Tag: Political Tactics

Please! BBQ His Butt!

I have made no bones about the fact that I do not support Bubba Clinton nor his wife, Hillary…..my dislike comes from the policies he enacted as prez and I feel Hillary will follow the same path…..I just do not trust the Clintons as far as I could spit them…….

I said in the past that if Bernie were to become a threat to her then the dirty tricks will rise to the top of the soup…..and that prediction was fairly accurate……

In the recent Massachusetts primary the bag of tricks was flung open….

Hours before his wife was named the Massachusetts primary winner on Super Tuesday, apparent political novice Bill Clinton strolled into a polling station in Boston. Standing with Mayor Marty Walsh at the Holy Name Parish School, Clinton greeted poll staff and voters and even kissed an elderly woman on the head, reports Boston.com. When one woman asked to take a photo with him, he responded, “as long as we’re not violating any election laws,” reports MassLive.com. He might have done just that. The office of Massachusetts’ Secretary of State William Galvin notes Hillary Clinton’s campaign had to be “reminded” that state election rules bar the solicitation of a vote within 150 feet of a polling location.

The former president had also entered a polling station in Newton, reports the Boston Globe. When asked if his presence alone was a violation, a rep said, “He’s a well-known person and he’s a spouse of a candidate. That should answer the question.” Galvin, however, says Clinton was permitted in polling stations as long as he didn’t solicit votes. “We just took the extra precaution of telling them because this is not a usual occurrence,” he tells the New York Times. Galvin adds Clinton is “not from here so he may not know” the rules, noting penalties are only dished out in cases of “absolute disobedience,” per CBS Boston. A rep for Walsh says he and Clinton “were not campaigning inside the polling location.”

I said that there sshould be some action taken to stop Bubba and his merry band of cronies from pulling these tricks…..I asked for it………I got it!

More than 106,000 people have signed a Change.org petition calling for “the immediate arrest of President Bill Clinton” for allegedly violating Massachusetts election laws. On Super Tuesday, Clinton was seen glad-handing voters and volunteers—and even kissing an elderly woman—at polling places. The problem? Campaigning within 150 feet of a polling place is illegal in Massachusetts, the Daily Dot reports. Clinton’s behavior led to a flurry of complaints, but Bernie Sanders supporter Veronica Wolski of Chicago decided to do something about it, creating the petition. “I am so grateful that so many saw the same injustice I did and are taking a stand to correct this,” she says.

Massachusetts’ secretary of state has already said Clinton was allowed to be at the polling places as long as he wasn’t soliciting votes. But Wolski points out that he isn’t a Massachusetts voter and would have no reason to be there other than campaigning for his wife. However, there are a few problems with Wolski’s petition to have Clinton arrested (other than its misspelling of the current president’s name as O’Bama). One, it’s addressed to the wrong state official. Two, MassLive reports the punishment for campaigning at a polling place is a stiff $20 fine. Hillary Clinton beat Sanders in Massachusetts 50% to 49%

I warned my readers to watch for the dirty tricks that the Clinton excel at……time to put Bubba in his place…..

Are You Afraid Of The Dark?

I have been writing about the use of fear as a political weapon for some time now…how it can be used to win elections, even the presidency…..and how it used to keep the American people ignorant of facts….look at the current economic slowdown….here in the US we are told by pundits that if we do not cut taxes then we could be the next Greece…..that could possibly be true, but NO one knows for sure….however it is used to get concessions on the political road……

The “Dark” I have in my title is the tactic of terror….and this is also a tool for political gain….from economic policy to foreign policy…..but what is all this use of “fear” and “terror” doing to the American public?  What is it doing to the world?

Indeed, politicians have known for thousands of years that playing the fear card gives them more power and makes their subjects more compliant:

“This and no other is the root from which a tyrant springs; when he first appears he is a protector.”
– Plato

“If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.”
– U.S. President James Madison

“Terrorism is the best political weapon for nothing drives people harder than a fear of sudden death”.
– Adolph Hitler

“Why of course the people don’t want war … But after all it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship … Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is to tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.”
– Hermann Goering, Nazi leader.

“The easiest way to gain control of a population is to carry out acts of terror. [The public] will clamor for such laws if their personal security is threatened”.
– Josef Stalin

But do we have cause to be afraid?

National Safety Council notes:

– You are 17,600 times more likely to die from heart disease than from a terrorist attack

– You are 12,571 times more likely to die from cancer than from a terrorist attack

– You are 11,000 times more likely to die in an airplane accident than from a terrorist plot involving an airplane

– You are 1048 times more likely to die from a car accident than from a terrorist attack

–You are 404 times more likely to die in a fall than from a terrorist attack

– You are 87 times more likely to drown than die in a terrorist attack

– You are 13 times more likely to die in a railway accident than from a terrorist attack

–You are 12 times more likely to die from accidental suffocation in bed than from a terrorist attack

–You are 9 times more likely to choke to death on your own vomit than die in a terrorist attack

–You are 8 times more likely to be killed by a police officer than by a terrorist

–You are 8 times more likely to die from accidental electrocution than from a terrorist attack

– You are 6 times more likely to die from hot weather than from a terrorist attack

With all that said…..we Americans are still afraid of the dark and anytime someone tries to dissuade people from their fear, then they labelled and condemned….ignorance is fear’s best friend!  For fear cannot exist without ignorance……….therefore ignorance must be cultivated for fear to live on.

