Bill Maher offers a solution of sorts to the Tea Party Extremist problem. He suggests that maybe there is a need for some batshit crazy leftists to counteract the right wing batshit crazies.
Maher: GOP Has Tea Party, Dems Need Contingent of "Angry, Left-Wing Crazy Mother F@#ers" | AlterNet
A big part of the problem with dealing with wingnut Tea Party loons is that President Obama and the Democrats talk at times like liberals or progressives when in fact they are not really much different from the Republicans. As we have seen Obama is as entranced with the Global War On Terror as Bush was.
As for economic issues such as the US debt Obama refuses to take on the Tea Party and stand his ground because he too sees defense spending as the number one priority and job creation, providing for the poor , the unemployed , those who have lost their homes etc. as being frills which can be cut on a whim.
As David Sirota puts it :
Obama is not a flaccid Jimmy Carter, as some of his critics insist. He is instead a Franklin Delano Roosevelt -- but a bizarro FDR. He has mustered the legislative strength of his New Deal predecessor -- but he has channeled that strength into propping up the very forces of "organized money" that FDR once challenged.For instance see: Obama isn't weak (he just isn't a liberal)
The president has the political muscle to enact a progressive agenda, but he doesn't want to
BY DAVID SIROTA at Salon.com, August 5, 2011
And as Amy Goodman at Democracy Now comments on the issue of the debt and defense spending:
"President Barack Obama touted his debt ceiling deal Tuesday, saying, “We can’t balance the budget on the backs of the very people who have borne the biggest brunt of this recession.” Yet that is what he and his coterie of Wall Street advisers have done."From: " War, Debt and the President "
by Amy Goodman at Truthdig via Commondreams, August 3, 2011
So those who are true Progressives and liberals who want real change in America are of course going to be disappointed by Obama again and again -though he may throw a bone to his base every now and again to renew their hope and support .
So check out what "The Real Americans" are up to in Texas with Governor Rick Perry
Christian Nationalists emboldened by weak Obama government. Next stop Theocracy for America.
Live Web Stream: The Response: A call to prayer for a nation in crisis
note live web stream no longer available but at the link the administrators say videos of and related to the event will be available soon.
So who is winning the Culture Wars -moderates and liberals are being treated as if they were the extremists while the Extremist Tea Party has taken over the GOP and they according to conservative spokespersons such as Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck , Sarah Palin & Fox News they stand for the policies of real Americans that is screw the poor and the lower classes in order to help out the superwealthy and their favorite corporations including the Military Industrial complex.
Americans United for the Separation of Church and State criticize Gov. Rick Perry's Response Day of prayer to save America from the Commies and anti-Americans in power.
Texas Gov. Rick Perry presides over prayer rally" by April Castro,Thomas Beaumont, Associated Press Sunday, August 7, 2011
,,,Perry's audience Saturday was filled with people who sang with arms outstretched in prayer - and wept - as Christian groups played music on stage. And Perry, himself, huddled on the stage in a prayer circle with several ministers who helped lead the event. It was Perry's idea and was financed by the American Family Association, a Tupelo, Miss., group that opposes abortion and gay rights and believes that the First Amendment freedom of religion applies only to Christians.
"We feel that God moved on him to do this. It will be read by the enemy, the political enemy, as a tool to win votes," said Gwen Courkamp of Houston, who plans to vote for Perry if he runs for president.
Critics argued the event - called the Response - inappropriately blended politics and religion, and protesters demonstrated outside the arena.
"He abused the power of his office by calling this event from his office as governor," said Rodney Hinds, who waved a sign at traffic demanding "Pastor Perry Must Resign."
"Perry's Response: Wingnuts Will Heal A Nation In Crisis by Abby Zimet Via Commondreams.org, August 5, 2011
Presidential wannabee Gov. Rick Perry's day of prayer and fasting on Saturday will feature the wackiest of the religious right-wing. Among their beliefs: blackbirds are dying because of gay soldiers, the Statue of Liberty is a "demonic idol," the gay rights movement is a “satanic anointment," Hurricane Katrina was divine retribution for the city's sins, and Oprah is a “forerunner to the harlot movement" who signals the Apocalypse. Well, they might be right on that one. Still, it may be a flop: Only 8,000 believers signed up beforehand for a stadium that seats 71,500, and none of the 49 governors invited plan to attend. So much for a nation healing itself. Rachel Maddow has more on who will be there, and why you might not want to be.
" Americans United Criticizes Perry Prayer Rally For Exclusionary Theology And Ties To Extreme Groups" from Americans United For Separation of Church and State, August 5, 2011
Governor’s Sponsorship Of Evangelistic Event Transgresses Church-State Boundary, Says AU’s Lynn
A coalition of religious and community leaders has criticized Gov. Rick Perry’s sponsorship of a fundamentalist Christian prayer rally.
The Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, joined the outcry against the Aug. 6 Perry event in Houston. Lynn reprimanded Perry for meddling in religion and failing to recognize America’s wide spiritual diversity.
“The problem with the rally isn’t just that it’s government-promoted religion,” Lynn said. “It’s actually government-supported evangelism. The aim of this event is to persuade people to adopt specific religious beliefs. That is never the government’s job. The sponsors will let non-Christians in precisely so they can learn about Jesus and be converted.”
