2012.02.22
A nightmarish Post of the Day from ‘dave’
Created by Dan
Note from Dan: the regular known as dave posted the fanciful cabinet list below this to Wednesday’s open thread. To some RWers it probably represents a Conservative Dream Team. But anyone with half a brain would likely regard it as a national nightmare. Del. Bob “Taliban Bob” Marshall a heartbeat away from the presidency? Good Grief!
I’m surprised dave didn’t name Ann Coulter as White House spokeswoman (but there’s still time).
“Here’s a good GOP lineup for you.
Little Ricky for Prez.
Bombastic Bob Marshall for VP.
Then if elected:
Scott Walker for Sec. of Labor,
Ron Paul for Sec. of Treasury,
The Cooch for Attorney General,
Michelle Bachmann for Sec. HHS,
Congressman West for SecDef,
Rick Perry for Sec. Ed
Herman Cain for SecState.
Jan Brewer for head of INS,
Sarah Palin for Dept of Energy,
Last but not least Morgan Griffith for head of the EPA.
What a joyous country this would be to try to live in!”
O Canada! Terre de nos aieux
Ton front est ceint de fleurons glorieux!
Car ton bras sait porter l’épée
Il sait porter la croix!
Comment by Sandi Saunders — February 22, 2012 @ 7:18 pm
repost from another thread
Dave – here’s some additions to the lunatic dream team of a Republican presidency:
How about Santorum for White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives…
Department of Education of course Sarah Palin…especially the geography division
and Newtonium for DOJ’s Departmental Ethics Office or
NASA’s Lunar Exploration Committee…
and White House Press Secretary – toss up: Limbaugh or Beck
Comment by Hillary — February 22, 2012 @ 7:29 pm
Comment by Hillary — February 22, 2012 @ 7:46 pm
“Ron Paul for Sec. of Treasury,
The Cooch for Attorney General”
As I posted on the other thread, those I can live with. They actually recognize that we have a constitution to which to adhere.
Comment by John Wilburn — February 22, 2012 @ 8:36 pm
Welcome to the United States of Afghanistan.
Comment by scott — February 22, 2012 @ 10:47 pm
Enough to make you wake up with the cold sweats and the DTs isn’t Dan?
And Cooch as AG and Ron Paul as Sec.Treas? We’d be back to the McCarthy era in a heartbeat and have a maasive worldwide depression within six months. You may be right though, John Wilburn. They might just fix things. The revolution that would immediately follow might just get usm os
out from under the thumbs of the corporations and the religious zealots.
Unfortunately, I think it would cost us a lot of blood and treasure.! I think I’ll write a novel. This might make a good plot.
Comment by dave — February 22, 2012 @ 11:26 pm
America would be instantly better with this stellar lineup. What’s alarming is you dunderheads are totally oblivious to the disastrous group of Communists making up the current administration.
Comment by Suzie — February 22, 2012 @ 11:27 pm
dave,
How blindly partisan can one be to deny that Paul and Cuccinelli would make a better Treasury Secretary and AG than the two complete disasters we have now!
Paul can actually do his income taxes and Cooch knows not only that American citizens have gun rights, but not to arm our enemies.
Comment by John Wilburn — February 23, 2012 @ 1:12 am
John Wilburn,
Ken Cuccinelli has been an embarrassment as Virginia Attorney General. As a state Senator, in 2009, he accepted a $1,000 campaign contribution from a man who wasn’t even one of his constituents and them turned around and sponsored a bill that required the state to accept completion of a 1-hour online video course as proof of “competence” that the state requires for issuance of a concealed carry permit. The $40 course, incidentally is a business operated by the contributor who gave the Cooch’s campaign $1,000.
Also during his AG campaign, he accepted 3 contributions ($5,000, then $500, then $50,000) from a con man using a fake ID who had ripped off Virginians to the tune of $2 million. The con man wanted a change in Virginia law that would allow him to continue ripping off Virginians — and he got it. Other state politicians got money from scamster Bobby Thompson, too, but Cuccinelli got 11 times more than anyone else — and more than any other RWer politician in the nation.
Shortly after his election he sent a letter to state universities advising them to repeal any regulations they had barring discrimination in employment against workers based on sexual orientation. He has sued the federal government to keep Virginia’s air dirtier than it has to be, recommended Virginia adopt a completely spurious law exempting itself from the Affordable Care Act, sued the feds over the ACA (a case he is most likely destined to lose), and engaged in a bold-faced witch hunt over imaginary fraud that he thinks could have been committed by a former UVa climate researcher, based on nothing at all more than a hunch.
