The Real News: The Dark Abyss of Politics

ELEPHANT DUNG

LECTURER IN CHIEF

THE END OF THE WORLD

IDIOTS IN CHARGE

The Republicans started campaigning too early for this Presidential election cycle. The party has found itself with a mish-mash of bad candidates with scrambled messages. In the Big Circus Tent of American Politics, the GOP has left only a trail of dung in the minds of the general public.

In an economic climate where at least 6.5 million Americans have permanently lost their career jobs, the Republicans cannot get any traction. People have been turned off by the non-stop corruption, sleaze and lies of their elected officials that it may be a lost cause, a sinking ship, a Mayan prophecy at hand.

With the Iowa caucus kick-off (where a mere 100,000 people buy and cast their opinion in an unscientific homespun state preference poll) at hand, the candidates slop through the muddy cornfields of the political landscape looking for strangers who will give them a pity pat on the head.

The clubhouse leader in the race is not even in the race. Future history books will state that in 2008, the Republicans ran the first zombie for President, John McCain. In order to give any life to that campaign disaster, the spunky Alaska governor, Sarah Palin, was brought on the bus. Now, Palin has figured out that she can make more money being a “potential” candidate than an actual candidate with her quasi-celebrity status she does not have to run for office anymore.

Michelle Bachmann Tea Party Overdrive is a Sarah Palin Lite edition of the Conservative Soccer Mom. She comes across as a “deer in the headlights” politician - - - totally frozen when she goes off script.

Tim Placenta was the other Minnesota candidate who came from the conservative back wash from Sen. Al FrankensteinÕs liberal election victory. He quickly got out of the race because he had a last name that TV anchors would butcher and no campaign money.

Pizza Godfather Herb Cain Mutiny is the Alan Keyes Lite because he is not a policy wonk but a former business executive. His self styled flight from the ÒDemocratic plantationÓ has caused his distracters to call him a racist even though he is a black man giving his own personal testimonial. But as with all Republicans with a hint of moral outrage, an alleged personal scandal of the sexual nature derailed and suspended Cain's campaign as he had surged to the lead in the national polls. His 9-9-9 tax plan turned into No-No-No very quickly with the stories of alleged multiple affairs, coaxed to the surface by Obama aides and supporters. But which such scandals, the party abandons those charged to the media wolves (who seem to only feast on Republican red meat because when Democrats have similar scandals, they are sympathetic and supportive.)

Mitt Romulus Care is the media's Trojan horse candidate, a moderate to liberal Republican from Massachusetts who adopted a state wide universal health care plan before Obamacare. The mainstream media pundits wonÕt admit it, but they would rather have Obama lose to a moderate like Romney, who is a Nelson Rockerfeller Lite, than a zealot Republican conservative. However, Romney is a terribly boring campaigner; like a door to door evangelic without a clear message.

Eye of Newt Gingrich has had his campaign implode twice since it started; once with his senior staff bolting and the next with the candidate himself opening his mouth. There is enough hot air bellowing from his mouth but he cannot lift himself off the ground. The author of the Contract With America now cannot get any traction once the press gets a hold of his baggage. Gingrich has more baggage than a porter in a 1920s movie. He was in favor of health mandates when he was in Congress long before it became a curse phrase. Also, taking a million dollars from Freddy and Fannie Mae to help them lobby Congress for more money which created the mortgage implosion scandal will be hard to explain away from voters whose house equity is underwater.

Texas Governor Rick Perry Tinnitus is the George W. Bush Lite. He came off dumber than a tumbleweed during the debates. Also, he has an Amazon Tax issue in his state which has many small businesses to consider fleeing the state because Texas wants to tax interstate commerce. You cannot run a pro-business message when you are also strangling small businesses at the same time. As Iowa rolls around, Perry is still sitting in the corner with a huge dunce cap on; unable to figure out how to get it off his head.