Personally, I refuse to succumb to fear and will definite NOT let ignorance win the day……but then…I can read a book!

How About The Hate Speech!

With all the hoopla in Wisconsin, I have heard many conserv pundits like Joe Scarborough of MSNBC scold the Left and the media for not calling out the protesters in Madison for all the hate speech that is flying around….they want the media to weigh in like they did during the summer of discontent (2010) of the Tea Party and similar groups……tghey say that the media is NOT being fair by their silence…..

OK, let me be one of the first….as soon as I see Walker caricature as a clown or Hitler or Stalin, I will be there to condemn it…..as soon as I see Wisconsin protesters totting guns and calling for some sort of violence, I will yell the loudest…..as soon as I hear or see a protester wearing a mask of Walker and calling him a fascist you will hear me….(I am NOT saying that some of this is NOT going on….just I have not seen it)

So far all the scenes that I have watched have signs calling for a return to democracy or support for unions or a call for people to get involved….that sort of stuff……NO guns…No Hitler signs…..No joker signs…..No….well you get it……and so far the people interviewed have been polite for the most part…they have given facts (as they see them) and call for a return to sanity….

I have NOT witnessed anything near the crap spread by the Tea Party and its supporters back last summer…basically, all the hoopla in the conserv press is part of the right wing agenda….they are losing the battle in Wisconsin and want to find someone to blame….the media is a convenient bad guy

Conservs cannot justify their attacks on labor and they are pissed and will refuse to accept that they are mostly wrong……or that it was a fool’s choice to fight this battle….

So….where is the hate speech?  Granted I am not there and may have missed something but neither are the pundits on the news…….

There is NO hate speech coming out of Wisconsin except from those that do NOT like seeing Americans stand for something……..Get over it!  I pray that it is contagious and for more issues than just labor……Working and average Americans need to take their country back….from special interests and from those that do NOT want a vocal majority…..

The Mouth Stays!

By now we all have heard the words uttered by Rep. Barton as an apology to BP for making them contribute to a claims fund….it case you missed it…

“I think it’s a tragedy of the first proportion that a private corporation can be subjected to what I would call a shakedown,” the Texan said. “In this case a $20 billion shakedown.” Barton said the administration has no authority to ask for this “$20 billion slush fund” and that litigation provides adequate due process for awarding damages.

“I apologize,” he said to Hayward. “I do not want to live in a country where every time a corporation does something wrong, it’s subject to a political process that amounts to a shakedown.”

After he made his now infamous apology the GOP scrambled to be on record to saying that he, Barton, did not speak for the Party.  After a meeting with the minority leader of the House, Barton came out and made an apology, sort of, it was nothing to remember.

The point was made that he was the ranking member of the GOP on the Energy Committee and if the Repubs win back the House then he would be the chairman of that committee.  Well the GOP had a meeting whether to strip him of is position or not and the votes are in….

House Republicans agreed Wednesday to keep Arlington Rep. Joe Barton as the party’s senior voice on energy policy, after one more apology – a private one to his colleagues – for the uproar he stirred last week by apologizing to oil giant BP.

“This issue is closed,” said House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio, who downplayed the episode as a “distraction” from discredited Democratic energy policies.

Now knowing that his words will show up a bunch of 30 second during this and future campaign ads for the Dems….why would they chance the fact that this could weigh heavy at the polls?

To me…Barton said openly what the rest of the cowards will not admit…..that they feel the same and if possible will do everything they can to stop the bleeding of money from BP.  They, the GOP, wants to keep an oil friendly guy on the Energy Committee, especially one that is in line for the chairmanship.

The GOP’s true colors will emerge as soon as they think it will not bite them in the butt at election time….my bet is that they will be on the side of BP in the near future.

Here Comes The “Fear” Card (Again)

Once again the RNC will use the “fear” card as a draw for fund raising….they were outed by a dummie that left the material behind in a hotel room and it came into the hands of Politico…….

The Republican National Committee plans to raise money this election cycle through an aggressive campaign capitalizing on “fear” of President Barack Obama and a promise to “save the country from trending toward socialism.”

The strategy was detailed in a confidential party fundraising presentation, obtained by POLITICO, which also outlines how “ego-driven” wealthy donors can be tapped with offers of access and “tchochkes.”

The presentation was delivered by RNC Finance Director Rob Bickhart to top donors and fundraisers at a party retreat in Boca Grande, Florida on February 18, a source at the gathering said.

In neat PowerPoint pages, it lifts the curtain on the often-cynical terms of political marketing, displaying an air of disdain for the party’s donors that is usually confined to the barroom conversations of political operatives.