The latter act has drawn the ire of scientists from across the country. And because of it, Virginia’s reputation in the scientific community has suffered.
Cuccinelli is a zealot. That’s a terrible quality for any government administrator or policy maker. If his term as U.S. Attorney General was anything like his term in Virginia, he would go down in history as the most controversial, least effect AG this nation ever had.
Comment by Dan Casey — February 23, 2012 @ 1:52 am
All that said, I’d still rather have him than Holder. He is a zealot, I give you that. If he makes it to Governor next year, I’m confident he will back the much needed state agency preemption and airport carry measures that were wussed out on this year.
As for authorizing the online CHP training, I supported that measure in the interests of liberty. Funny you mention that, just today I lost a prospect for my class in favor of a $30 class he found online. His choice.
Oh, and on the Holder and Obama gun control wish list front:
http://patdollard.com/2012/02/holder-admits-obama-administration-is-adamant-to-re-implement-assault-weapons-ban/
Comment by John Wilburn — February 23, 2012 @ 2:24 am
“The national debt would increase, perhaps dramatically, under the tax and spending plans of the leading Republican presidential candidates, according to an independent budget watchdog group.”
http://apidata.usatoday.com/communities/onpolitics/post/2012/02/budget-watchdog-most-republicans-would-increase-debt/1?csp=24&kjnd=y9pBNHSAQ9s%2B%2FVSSlAXPwio%2F4OluWsimvPsruGlUWDkKgtmbDqZlenz9hYi0XuB5-f56b76af-21fb-40db-9bfd-eca0561a1c43_6zrEKeOLLRnilbFVnpUETJJHWMiECmpZCloQiCxKvU6dLaGouh0pI4vNL1qi4j5W
Comment by Debbie — February 23, 2012 @ 6:01 am
How blindly one issue oriented can one be to deny that Ron Paul is a dangerous man and Ken Cuccinelli is an afront to, not a hero for freedom? Government is ALWAYS about more than one issue and pols like Rand and Ron Paul and certainly right wingers like Cuccinelli are not capable of real leadership. Your issue is paramount to you, the state and in this conversation the nation, not so much. Governing is about putting the nation above your self interests and right wingers cannot separate the two. Therein lies the distinction between Soros and Koch as well.
Comment by Sandi Saunders — February 23, 2012 @ 8:27 am
Reports today indicate that speculation by hedge funds (Wall Street Investment Bankers) is the main driving force behind gasoline price increases. These are the same hedge fund managers that forced Congress and GWB to forego regulation on hedge funds with heavy lobbying and threats. These are the same hedge fund managers that receive the huge tax loophole on the taxation of their management fees. These are the same hedge fund managers that want Dodd Frank removed. These are the same hedge fund managers that make the multi-million dollar contributions to the Republican Superpacs. These are the same hedge fund managers that are now being promised additional tax breaks by the two leaders in the GOP Presidential campaign. These are the same hedge fund managers that caused the Great Recession of 2008 and received a trillion dollar bailout. These are the same hedge fund Managers that do not consider themselves US Citizens but rather World citizens that have threatened to move to other Countries with their money if the US does not comply with their wishes. Our Nation is being bought by these investment bankers that have no concept of nation but only a concept of how much power they can achieve and wealth to accumulate. They have bought the GOP and Congress. They must be stopped.
Comment by Richard J Beason, CPA — February 23, 2012 @ 8:36 am
#7 The Cooch would have his folks conducting national witch hunts while claiming that it costs taxpayers only $300. What a joke.
Comment by gdad — February 23, 2012 @ 9:19 am
Why not just replace the stars on the US Flag with a big Dollar Sign wearing a Crown of Thorns being Crucified on the cross?
Comment by scott — February 23, 2012 @ 11:04 am
Ron Paul’s vendetta against the Federal Reserve and belief that all banking should be deregulated and that we don’t need a central bankin system was settled when we threw out the Artidles of Confederation and adopted a Constitution. His screwball Ayn Rand look alike theories on finance would be disastous and woul go a long ways toward sending us back to the days of a bunch of loosely affiliated independent states. There are no 2nd amendment rights that are worth destroying our country for.
That kind of tunnel vision is what makss the religious zealots and any people who believe that only their opinion is right and compromise is a dirty word so dangerous to our survival as a nation.
Comment by dave — February 23, 2012 @ 11:25 am
I don’t see Benito Mussolini on the list, but he would fit right in.
Comment by dobbs — February 23, 2012 @ 12:35 pm
“That kind of tunnel vision is what makes the “ANTI religious” zealots and any people who believe that only their opinion is right and compromise is a dirty word so dangerous to our survival as a nation”.