Ron Paul is the outsider inside the Republican Party. He is a Harry Browne Lite, a libertarian in name. For twenty years, Republicans feared the message of the Libertarians, so much so that they adopted many of that third party's platform items and allowed state election laws to change to make it more difficult for third party candidates to run. Paul has the Bobblehead problem of being too progressive on social issues and too conservative on economic and foreign policy issues to connect with a independent Republican voter.

Meanwhile, while the Republicans slog through their own mess, President Obama continues to make curt speeches thinking that he has solved all man kind's problems prior to his next round of golf or vacation. While he continues to tell us what to do, he has never had a grasp on how to actually govern (or run the executive branch). His cabinet officials are all off on larks of their own choosing which is fine with Obama because then he does not have to make any real decisions. In reality, Obama does not have to run for re-election again. He could claim that he accomplished all his uber-liberal agenda items in his first term and retire as the greatest man on the planet revolving around his ego.

We begin the new year high unemployment, stagnant wages, skyrocketing core inflation, massive public debt borrowings and no vision except more government micromanaging of society and its resources. For the first time in history, student loan debt now exceeds all American credit card debts. The unemployment rate for people aged 30 to 69 is 29 percent. The misery index is at an all-time high. Pollsters don't even ask the question anymore whether you were better off four years ago.

People are so tired of the institutionalized corruption from insider contracts to corporate welfare bailouts that the end of their world may be at hand. The Mayan calendar ends on December 21, 2012. There is much speculative debate about what it means; the doomsayers believe the world will collapse in a great flood, others claim that it means a rare astronomical event will mark nothing more than a new calendar cycle. In reality, the special interests, whether religious, pagan, or global warming environmentalists latch on to anything to secure their position (and public funding) on page one of the news. School children know from an early age the climate of earth is directly affected by the sun's rays, the ocean currents and more importantly, the wobble of the earth on its axis. What the Mayan calendar really shows is the convergence of several important events happening right now: the sun is going through a sunspot phase which will release more radiation toward earth; the earth's electromagnetic field shields most of it, but it is weakening in a probable dramatic polar inversion; and the earth is going through a progression, in which the wobble of the earth is about to conclude and a new shift of the equator to the sun will occur. If all three events occur at the same time: more sun activity, a reversal of the north and south poles, and a shift in the earth's axis relative to the sun - - - major planetary changes from disruption of the electrical grid to large shifts temperate zones will impact plants, animals, sea levels, crops, and living conditions for people. It would be the computer Y2K with real consequences.

It is doubtful whether world leaders are aware of basic school planetarium principles. They are too busy fending off man-made derivative disasters in the global banking system and government bankruptcies to focus on any big picture items.

The real disaster at hand is that the idiots that ruined the nation are still in charge. Their main purpose is to maintain their power by getting re-elected. To get reelected, they solicit campaign funds in exchange for support and votes on legislation. One can hardly wonder why normal light bulbs costing 50 cents will now be energy-saving bulbs costing $5 under new laws effective in 2012. A green agenda is more expensive to the consumer, but more profitable to the light bulb manufacturer (and political donor). But that is the short sightedness of Congress to pass bills without realizing the consequences, intended or unintended, from their actions. The Election of 2012 is shaping up to be a poor choice between the lesser of two evils. It is not a comforting thought when the nation is at a critical crossroads in history.

PART TWO * JANUARY 8, 2012

CRAZY 8

IOWA SANITARIUM

MODERATE INSIDERS TO THE FRONT

WANE OF THE INDEPENDENTS

IDIOTS STILL IN CHARGE

The Iowa parlor opinion polling was completed (with some controversy about whether the state party can count ballots properly) with Milt Romney the straw poll victor, by a slim 8 vote tally over dark horse ex-Sen. Rick Santorum, who became the conservative wing flavor of the week after Newt Gingrich's diving board collapse in support. Libertarian Ron Paul finished third. Tea Party runway model Michelle Bachmann finished last, and ended her Sarah Palin Lite campaign the next day.

