The Risible Mr. Hannity

I enjoyed a laugh yesterday when Hannity opined as how he was fine with the First Amendment ("I practice it everyday here on the show," he said), but not with Common's statements.  Poor fellow.  The contradictions must twist his lower intestines to such a degree that getting normal "regularity" must be a chore.  It's now only one tiny step to "I'm fine with the First Amendment, as long as you say what I approve of."  Some fellow traveler on the show chimed in to entirely change the subject to how rappers generally talk about women, assuming there is such a generalization out there in reality.  Who knows.  For a PhD in brow-beating, you can't beat Hannity.  My guess is, he learned the trade from newspaper home delivery sales drives.  Either that, or from making money in the summers selling bibles to the unwary.  Meanwhile, Osama remains deceased, and the rhetorical war on "rinos" continues apace on the rightwing blogs, according to reliable sources. 

Nixon?

There is a want of a nail aspect to motor racing, as there is to life in general, and it wasn't just Napoleon who discovered that aspect of how things are.  First, at the Brickyard, a rookie driver crashed on the very last turn and allowed vet Dan Wheldon to win the dang thing, while the rookie was going so fast that even wrecked and missing wheels, he crept across the finish line in 2nd place.  Then last night at Charlotte, the same thing happened more or less.  After Jimmy Johnson's engine blew up and caused an endless caution, running the gas down to fume in the top three or four cars, Kevin Harvick of all people managed to win the race, blasting past Junior's final turn-to-line coast for an entirely unexpected win, even to himself.  And then we saw the happy sunny side of Harvick.  All was well for the moment.  No doubt Kyle Busch's retirement to the garage and far distant 32nd place did not but add sweetness to Harvick's humour. 

We felt kinda like election day, '68.   The good news is, Fox's is running through its allotment of races and soon will be on to other stuff.  NASCAR had best be some careful--it could all end up looking too much like wraslin'.  That would not be a good thing. 

Rockefeller Republicans

ABC news got a nice little behind the scenes picture of where things are at re the Ryan budget.  Here's the clip:

http://politicalwire.com/archives/2011/05/25/clinton_encourages_ryan_backstage.html

I always figured Bill Clinton as a Rockefeller Republican.  He certainly had no problems with NAFTA or with watching American jobs vanish by the millions.  He was fortunate (and competent)--during his term the economy was doing quite well, and lost jobs in the rust belt were being replaced  by less strenuous jobs elsewhere.  For a lot of the real work that remained, Latinos legal and otherwise amounted to exactly the same result as sending jobs overseas.  Then, of course, along came Bush.

Maybe it's just me, but I find Bill Clinton's commiseration with Mr. Ryan appalling.  If Democrats can't take a clear position in opposition to the Ryan budget, what are they going to take a clear position against.  Do Democrats these days actually believe the trickle down jive?  As I was saying in my last post, Mr. Ryan needs to be put to a new task--finding himself a nice job at the CVS cash register.  Putting a few years in that slot might actually teach him something.  Something real I mean.  Like making a car payment, or a health insurance payment for that matter.  

The Fake Budget Crisis

GOP retirement at the Wisconsin Dells

From the Daily Howler today:

"In the 1998 State of the Union, Clinton said the projected federal surpluses should be applied to Social Security’s long-range balance sheet. In this way, he blocked the House GOP’s proposal for a large tax cut. In 1999, he made his full proposal: 62 percent of those federal surpluses would be used to strengthen the program’s finances, thus extending the life of Social Security by some twenty years. Some of that money would be invested in the stock market—but it would be invested as a federal fund under federal direction, not as part of individual “private accounts.” Other funds would be used to help citizens establish savings accounts—savings accounts which would operate in addition to their regular Social Security benefits, which would not be cut.That was Clinton’s proposal for the use of those looming federal surpluses. After Chris Matthews sent George Bush to the White House, this new president had a different idea; he used those projected federal surpluses for his massive tax cuts. Whatever one thinks of Clinton’s proposal—Candidate Gore didn’t agree with several parts of the plan—the Clinton proposal was vastly different from anything Bush ever did."

There's quite a lot more at Howler, check it out. 

Now that Democrats have made the first baby step towards regaining majorities in 2012 with a flawed but still significant victory in upstate New York, their goal should be to totally demolish the false fantasy of looming budget disaster which the Republicans have fabricated and helped use to launch the Ryan Budget.  The Republican cards are on the table.  What's not on the table is the obvious solution: sensible progressive tax increases to adjust the budget shortfalls, plus (of course) some sensible cuts where they are needed--in military spending. Surely the Democratic Party is capable of convincing a majority of American voters of the intelligence of such a course of action.  Wouldn't it be just wonderful to see Paul Ryan where he belongs--running a cash register in some CVS in a strip mall in Chippewa Falls, or working the swing shift at the Dells Antique Mall.  He would in either case still only be a scant few miles from I-94, and could drive down to the entrance of a Sunday afternoon and watch the traffic.  

http://www.kalahariresorts.com/wi/
 
Don't let the music scare you.