some politics bullshit

ok, this time i just want to talk about some politics bullshit. first of all, the heroic rep. dennis kucinich of ohio successfully got an impeachment resolution on the floor of the house and after majority leader major league asshole steny hoyer tried to kill the measure, the republicans, ironically enough, voted to keep the impeachment resolution alive, wrongly thinking that it would make the democrats look bad. in the end, the democrats all voted to send the articles of impeachment to the house judiciary committee, headed by john conyers, and the republicans all voted against that. oh, and this impeachment is against dick cheney, not george w. bush. anyway, the media barely covered the fact that the impeachment of dick cheney has begun, and the few pieces they did do all ridiculed dennis kucinich and the idea of impeachment. so in a way the republicans were right when they thought this would make democrats look bad. although a majority of americans favor beginning impeachment proceedings against dick cheney, the media is badly out of touch with america, and things that most americans think of as common sense seem ridiculous and stupid to the out-of-touch elitists in the media.

now the democrats did manage to override a veto of president bush’s for the first time. of course, all of bush’s vetoes so far have been completely unjustified and wrong and everything he vetoed should have been passed into law. this includes things like stem cell research, ending the war in iraq, and the state childrens’ health insurance program. bush’s justifications for vetoes are always full of lies and misinformation but it seems the crazy weirdos in the bush white house actually believe all the bullshit they say. like for the childrens’ health insurance, there were lies about how the program let adults and illegal immigrants and people in the upper middle class collect benefits, all of which were completely untrue. and some republicans in congress actually told the truth about how they oppose any government involvement in healthcare, rather than hiding behind lies and bullshit like the majority of the republicans, who falsely claimed they wanted to renew the program. so anyway, this veto override was a water projects bill, which authorizes many government-sponsored projects all around the country, all related to water, most notably in the areas affected by hurricane katrina, and in the everglades of florida. the bill (actually a law now) authorized all these programs but did not provide any funding for them; they have to be funded separately (but actually they do not have to be funded; congress can decide to only fund some of them or only fund them partially). so really there was no reason to veto this water projects bill since despite bush’s lies, the bill did not contain any spending, but rather authorized future legislation to contain spending. more recently, since this veto override, the house passed a tax bill without a single republican voting in favor. the tax bill would eliminate the alternative minimum tax, a tax which neither party likes and everyone wants to eliminate, and pay for this by raising the taxes on hedge fund and private equity fund managers from the capital gains tax rate to the income tax rate (which is over twice as high, at least for rich people). i am not sure of the exact figures, but i think i read that something like 26 million people would get a tax cut by having their alternative minimum tax eliminated, and only 50,000 people would get a tax increase because they are private equity or hedge fund managers. something like that, those numbers might be different. anyway, that is like 500 times as many people getting a tax cut as a tax increase. but the republicans, liars that they are, continually called this measure a tax increase, even though it would only be a tax increase for a very small number of very wealthy people who pay hardly any taxes under the current law, and all the bill does is make them pay their fair share just like everybody else, instead of getting away with tax evasion by taking advantage of legal loopholes in the current tax law. time and time again, republicans prove that they only care about the ultra-super-mega-wealthy and nobody else. then again, who do you think donates all the money to republican campaigns? republicans trick ordinary people into supporting a tax system that favors the wealthy by tricking people into thinking they have more than a snowball’s chance in hell of becoming wealthy someday. since people are tricked into thinking they may someday become wealthy, they incorrectly vote for politicians who help the super-wealthy and hurt everyone else. and those people never become wealthy; they only think they will become wealthy. wealth is becoming concentrated in the hands of fewer and fewer individuals, and the gap between the rich and poor continues to widen. republicans promote policies that make this gap even worse, thus creating a situation where class warfare may at some point in time occur, with poor people taking up arms and stealing all the things that belong to the wealthy, at gunpoint, in a mass uprising of thieves. the only thing protecting the wealthy from this is the government and its police and laws (and maybe bodyguards and home security systems too). anyway, one of the main purposes of government appears to be to protect the wealthy from having any of their wealth stolen from them by those who are less fortunate. so it is perfectly reasonable for the government to collect taxes in exchange for protecting the wealthy from the angry masses who despise them. the wealthy should be happy to pay the taxes, since they do not really need the money anyway since they have too much to even spend, and the government will use it to protect them from anyone who wishes them harm. now the mindless idiot republicans all want to eliminate the alternative minimum tax without any tax increase or spending cut to prevent this from increasing the budget deficit and the national debt. why are they such mindless idiots? well they fail to realize that any tax cut that occurs now will cause a decrease in government revenue but no change in government spending, thus increasing the budget deficit, which will be added to the national debt, and then the government will have to pay all the money back, with interest... very high interest. in other words, any tax cut that occurs now will require a much bigger tax increase in the future, to pay for it. future generations will bear the burden of paying off the mountain of debt accumulated by short-sighted politicians who cannot manage money. neither party is good at managing money, but republicans have proven themselves time and time again to be the worst possible stewards of our nation’s finances, continually cutting taxes and raising spending to create ever-higher deficits and debts that future generations will need to pay off. all of the republican propaganda about cutting spending along with taxes and being fiscally conservative turned out to be complete and utter bullshit, and republican politicians in washington deserve no trust whatsoever from anyone. well, most of them at least... there may be a few good republicans, but i doubt it.