The national cable news networks, sans Fox, were giddy at the Romney victory. The anchors continued to hammer home their Democratic strategist talking points that Romney is the most “electable” of the bushel basket of Republican stones. It is a backward notion but shows how professional politicians now view elections: it is all about winning, and not about platforms, ideas or values. Pundits want voters to only vote for winners and not idealists. That philosophy downplays sound bite marketing plays of past election cycles; the new reality is the racing form and the odds of victory. Romney has the name recognition and the money to fund a long primary campaign. As a moderate, he allegedly captures the liberal side of the Republican regular party members. That is supposed the help Romney in the general election because independents are more moderate than conservatives believe. Even Democratic candidates run to the middle in general elections since the independent vote is now larger than either party membership rolls. The Democrats think Obama can beat a moderate Republican because the conservative base will not support Romney.

The growth of independent voters is because mainstream America is fed up with the career politicians micromanaging their lives. The new independents believe that there is no difference between a Republican or a Democrat. They are the same gears in a runaway bureaucratic machine. But independents cannot choose a viable third party candidate since the two major parties control the state legislatures. During the past two decades, they have written election laws so harsh that independent candidates cannot get easy access to the ballot. Then, the parties snip off the popular rhetoric of an independent candidate as their own (false) solution making the third party outsider irrelevant in a general election campaign because he or she is not “electable.” This mantra is employed to keep the party regulars in power election to election.

Independents are aware that the nation is on the brink of collapse due to the weight of the incompetence of their public officials. Massive federal deficits, high taxation, high unemployment, special interest corporate welfare, massive state and local deficits, increasing crime rates, political corruption and looting of the public treasuries continue to be institutionalized as the new normal. Some historians compare the warning signs to the Fall of the Roman (American) Empire.

Obama ended the military operations in Iraq to appease his liberal doves in his own party. He is blocking energy policies and new pipelines to appease his liberal environmentalists. He is forging ahead with new tax the rich (but in reality the squeezed middle class) to appease his liberal socialist friends. Obama can continue his liberal agenda without cloaking it in the robe of a moderate because he is running unopposed for a second term. It does not matter that the consequences of his policies will hurt small businesses, the unemployed or the overtaxed middle class. Obama's handlers know that there are no real challengers in the Republican party to overthrow the status quo: big government and big government spending and regulation.

Burt Wolfe had a recent PBS special on America. He found that what puts the US ahead of everyone else in the world is the history of the inventor, small business entrepreneur. Those individuals are the agents of real change, real progress, and real wealth creation. Wolfe interviewed people who indicated that the worst thing in America today is the reliance on management to figure things out and not the entrepreneur independence. Corporate management gets rewarded (and highly overpaid) whether they make money or lose money. This same philosophy is apparent in the federal and state capitols: elected officials retain office whether they make citizens lives better or worse. With a small business-inventor, he or she wins or loses on his own talent; the risk to reward; the human capital and sweat equity to succeed. But the free spirit inventor is now an anomaly in our culture, since big government programs have trained generations not to work hard to succeed on their own, but wait for the next program hand-out and empty promise like Pavlov dogs at a feeding bowl. And that is the darkness that has encapsulated the American way of life; the reality show of idiots being highly rewarded for acting like fools.

It is foolish to say that Romney, Santorum, Gingrich or Paul are outsiders. They are all politicians. They are all been elected officials. They are all spouting the drum beat of their political forebearers. They are saying what people want to hear but with the long lasting substance of stale chewing gum.

PART THREE * FEBRUARY 5, 2012

GOING SOUTH

CAROLINA BARBECUE

A REBEL WITH A CAUSE

ANGER IN THE PULPITS

NUMBERS LIE

In an election cycle, the candidates are like peacocks strutting themselves. However, this season they are more like plucked naked turkeys. The Emperor cranes have no feathers. And voters have not looked, or worse, do not care.