Well spoken Dave — Add ANTI in front of religious and you have a perfect description of liberals.
And this celebrated post of the day brought to you by someone who thinks the current administration is simply “the bomb”. HILARIOUS!!!
Comment by will — February 23, 2012 @ 1:15 pm
The difference “will” is that I am not anti religious, I am just opposed to allowing religious extremists have the right to impose their beliefs and their agenda on people with different beliefs through use of the political system and government in violation of our long standing tradition of separation of church and state. And second, I have always believed in compromise and so do the people who currently inhabit the White House and the Executive branch. The problem has been that the Republicans have said my way or the highway and refused to c0ompromise on any reasonable combination of cuts and additional revenues to deal with the deficit and have attempted to tie every effort to accomplish anything to some social agenda to satisfy their fringe right constituents.
Comment by dave — February 23, 2012 @ 1:44 pm
#18 dave, add will to the list of people who just won’t ever get it. Anti-religious and anti having religion forced on everybody are different things.
Comment by gdad — February 23, 2012 @ 2:07 pm
“Governing is about putting the nation above your self interests and right wingers cannot separate the two.”
Like insisting that the government protect you “right” to not feel uncomfortable around guns.
“There are no 2nd amendment rights that are worth destroying our country for.”
Yet with no Second Amendment rights, our country will be destroyed… from the top down.
“Republicans…..have attempted to tie every effort to accomplish anything to some social agenda to satisfy their fringe right constituents.”
I agree with the meat of that post, but know that what constitutes “fringe rights” to some are essential rights to others.
Comment by John Wilburn — February 23, 2012 @ 2:10 pm
“Rand and Ron Paul and certainly right wingers like Cuccinelli are not capable of real leadership.”
Do you honestly consider Obama to be a real leader?
Comment by John Wilburn — February 23, 2012 @ 4:04 pm
#21 John Wilburn – I thought I saw quite a few posts of yours on another thread regarding gun control. Lots of people hawking the premise that President Obama somehow would take away what they perceive as their 2nd Amendment right to
bear arms.
Can’t you even give the President recognition for “leadership”when he bucks his own constituency with
“A bill that Obama signed in May [2008] permits licensed gun owners to bring firearms into national parks and wildlife refuges as long as state law allows it. The new law, which takes effect in February [2009], will replace rules from the Reagan administration that generally require that guns in national parks be locked or stored in a glove compartment or trunk.” http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/obama_chided_for_allowing_guns.html
Honest criticism is one thing, but sometimes acknowledging when the President does not make a political football out of something which seems near and dear to you and others – gun advocacy. I believe one should give credit where credit is due – it certainly did not make his “base” happy…and IMHO the President in that instance and many others has clearly shown leadership, not partisanship – you of course have a right to disagree…
Comment by Hillary — February 23, 2012 @ 6:51 pm
Will, being anti-Theocracy is not “anti-religious”, you need to learn the difference.
John Wilburn, I have not insisted the government protect my right “to not feel uncomfortable around guns”. I am not uncomfortable around guns. I am not sure how many times I have to repeat this, but I am always glad to do so. I am uncomfortable around idiots with guns and nothing the government has done has fixed that problem and much of what gun advocates have done has made it more likely.
Yes, I believe President Obama is a leader, and a good one. I am sorry that right wing heads imploded upon his election, that honesty has become forbidden in right wing media and that facts, truth and the American Way have been sacrificed so willingly just to defeat him, but none of that is his fault. All he did is become an American success story and a world icon, more than good enough for me.
Comment by Sandi Saunders — February 23, 2012 @ 8:27 pm
Hillary, thanks for being polite in your disagreement.
“A bill that Obama signed in May [2008] permits licensed gun owners to bring firearms into national parks and wildlife refuges as long as state law allows it. The new law, which takes effect in February [2009],”
Is my math off here? Nonetheless, that was a concession he made, but it only works with the states that don’t prohibit carry anyway. To have more teeth it needed to preempt the states from banning carry there in the first place. I admit, he hasn’t come after guns in the first term and as we have already discussed, time will tell on the second. I still don’t believe he cares about our Second Amendment rights and will undermine them if reelecteed. The word is now that he is going to try to bring back the “assault weapon” ban.
http://patdollard.com/2012/02/holder-admits-obama-administration-is-adamant-to-re-implement-assault-weapons-ban/
As for leadership, over-the-top shamelessly spending our country bankrupt is not leadership. Leadership is a quality sadly lacking in politics today. I watched the Republican debate last night and each of the candidates was given a good amount of time to think of one word that describes him. I heard “consistent”, “cheerful”, and two others I can’t really remember. Sadly, I did not hear “leader”. Obama is not a leader and apparently, he isn’t going to be competing against one either.