Continued Lynn, “This rally also sends a message to everyone who does not accept this narrow form of Christianity. It tells those people that they are wrong. It says that there is a ‘right’ religion and the state has determined what it is. It celebrates a faith of exclusion when governments ought to be about inclusion. It erects barriers between people when states ought to tear them down. It divides us – when government’s job is to bring us together.”
Lynn also chastised Perry for aligning with extreme Religious Right groups. One of the rally’s primary sponsors, the American Family Association, is so vociferous in its attacks on gay people that it has been labeled a “hate group” by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Lynn noted that others sponsors and endorsers of the Perry event, known as “The Response: A Call to Prayer for a Nation in Crisis,” include Pentecostal pastors affiliated with a movement called the New Apostolic Reformation. Members of this movement believe they have an obligation to take “dominion” over society and impose their version of biblical law. Some of the endorsers consider the Statue of Liberty to be a “demon idol,” while others regard TV talk show host Oprah Winfrey as a “forerunner” of the Antichrist.
“This is America,” Lynn said. “People can believe anything. But they should not receive backing from the government for these ideas. They can promote them through private means and personal resources but shouldn’t be seeking any stamp of government approval.”
Americans United is a religious liberty watchdog group based in Washington, D.C. Founded in 1947, the organization educates Americans about the importance of church-state separation in safeguarding religious freedom.
Five Scriptures You Won’t Hear at Rick Perry’s Prayer Event | Common Dreams, August 3, 2011
The use of the governor’s office to promote one religion in a country with such rich religious diversity is obviously unhealthy politics, but -- if one takes the Christian and Jewish scriptures seriously -- it is also unhealthy religion. Here are five rather important verses of scripture you aren’t likely to hear at “The Response”:
Don’t make a show of prayer
“And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray in public places to be seen by others… But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your heavenly parent, who is unseen.” (Matt. 6:5-6)
While Jesus never addressed the issues most important to some of this event’s co-sponsors, such as homosexuality and abortion, he did speak out against public displays of religion. Whatever Jesus meant by the word “prayer,” it seems to have been about the quiet and personal. The disciples had to ask Jesus how to pray, which is a pretty good indication that he wasn’t praying a lot publicly. What he did say about prayer carried a warning label: “Don’t rub it in other people’s faces.”
God doesn’t withhold rain because we’ve done something wrong
“God causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” (Matt. 5:45)
Perry recently called Texans to pray for rain, which implies that God steers clouds toward the worthy. According to Right Wing Watch, one of the events co-sponsors has said the earthquake in Japan happened because the emperor had sex with the Sun Goddess. It may be a part of our lower nature to blame disasters on people we don’t like or understand, but Jesus taught that God sends rain on the just and unjust. Furthermore, he said our love should be equally nonselective.
"The White House Gives Credibility to the Psychotic Radicals of the Tea Party" by MARK KARLIN, EDITOR OF BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT, August 5, 2011
There is a false equivalency that comes into play when President Obama insists on presenting himself as a "reasonable" mediator between two political sides.
Since BuzzFlash was founded in May of 2000, we have lambasted many Democratic leaders for lacking strength and conviction. We have deplored that Democratic leaders, with a few exceptions like Bernie Sanders and Dennis Kucinich, repeatedly accept the far-right Republican-generated "conventional wisdom" as the starting point for negotiating public policy.
When President Obama, in an appeal to the so-called "Independent" vote, positions himself as straddling the middle ground between two equal sides, it is an abandonment of leadership that could expose the moral bankruptcy and manufactured bullying of the Koch brothers' (and like-minded billionaires') created "Tea Party."
President Obama implicitly and explicitly asserts that those who would protect Medicare and Social Security, for instance, are leftist counterparts to Ayn Rand followers who want to destroy the federal government and create free-market anarchy to replace it.
As BuzzFlash has stated many a time, the mythical "center" of public opinion is not some immutable set of public policies. America's strength has been its vigorous and inventive ability to evolve. Otherwise, we would still have slavery and women wouldn't be able to vote.
When the White House legitimatizes the radical notions infused into a segment of confused and frustrated Americans by "Americans for Prosperity," "FreedomWorks" (two perniciously euphemistic names considering their missions) and the entire right-wing media and think-tank infrastructure, it is providing them with credibility. Outrage is called for from the bully pulpit of the presidency, not equating advocates of programs for the elderly and poor with hateful radicals who want to drown government in a bath tub, after strangling it (as followers of Grover Norquist) - but keep their Medicare and government subsidies.
The 20 to 25 percent of the population that is holding America hostage has made Obama look weak, not strong. In his first administration, Obama held all the cards, but still folded on virtually everything but health care reform (and that, while having many good substantive insurance improvements, was a financial windfall for private health insurance companies).
The White House's attacks on progressives while showing respect toward the acolytes of Ayn Rand will not help the nation evolve into a clearer understanding of the serious action needed to save our economy and preserve our democracy.
It calls for the audacity of hope, an impassioned advocacy of a vision infused with the facts, not a "reasonable" legitimatizing of psychotic politics that threatens the ruin of our nation.
and so it goes,
GORD.
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