South Carolina is a Republican conservative base. The Right thought this would be the ground to halt the Romney bus in its tracks as the high unemployment state would rebel against a Massachusetts liberal Republican. Carolina people should still be stinging mad with the Obama National Labor Relations Board's unilateral blockade of a new Boeing plant. Carolina is a right to work (or non-union) state; Obama's minions decided to make it a test case to buy some election year loyalty. But apparently, it was not enough of a fight to set torches ablaze and run down to the polls to vote for the most conservative candidate on the GOP ballot. Romney won. Easily.

Romney won but just campaigning in Carolina, and not get lynched on his Massachusetts record. Romney won when he actually got people to vote for him on election day. Romney won because the media red herring of being the most “electable” candidate has gotten traction. Romney won because his own real opponent is now Mr. Hot Air Balloon Face, Newt Gingrich.

The conservative's conservative, Rick Santorum, gave up the state the weekend prior to the vote. Even with the Iowa test score administrators finally giving him a slim caucus win a month ago, could not stem the high tide of boredom his campaign waded through the campaign stops. He was smart enough to call it hopeless and go home to bet the mortgage on the Steelers in the playoffs. Oh, dear. It is really time to re-group.

Rick Perry had already abandoned ship and went back to Texas to sulk. His debate performances were so bad, educational achievement scores in the deep South suddenly rose. He had fallen off his own high horse, and was trampled to death by his own words.

Ron Paul is still on the campaign trail because he is on a carnival ride that he cannot get off of - - - he is not running for office but leading his libertarian cause against the status quo in Washington D.C. Again, people all over the country like what he says, because he says it well. But they just cannot get over the hump to pull the lever and actually vote for him. It is like going to the county clerk's office to ask for a marriage license for a platypus bride.

So all the Republican candidates have been mere condiments with no meaty platform or charisma. There is plenty of issues on the fire pit. Obama's economy: dreadful. Obama's foreign policy: miserable. Obama's Justice Department policies: criminal. Obama's spending: out of control, over a cliff, incoherent suicide. But every time a candidate starts to raise such an issue, it looks like he is tossing old roadkill at the audience. The rhetoric is tired, the message is garbled, the solutions non-existent and the pompous factor is rising fast.

So the Democrats can seize the Moment of Dullness to cook the numbers in their favor. The January unemployment rate went down, said the headlines. But the real reason is that millions of unemployed workers fell off the rolls and are no longer counted in the official unemployment rate of 8.5%. The real unemployment, underemployment rate is more like 15.5%. Minority unemployment is closer to 25% and that is the alleged Democratic base. But numbers can lie and liars can figure they can repeat their headline enough times to brain wash the public in believing that their lives are getting better.

For worse. As the grocery store receipt sticker shock continues to climb (while the quality of food declines), the intestinal fortitude of the American people will start to be sorely tested. The question is whether they will get angry enough in time to harness the right person to challenge the Democrats free spending Roman orgy in November or whether the gastroenteritis will cripple the people into an apathetic coma. A recent poll found that more than a third of the electorate wanted a new candidate to jump into the race. That is not going to happen.

And the two GOP front-runners won't change their inner stripes to queasy their uneasy stomachs. Romney and Gingrich both appear approaching a Euro-conservative moment. They are both tried and true big spending program pork project guys in fiscal responsible sheep's clothing. What they are going to say next is that they should be elected because conservatives are better managers of the spending programs. Not that they will cut the programs or stop the spending, but manage it better. Which is how Europe has collapsed and is now wallowing in their own fiscal cesspool. Conservative spenders are the same as liberal spenders, and neither are managers because they don't change the problem but add scented feces to the wallow pit.