Comment by John Wilburn — February 23, 2012 @ 8:29 pm
Sandi,
will actually is an anti-theocrat. He just doesn’t realize it.
Comment by Dan Casey — February 23, 2012 @ 9:53 pm
For the life of my I can’t understand the argument that Obama is going to go after guns once he’s a lame duck. If anything, he’ll have less power at that time, not more.
I also don’t understand the contention that he’ll be able to rewrite the constitution to exclude the Second Amendment. Can someone explain this to me, please?
Does he have a devious plan to trick Congress into passing enabling legislation that would give him such powers? Do you honestly believe that people like Morgan Griffith and Bob Goodlatte are so stupid that they would let it happen? (For the record, I don’t think they’re that dumb).
Comment by Dan Casey — February 23, 2012 @ 10:01 pm
#24 John W, you DO realize, don’t you, that the budget plans so far of both Santorum and Newty will increase our deficit even more than it is now under Obama?
Comment by gdad — February 23, 2012 @ 10:13 pm
“I also don’t understand the contention that he’ll be able to rewrite the constitution to exclude the Second Amendment. Can someone explain this to me, please?”
I didn’t make that contention, but I think he has no respect for it. Sotomayor’s appointment alone shows that. 2A isn’t safe… look what happened to 4A. As for Morgan Griffith not letting that happen, he supported a flawed HR822 national right to carry legislation that wasn’t clear about the scope of the federal government’s ability to regulate handgun carry. Despite first meeting him at a gun show, I don’t blindly trust Griffith to keep him in check. Our gun rights are far too important to take lightly.
Comment by John Wilburn — February 23, 2012 @ 10:24 pm
From your posts John Wilburn, it appears that you believe ALL of our rights under the Constitution and the Bill of Rights depend upon unfettered right to carry firearms. That in a modern world, your right to carry a handgun would protect you and the citizenry from despots, dictators, and all powerful government iontent on destroying your roight to carry. Get real. The peashooters that you are pinning your life on would be overwhelmed in an instant by modern technology and weaponry. All these things do is give you and others a false sense of security You are far more likely to have your “rights” and “freedoms” usurped and taken away by the economic power of the growing plutocracy or the paranoiac ravings of those who would turn us into a theocracy than by a government coming after your guns. When guns become the all important thing and the sole reason for evaluating a person’s leadership skills or choosing elected officials, then we are truly in trouble.
Comment by dave — February 24, 2012 @ 2:39 am
#28 I have to agree, John W, that the U.S. wouldn’t be nearly as much fun if we didn’t have so many gunshot deaths per year. I don’t know how most all of the other civilized nations in the world stand it with such a paucity of firearms.
Comment by gdad — February 24, 2012 @ 8:22 am
Santorum’s asinine statement of the day(he makes one every day) was the meme that he continues in attacking educatin. Today it was higher education in his sights. The gist of his remark was that 60% of today’s high school graduates are going to colege and that this is destroying America. The reason: All those liberal professors are indoctrinating our young people in secularism and attacking our religious foundations. Each day he puts one more nail in the coffin that has bexcome his candidacy.
Let’s just keep all those youngsters home and keep ‘em ignorant so they’ll all vote for RW Republicans.
Comment by dave — February 24, 2012 @ 8:18 pm
John Wilburn. Do you not think President Obama showed leadership on the what is called a “bailout” for the American auto industry? [Why is it called a bailout when the government subsidizes an industry that employs millions, while big oil or coal, including AEP, are "subsidized" to put more money into the corporate coffers?] Had he listened to the Republicans, millions more would be unemployed, and Chrysler would be left to go through bankruptcy – and one must note, that no private sector entity was willing to advance money to Chrysler Corp. Had they gone bankrupt, the President would have been blamed – the unemployment numbers would have been greater. I believe, and you might disagree, that in and of itself, demonstrated leadership – the President recognized the Republicans would and continue to, point to this as “big” government. And yet, at the end of the day, this was the right move for the industry and those they employ.
I also contend that but for the unnecessary war in Iraq, under the former president’s “leadership”, our economic situation would be far better. The $1 trillion cost to taxpayers for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq weakened the US economy, not to mention what the banks and Wall St got away with…
It was a deep hole the President had to climb out of, and in my opinion, the massive deficit and war spending became an albatross around the neck of the economy.
