill that aims to ban ethnic studies in Arizona schools was signed into law Tuesday by Gov. Jan Brewer, cheering critics who called such classes divisive and alarming others who said it's yet another law targeting Latinos in the state.

HB 2281 bans schools from teaching classes that are designed for students of a particular ethnic group, promote resentment or advocate ethnic solidarity over treating pupils as individuals. The bill also bans classes that promote the overthrow of the U.S. government. The bill was written to target the Chicano, or Mexican American, studies program in the Tucson school system, said state Supt. of Public Instruction Tom Horne … (who) has been trying to end the program for years, saying it divides students by race and promotes resentment.

Washington Post:

According to the Associated Press, Horne has wanted to limit the program since he learned several years ago that Hispanic civil right activist Dolores Herta told Tucson high school students that “Republicans hate Latinos.”

In the Mexican-American Studies program, an American history course explores the role of Hispanics in the Vietnam War, and a literature course emphasizes Latino authors. The kids learn, for example, that Arizona was once part of Mexico, and that in the 1960s Chicano radicals called for reclaiming the land.

Subversive stuff, that.

Shotgun Justice and Home Heating Clash.

In one possible solution to our energy problems…

Middleton Police were dispatched due to a report of a female that had threatened an Madison Gas & Electric employee with a gun.

Here we are, the richest nation in the world, taking away a persons heat and electricity in the after math of the Great Recession. But more importantly, an armed society is encouraged to use whatever force they can imagine when push comes to shove.

MG&E had responded to this residence to cut service per their policy. Resident, Tracey Ace then confronted the MG& E employee while she was armed with a shotgun and made threatening statements to in an attempt to deter the MG&E employee from terminating service to the residence. Ace was taken into custody without incident. Middleton Police did recover a 12 gauge shotgun from the residence.

Desperate times…

Sen. John Cornyn: Judicial Experience not necessary...but maybe it is now...I can't remember..!

The grand old party of contradictions continues its hapless positioning, by once again, flip flopping on the issue of judicial experience for a supreme court nominiee. When will they stop the hypocrisy? It will only end once the main stream press beats them over the head with their insane double standard.

AP - So, Senator, how much does judicial experience matter when considering a Supreme Court nominee? ... Republicans now criticizing President Barack Obama's nominee, Solicitor General Elena Kagan, for her lack of judicial experience welcomed that same lack of credentials a few years ago, when a president of their own party nominated a non-judge for the high court.

In 2005, when then-President George W. Bush nominated Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, plenty of Republicans said they found it refreshing that Miers' experience amounted primarily to her time as a corporate lawyer and Bush aide. That included Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who noted then that "40 percent of the men and women who have served as Supreme Court justices" had no judicial experience. "One reason I felt so strongly about Harriet Miers' qualifications is I thought she would fill some very important gaps in the Supreme Court," Cornyn said in 2005. "Because right now you have people who've been federal judges, circuit judges most of their lives or academicians."

Now, what Cornyn once considered refreshing in a high court nominee is in Kagan's case "surprising." "Ms. Kagan is ... a surprising choice because she lacks judicial experience," Cornyn said Monday. "Most Americans believe that prior judicial experience is a necessary credential for a Supreme Court Justice."

The top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, likewise found Miers' qualifications suitable five years ago: "It is not necessary that she have previous experience as a judge in order to serve on the Supreme Court," Sessions said. "It's perfectly acceptable to nominate outstanding lawyers to that position."

But on Monday, Sessions said, "warrants great scrutiny" because of her lack of time as a judge. "Ms. Kagan's lack of judicial experience and short time as solicitor general ... is troubling," he said. And the list goes on. Republican Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson of Texas thought Miers was a "wonderful choice" in 2005, but today she "has some concerns over Elena Kagan's lack of judicial experience." Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., said Monday that Kagan's lack of judicial record raises questions - though he said in 2005 that he was not troubled by Miers' lack of judicial experience. Another Republican, Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby, likewise didn't see Miers' lack of time on the bench as a holdup.

The last nominee to serve without judicial experience? The late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who was nominated to the court by President Richard Nixon and served from 1972 to 2005, and is still lionized by conservatives.

Warning! Palin's new book Coming out in time to Compete with Christmas. Only $14.

Borders Books just announced:

America by Heart celebrates the values that have made this country what it is today.

Framed by her strong belief in the importance of family, faith, and patriotism, the book ranges widely over American history, culture, and current affairs..."

And it looks like Palin took the easy way out, filling the new tome with other peoples inspiring work. It adds length and a bit of professionalism to what would normally be another empty contribution to a fan base enamored by platitudes and "the show."

Written in her own refreshingly candid voice, America by Heart will include selections from classic and contemporary readings that have moved her—from the nation's founding documents to great speeches, sermons, letters, literature and poetry, biography, and even some of her favorite songs and movies.

She will also draw from personal experience to amplify these timely (and timeless)
themes...

Maybe she'll finally tell us all about those death panels....

So What is it that's turning the economy around? GOP Whiners of course.

The Obama stimulus, Bush bailouts and auto industry loans just aren't working, say the Republican geniuses who brought us the Great Recession. Wrong again.

Hey, let's vote Republican again!!!

Kornacki Exposes the Tea Party as "The Republican Base." What a Movement.

Salon's Steve Kornacki gives the best summation defining the tea party movement that I've heard so far. They're actually loud mouthed whiners (my description) unhappy about losing the elections. They're hard core small government, no tax egotists who are ready to blame poor people for their own bad decisions. You know, the same way Jesus blamed the lepers, prostitutes and criminals. Rachel Maddow uncovers the great tea party "Republican base."

Rush Just making it up for trough eating ditto heads and tea partiers.

Taxes Lowest Since '50's. Go Tea Party movement...?

The Republican ideology is teetering on the edge of a double edged knife. It seems they can't catch a break when it comes to the harsh realities of life and their contradictory vision of it. The latest striking example; the tea party protests over rising taxes and huge debts. Obama's killing us with taxes. Killing us! Wrong again guys! Really, really, really wrong. Chris Matthews comments:



But in Thom Hartmann's daily email..:

Even though there are Tea Party protests about high taxes, a USA Today analysis of federal data shows that Americans paid the lowest level of taxes last year since the Harry Truman's presidency. Federal, state, local, property, sales, and other taxes are 9.2% of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950. This is also true of multimillionaires and billionaires, who pay a maximum 35 percent income tax on salaries and not a penny in Social Security taxes on the vast majority of their income.

And when, like hedge fund managers, banksters, and health insurance company CEOs often do, they can call their income dividends and capital gains and pay a
maximum 15 percent income tax. So billionaires pay 15 percent income tax and virtually no Social Security tax, and they are doing everything they can to keep
it that way, funding entire think tanks and PR machines and Tea Parties to keep the anti-tax waters boiling.

They're scared to death that anybody may remember that from the 1930s to the 1980s the top income tax rate was between 74 and 91 percent - a level only paid by millionaires - which kept CEO salaries reasonable and built the strongest middle class the world had ever seen. Now, with those top tax rates down to 15 percent for rich people, the middle class in America is vanishing, while countries like Denmark and Germany that still have 70 percent or higher income tax rates on millionaires have strong, robust, and growing middle classes. Time to roll back the Reagan tax cuts!

They're Leaving the Burbs!

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