Romney may be ahead in the delegate count and Gingrich may hold a second banana position while Perry is in the Texas capitol whittling a pointy stick as Paul continues his political vaudeville act which may amuse some in the media to tedium. Santorum may follow Herman Cain into the loser-gets-a-radio-show Sarah Palin career path gig to bank his 15 minutes of fame. How sad must the basset hound face of the Speaker of the House be if his party cannot get its act together by this summer.

PART FOUR * FEBRUARY 11, 2012

NEWT'S THREE WAY

PARDON THE INTERRUPTION

ELECTORAL MAP

THE PAC MEN

CRISIS? WHAT CRISIS?

Romney may be still ahead in the delegate count, but the roots of his gray sideburns must be on fire. Gingrich continued his endless attacks on Romney's record, calling him every name in the conservative boogie man book: moderate, liberal, mandate heavy and from Massachusetts. He even lashed back when Romney pointed out that Gingrich is a career politician by saying Romney was jealous since he had lost a race to Ted Kennedy. All this sparring led to another man to sneak in the ring. Under the cover of an actual vote, Santorum shocked the mainstream media by winning the dog and pony shows in Nevada, Minnesota and partial caucus in Missouri.

None of this really matters since the delegate count is so low. A nominee needs more than 1100 delegates at the convention. Romney, still in first, has less than ten percent of that total. And with more states using a pro rata delegate formula, the race may not be decided until the final primaries.

What is more interesting is seeing what the electoral vote is for each GOP contender at this point. Delegates may nominate a candidate, but state electors in the general election will cast the votes for president. If a candidate can win the Republican race in these early states, logic presumes that he should be able to hold in the general.

So the breakdown is simple:

Romney wins New Hampshire (4) and Florida (29) for 33 electoral votes.

Santorum wins Iowa (6), Nevada (6), Minnesota (10) and Missouri (10) for 32 electoral votes.

Gingrich wins South Carolina for 9 electoral votes.

Paul wins only some debate points and “better luck next time” back pats on the train platform going out of town.

Gingrich must be smarting the most for the Nevada loss. His biggest SuperPAC backer is a Nevada casino owner who is willing to pour millions into unregulated campaign ads which should give Newt an edge against the Romney campaign war chest. But to the surprise of both big money players, Santorum won. He won without the big donor backers that the U.S. Supreme Court unleashed with its Citizens United decision last term. Money is free speech and campaign donations are political speech so game on!

Money is always a corrupting influence in politics. Now, there will be more of it. Obama is churning his way to his goal of a billion dollar war chest to carpet bomb any Republican nominee into the Stone Ages. But even the President, with the power of incumbency and the perks of instant national press coverage, decided he could not escape the lure of having SuperPACS supporting his cause. He unleashed his staff to go out and tell big money donors that it was okay to fund the New Bullies on the election block. Game on!

All this bickering, back stabbing, name calling and money loading has done nothing to help define the issues or find solutions to the nation's problems. In fact, the candidates and media seem to not notice the fact that Main Street is still stuck in the quicksand of high unemployment, rapidly increasing food and energy inflation and the erosion of personal savings by negative interest rate policy of the Federal Reserve. Financial capital is still seized up by the major national banks. Human capital is still on the sidelines, growing more every quarter as more unemployed people fall off the national unemployment counter (when unemployment benefits run out.) The real unemployment rate that includes the five million people who fell off the government survey is higher than ten percent. The unemployment and underemployment rate (those stuck in part time jobs but want better full time employment) is more than sixteen percent. Minority and urban unemployment in the old rust belt is more than twenty-five percent. The malaise in the job sector puts a malaise on the economy. America is stuck in neutral falling backward down a steep slope.

The US Senate still refuses to pass a budget in some sort of self-denial that there is no crisis. The federal deficit has sped by the total gross domestic product by more than a trillion dollars. The trade deficit has widened so the US is importing more goods from overseas. Times continue to be a bleak side of spectrum. But elected officials continue to boast that things are getting better; but there is more work to be done. More sacrifice, more fairness. But at a certain point, you cannot get blood out of an unemployed turnip.