and that takes us to rep. ron paul, republican of texas, a congressman running for president. i have observed that all over the area i live, someone or a group of people have posted ron paul for president signs pretty much everywhere. all over the internet, whenever people are posting things about which presidential candidate they support, ron paul gets way more support than anyone else. the other day at work i saw someone wearing a ron paul button. on c-span it seems most of the callers who call in are ron paul supporters. and i have read about how on every college campus, ron paul has a much greater number of students organized to support him than any other candidate. i find all of this pretty puzzling, since this dude is a republican after all, and he supports all of the policies that favor the wealthy, and opposes universal health care as well as most existing government programs, and is anti-abortion. he is pretty unique as a republican, opposing the war in iraq and the patriot act and supporting the constitution. but he wants to take the united states out of the united nations. and he has the support of the john birch society and all the right-wing conspiracy theorists, as well as many neo-nazis such as david duke. of course, i do not really believe in guilt by association to the extent that garnering support from bad people is a bad thing. after all, the communist party of the united states did everything it could to get john kerry elected in 2004, but that should not reflect badly on john kerry. just because all the neo-nazis support ron paul, that does not necessarily mean anything bad. but ron paul is more than a little wacko. i support dennis kucinich, the guy who is trying to impeach dick cheney. dennis kucinich also voted against the iraq war and the patriot act like ron paul, but kucinich is a progressive and supports universal health care and does not want to dismantle most government agencies like ron paul. a vote for ron paul is a vote to dismantle the federal government of the united states of america. he is a libertarian, which is very very close to anarchist, except libertarians want to leave behind an itty bitty little government that is just barely big enough to prevent any other government from forming. ron paul wants to dismantle the entire public education system and replace all public schools with private schools. kinda wacky. now the only thing really weird about dennis kucinich, besides the fact that he has a really really hot new wife who has her tongue pierced and a british accent, is that he claims to have seen a ufo. also, recently dennis kucinich speculated that president bush is insane, and that got some media attention, but i agree, bush is insane. anyway, this ufo thing is the only thing about rep. kucinich that really gives me pause, besides his low poll numbers (but ron paul has low poll numbers too, in the official conspiracy polls). anyway, rep. kucinich simply said that he couldn’t identify what the flying object was; he did not say it was aliens or anything. it could have just been a plane or helicopter or bird, or a funny-looking weird-shaped dark cloud. so i don’t really think it should be too big of a deal. so he saw something weird in the sky and couldn’t tell what it was? so what? i still think he is the best candidate. and his hot wife would make the best first lady evar! now i keep hearing how more and more democrats are backing hillary clinton, and more and more republicans are backing rudy giuliani. and rudy’s closest associate, bernard kerik, who was police commissioner when rudy was mayor of nyc and was a business partner of rudy’s after he stopped being mayor and was recommended by rudy to be secretary of homeland security, this bernard kerik guy, guess what, he is a complete crook, and was arrested and indicted for a long list of very serious crimes. and rudy giuliani comes from a mafia crime family (although he did become a prosecutor and fight the mafia despite his own mafia upbringing). his own dad was in the mafia. anyway, rudy giuliani has the support of pat robertson, despite giuliani being pro-abortion and pro-homosexuality. apparently, the issues that pat robertson has claimed are most important to him, for many years, are not important to him at all anymore. so pat robertson has basically proven himself to be a right-wing republican political hack and not really a religious leader at all, just a complete fraud. all of the religious beliefs he claimed to have... well... they don’t matter anymore and pat robertson is supporting a candidate who goes against everything he claims to believe in. well, rudy giuliani, with friends like bernard kerik and pat robertson, who needs enemies? as for hillary clinton, she is the most conservative of all the democratic candidates... the establishment candidate... the one who will maintain the status quo in washington, d.c. and by the way, washington, d.c. is the most undemocratic place evar! its residents cannot vote for representatives in congress or the senate. they have no representation! and their city government has its powers limited because politicians in congress get to make laws that only affect the district of columbia, and they actually use it as an experimental testing ground for new right-wing policies that the residents of washington, d.c. oppose (or at least, they did so under the republican congress for many years). the residents of our nation’s capital do, luckily, get to vote for a mayor and city council, and they do get to vote for president of the united states. but they need representation in congress! why do they lack this? pure politics... and pure racism. since the city is full of black people who vote democrat, there is no way in hell republicans want washington, d.c. residents to have any more political power, or any representation in congress. just remember what kayne west said on national tv after hurricane katrina: “george bush doesn’t care about black people.” if the republicans actually gave a damn about black people, they could show it by letting black people in washington, d.c. have representation in the house and the senate. by staunchly opposing voting rights for residents of our nation’s capital, republicans have shown their pettiness and their racism. and they have failed to uphold the principle our nation was founded on, “no taxation without representation”. residents of washington, d.c. should not have to pay