Comment by Hillary — February 24, 2012 @ 8:52 pm
“A bill that Obama signed in May [2008] permits licensed gun owners to bring firearms into national parks and wildlife refuges as long as state law allows it. The new law, which takes effect in February [2009], will replace rules from the Reagan administration that generally require that guns in national parks be locked or stored in a glove compartment or trunk.” http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2009/08/obama_chided_for_allowing_guns.html
I think GW Bush was still president in May 2008. The bill Obama signed was in May 2009.
Comment by Ron — February 24, 2012 @ 9:02 pm
Quite correct Ron. My date screw-up.
Comment by Hillary — February 24, 2012 @ 10:11 pm
“Had he listened to the Republicans, millions more would be unemployed”
This business of creating jobs for the sake of creating jobs or saving unsustainable jobs where there is no market justification is part of the problem. Let the market create the jobs. It’s best for long-term economic health; it just hurts the votes one receives at the polls.
Comment by John Wilburn — February 25, 2012 @ 1:24 am
“When guns become the all important thing and the sole reason for evaluating a person’s leadership skills or choosing elected officials, then we are truly in trouble.”
You’re right. We’re just about there.
Comment by John Wilburn — February 25, 2012 @ 1:26 am
Cooch has done nothing to denigrate his own character to the levels that Holder did with his work on the Marc Rich pardon…..NOTHING. In fact, Cooch could give back tons more illegal money and STILL be a much more virtuous person than Holder.
Comment by Phil Chitwood — February 25, 2012 @ 9:55 am
John Wiburn, the problem sometimes isn’t that there is no market justification for an economic intervention, it’s that there is no market, period. That was the case in the auto bailout, where there was no operative market for large scale subprime corporate debt in early 2009. Whether the private sector felt loans to Detroit were justifiable was in an important way irrelevant, because there were none being made, not even to far healthier companies in other industries. It was a post-market forces environment, with larger forces overwhelming economic market forces. The only way that state of affairs (frozen credit markets) remained a product of economic market forces was as the end result of allowing UNREGULATED choices, until the entire market reached an entropic state of complete disfunction. The goal of regulation is simply to put the worst of human nature at a disadvantage, whether it is in swindling credit markets with subprime derivatives, or gun policy.
Comment by Warren — February 25, 2012 @ 12:53 pm
You’ve convinced me. There is a tipping point and we do appear dangerously near it. There are 10 Amendments in the Bill of Rights, let’s all pick one and divide the nation to champion it. What a great country that will create! Then we have the other Amendments, all those Sections and Articles, wow, we can fight each other forever! Game on. United States of America…not so much.
Comment by Sandi Saunders — February 25, 2012 @ 1:04 pm
Phil, Cuccinelli has used his office for his own personal religious and political agenda and according to you Holder has used his connections for his political gain or agenda too, sounds more like peas in a pod than people who have virtue IMO.
Comment by Sandi Saunders — February 25, 2012 @ 1:13 pm
“Phil, Cuccinelli has used his office for his own personal religious and political agenda and according to you Holder has used his connections for his political gain or agenda too, sounds more like peas in a pod than people who have virtue IMO.”
How in the world could securing a pardon for Marc Rich further anyone’s political agenda?? Absolutely no one has even tried to defend that pardon. For Holder to risk his political ascention with this pardon, and he certainly did risk it, there could only be some stealth personal gain awaiting him. Holder must have done this for the most old fashioned reason….personal enrichment.
Cooch has done nothing to denigrate his own character to the levels that Holder did with his work on the Marc Rich pardon.
Comment by Phil Chitwood — February 25, 2012 @ 4:34 pm
I agree with Phil C that the Marc Rich pardon was unconscionable. It’s clear that the blame for that, though, belongs with Clinton. Rich’s wife bought a pardon from the president in exchange for raising $450k or so for his foundation, $1.1 million for the Democratic party, and more. Clinton, not Holder, granted the pardon.
Does anyone truly believe that Clinton would not have pardoned Rich were it not for Holder’s “neutral, leaning toward favorable” recommendation?
Comment by Dan Casey — February 25, 2012 @ 4:58 pm
But Dan, Holder was the tool that Clinton used….a willing tool , at that. I wonder how many people Clinton asked to ramrod this thing thru before he found someone to say yes.(Admittedly, few were in a high enough position to actually help.)
It just makes you scratch your head and wonder why. Speculating only, when Clinton got busted with “all those FBI files of Republicans”….only, that is a misnomer. There were many FBI files of Democrats too! You never know when you might need those!
Phil channeling Clinton, “Eric, ramrod Rich’s pardon through, ot I’ll release you FBI file.”
In the interest of full disclosure, Rich’s attourney during all his fugitive mess was……..Scooter Libby.
Comment by Phil Chitwood — February 25, 2012 @ 6:15 pm