IOWA GOP TOP THREE; WAR MONGERS 2, PEACENIKS 1

It was disappointing that the top two vote getters in the Iowa Republican caucuses, unrepentant war promoters Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, garnered nearly 50% of the votes. But there is a glimmer of hope that anti pre-emptive war Ron Paul came in third with nearly 25% of the vote.

Romney and Santorum represent the war party wing of the Republican Party. They've not only done nothing to stop the trillion dollar carnage we've unleashed in the Middle East for over ten years now, they actually incite new wars to score votes in Republican primaries. Romney proclaimed at one debate, "If Obama is re-elected, Iran will get a nuclear weapon. If I'm elected President, Iran will not get a nuclear weapon". That is simply a veiled way of saying "Obama will not bomb Iran, but I will". Santorum, more prone to go for the jugular than the polished Romney, proclaimed on Meet the Press that President Obama is too soft on Iran and he, Santorum, would bomb their nuclear facilities.

With exactly ten months of electioneering to go, we will be subjected to endless saber rattling by the GOP contenders, minus Paul, of course, since Obama has infuriated the war party and the Military-Industrial Complex with his ending of the Iraq war, his call for a smaller military, and his refusal to light to fuse for more Middle East fireworks.

Hang in there candidate Paul. The GOP elite and the munitions makers hate you because you represent a threat to the endless war gravy train. Keep placing pennies on their tracks to de-rail their ride to Armageddon.

CANTOR CAN'T RECANT

It you want to view a political train wreck, watch a video of House Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor's interview with Leslie Stahl that aired on "60 Minutes" New Years Day.

Cantor has been taking a lot of heat from fellow Republicans for being the highest profile, non-compromising obstructionist in Congress, and is being given much of the blame for the abysmal 9% public approval rating for Congress. The nearest fictional character Americans think of when Cantor's name is mentioned is the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. What to do?

In Cantor's case, its to appear on 60 Minutes and show his human side. We see Cantor in a sweater beaming as his son says he's "pretty cool" because he likes rap music. You get the picture.

Turning to politics, Ms Stahl grilled Cantor on his championing the GOP Tea Party freshman class mantra of not compromising one bit with the President's job creation and tax initiatives.
Cantor said he'd never compromise his principles like his idol Ronald Reagan. When Stahl corrected him, asserting Reagan raised taxes, compromising that very Reaganesque principle, a voice off camera, Cantor's press secretary, boomed out: "That just isn't true... I don't want to let that stand". Cantor was both stunned and embarrassed.

To drive home the utter falsity of Cantor's position on compromising, Stahl showed the Gipper himself, asserting in a budget speech that he had to raise taxes "in the spirit of compromise".

The interview showed Cantor for what he is: a phony, insatiably ambitious partisan, utterly captive to the Tea Party faction he's using to take over John Boehner's Speakership position in the next Congress. His major legislative focus is on maintaining, if not increasing, tax cuts for his rich base to the detriment of real job creation and sensible deficit reduction.

Memo to Congressman Cantor: If you want to appear more human, ditch the sweater and the rap music and do the work of the 99% instead of that of the Tea Party and the wealthiest 1%. You will not only appear human....you'll be human.

Originally published in USA Today, January 4, 2012; also published in the Daily Herald, January 8, 2012

A CENTURY OF PROGRESS?

The banksters and the billionaires and the colossal multinationals who have been miraculously turned into "persons" by the Supremes, are sure upset about some of things being said about them and their inhaling of the nation's middle class wealth:

"There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains. To put an end to it will be neither a short or an easy task, but it can be done."

"The right to regulate the use of wealth in the public interest is universally admitted."

"Conservation is a great moral issue, for it involves the patriotic duty of ensuring the safety and continuance of the nation."

"The Constitution guarantees the protection to property and must make that promise good. But it does not give the right of suffrage to any corporation."

Though you may think those statements were from President Obama's "make or break moment for the middle class" speech at Osawatomie, KS on December 6th, they actually belong to Republican Teddy Roosevelt one hundred years earlier at the same Osawatomie, KS venue. That's why there will be no mention of TR as a great Republican forebear at the 2012 GOP convention. Should he be able to step down from his perch on Mt. Rushmore and try to gain entry at Tampa August 27, he'd be branded a wild eyed American hating socialist and tossed out faster than you could say "I feel fit as a Bull Moose".

Originally published in the Aurora Beacon News, December 27, 2011

RUN RUN, RUN

This antiwar progressive is hoping for a Ron Paul victory in Tuesday's Iowa caucasus. Paul is crazy as a loon on domestic issues in that he wants to essentially shut down government services to the needy to conform to his extreme cult like libertarian beliefs. But he sure has GOP establishment heads spinning around their shoulders over his antiwar positions. The GOP and their benefactors in the Military-Industrial Complex are terrified that a Paul groundswell among GOP voters spells trouble for their trillion dollar war spending gravy train. All GOP Presidential contenders except Paul have been running around Iowa beating the drums for war against Iran because we need a new bogyman to attack, now that the Iraq war is over. Their quotes are eerily and scarily reminiscent of the Bush Administration propaganda and lies that caused millions of casualties and refugees in the process of shattering Iraq into the broken and failed nation it is today, all at the staggering cost of a trillion dollars, with a couple trillion more in extended vet benefits to come.

Any chance we could have a bi partisan co-Presidency of Barack Obama for domestic issues and Ron Paul for foreign affairs? That would be the audacity of hope.