any taxes based on laws passed by a congress that they have no representation in. residents of puerto rico pay no income taxes. there should be no taxes in washington, d.c. except those going to the city government, until its residents get voting representatives in both houses of congress. anyway, i am sure dennis kucinich supports full voting rights for residents of washington, d.c. i will still support him, even as i observe all the media saying hillary clinton and rudy giuliani both have their respective nominations lined up, even as i observe that in actuality, ron paul has way more supporters than anyone else, but this is being covered up by the media. the thing that disturbs me most about the ron paul phenomenon is that people are changing their party registration to republican just to vote for him in the primary. that is all well and good in the short term, but what if these people actually end up becoming loyal republicans, after they officially join the republican party with their voter registration? i certainly hope none of these people changing their registration to republican actually plan on supporting any republicans besides ron paul. haven’t we as a nation let the republicans do enough damage? as for the democrats... well... the democratic leadership certainly tries quite hard to repress people like dennis kucinich. they keep funding the war, they take impeachment off the table... and some of the failures of the republican congress that preceded the democratic congress continue to this day, such as not getting any of the regular funding bills passed. a bill needs 60 senators to get through the senate, and if the president opposes something, it needs a 2/3 majority in both houses. but that is no excuse for all the failures of the democratic congress. and these failures are the responsibility of the leadership of both houses, not the rank-and-file members. what is with all the bills that pass one of the 2 houses of congress but not the other? why can’t the leaders of the 2 houses pass the same bills in both houses? i think congress has gone from working 2 days a week to 3 days a week, or something like that. i am glad they increased it, but they should really be working 7 days a week, and have no vacations at all. they should be passing 100 times as many bills as they do now. they need to be worked like slaves. after all, they are “public servants”, and as a member of the public, i demand service from my servants! do whatever i say! i am your master! impeach the president and vice president, remove them from office, end the war in iraq, and pass universal health care... or else! and as for what is going on in turkey, did you notice that general pervez musharraf justified his actions based on a supposed threat of terrorism that he claims justifies taking away individuals’ civil liberties, and on “judicial activism”? sounds just like the republicans! if the democrats had not been elected in 2006, we would probably be headed on the same path towards dictatorship just like pakistan, and we would have permanent one-party rule just like communist china. the “permanent majority” of karl rove. and the doctrines of “executive privilege” and the “unitary executive theory” are both euphemisms for “totalitarian dictator”, by the way. executives have the privilege to do whatever the hell they want, under the unitary executive theory, with no oversight by anyone else, and they are not answerable to any courts, and any courts who dare challenge violations of the constitution are “activist judges” who need to be removed and replaced with judges who will always side in favor of government power and the executive branch. the bush administration keeps all its legal opinions secret, and tries to keep pretty much everything secret, because they have something to hide, or rather, many, many things to hide. if they had nothing to hide they would not try to keep everything so secret, after all, since all it does is make them look guilty as hell. it is ridiculous that they cannot even reveal whether they consider waterboarding to be torture and whether they think waterboarding is legal or illegal. they should all be impeached, removed from office, and tried and convicted for treason! now i am not an extremist. i do not advocate the death penalty for these cases of treason. i think life in prison without parole would be enough punishment for the likes of bush and cheney, even though that is not the maximum sentence. after all, these people do not know the difference between right and wrong, so they could use the insanity defense, and it would be valid. so perhaps we should just try and convict them of treason, let them use the insanity defense, and then put them in psychiatric hospitals for the rest of their lives. but how many bush administration officials deserve such punishment? just bush and cheney? or how about others like don rumsfeld, john ashcroft, alberto gonzales, condi rice, etc.? if we put all of them in psychiatric hospitals, there would be overcrowding, because there are so many bush administration officials! so we should probably just focus on the most high-level cases and let the lower-level ones get off with maybe a fine of $100 trillion each instead of prison. of course bush and cheney should also have to pay the fine too, along with their lifelong imprisonment. unfortunately, it seems these criminals will probably get away with their crimes and their countless violations of the constitution, with no punishment. hopefully we can at least make their lives miserable for the rest of their lives, somehow. like you know how, after o.j. simpson was acquitted for murder, everywhere he went, people yelled “murderer” at him? well we can probably just treat everyone from the bush administration like o.j. simpson once they are out of office. and foreign governments can treat them like henry kissinger (who cannot travel anywhere because of all the countries who have legal cases pending against him for crimes against humanity). they ought to be kept under house arrest, at the very least, like pervez musharraf has done to benazir bhutto. it is hard thinking of a punishment that fits the crimes of the bush administration. oh, i got it! we can just send them all to iraq, and leave them there, with no passports or return flight home! that is the ultimate punishment, the same one condi rice is trying to do to the diplomats of the state department! perfect!