The presentation explains the Republican fundraising in simple terms.

Once again the RNC and those who buy into this form of propaganda are NOT working in the best interests of the country….yes, Bush was a caricature many times….that does not make it right and I do not seem to recall those same caricatures used as a fund raising tool……this is just wrong on so many levels…and of course, no one contacted in the RNC knew anything about this smear campaign…..

It is a childish attempt to scare the living Hell outta the base……but maybe that type of immaturity plays well with conservatives…..after all they do HATE intellectuals or anyone with half a brain….

Open Letter To Congress #2

As anyone who visits Info Ink will testify that I am an opinionated SOB and have NO problem tell it like it is, or at least as it looks to me….this will be the second open letter that I will have sent to Congress…it is just my small attempt to let the guys and gals in Washington know how frustrated most Americans are at this point in time…..I am an equal opportunity trasher…it will go to Dems as well as Repubs….for both are equally as guilty as the other for the situation we Americans are facing…..

To The “Honorable” Members Of Congress:

We, the people, have been subjected to a political theater of the absurd and it is beyond time for this turkey to give a final curtain call.  Dear Members you are NOT acting in the best interest of the country and its people.  You are not acting as the good faith representatives that you were elected to be…..you were elected to serve the country, I repeat, serve the country not to play political games.

With each new issue the rhetoric and the antics and theatrics become more and more absurd….it is beyond time for you people to start behaving like the statesmen that you pretend to be.

End the emotional detachment from the plight of the American people; you are making the institution of government a un-amusing joke……Apparently the people and the Constitution mean NOTHING to you clowns except when they can serve a purpose in your silly little game.  The whole process that you people engage in has become disgusting and your attitude even more disgusting.  The very idea that you people would rather play  party politics than trying to find real answers to America’s problems is in itself a disgust idea.

The Congress was elected by the people in good faith and in return all we get is pathetic political games…..almost to the person, you told the voters that you would go to Washington and make it a place where the people would make a difference….so far that is a total lie and the games are the games of cowards not statesmen.

Americans are losing homes…….going hungry……losing jobs……dying for lack of health care…..losing retirement funds and the best you people can do is argue over the words in a bill or make up some vague concept that has NO foot in reality…..that is what cowards do when they have NO idea on what to do.  Lobbyists money is WELL sspent!

Have you experienced what the people have to experience everyday?  Have you lost your home?  Do you go to bed hungry?  Do your kids?  Do you have to choose between food or rent?  NO!  Then how can you possibly know what Americans are going through?

I am not choosing one party over the other……I am calling ALL OF YOU….COWARDS!  This silly theatrics has been going on for decades…..a theater of the absurd and all of you deserve the best actor award for your part in the play……maybe your approval rating among the people would be better than 23% if you actually did something other than play this game…..the truly sad part of this whole play is that the American people will be duped time and time again and return you people to Washington on the lies you feed them every re-election campaign……

If the participants in our government cannot act in the best interests of the people….maybe we as voters should rethink renewing your contract with us….for as it stands now you people are nothing but a waste of time and money…..and you have had enough time to waste both those precious resources……I can only pray that I meet you in the unemployment line….wait!….that cannot be……why?….most of your are already millionaires thanks to the American people…..so yet another hope gets drowned in the toilet of government…..thank you for absolutely NOTHING!

Do They Think Before They Speak?

First of all….to answer the question….NO!…these morons think they are above reproach…

In the past I have come down hard on the conservatives for the dumb ass things they have said and even on occasions I have called Dems for their stupidity…..but the best so far has been the moronic, ill thought out comment by Senate majority leader Harry Reid:

“Instead of joining us on the right side of history, all Republicans have come up with is this slow down, stop everything, let’s start over,” said Reid. “You think you’ve heard these same excuses before, you’re right. When this country belatedly recognized the wrongs of slavery, there were those who dug in their heels and said, ‘Slow down, it’s too early. Let’s wait. Things aren’t bad enough.’ When women spoke up for the right to speak up, they wanted to vote, some insisted, ‘Slow down, there will be a better day to do that. The day isn’t quite right,’ “

Someone needs tro find the guy or gal that wrote such BS and take them out to the wood shed and whack their pee-pee….instead of having a substantial debate on the health reform measure, Reid reads the above from notes and gives the Repubs more ammo to change the focus of the bill.  Good going you morons!

Once it was uttered then he gave all the mouths on the Right something to jerk off over…..they have the Dems fighting each other over abortion and now the majority leader has given them yet more ammo in the tactic of delaying the vote on the bill….

With all that said, I would like to point something out……Reid is an idiot!  But I listened to his comments and have read all them stories on them….and as of yet I cannot see where the comment was leveled as an insult….he basically said that the present day opponents are using the same tactics as was used during the slavery debate…..he did NOT call anyone a racist…….he said the opponents to ending slavery used tactics like delaying, etc to try and beat the proposed freeing of slaves……..

But wait……is not the Repubs using the very same tactic today?  Is not the fake outrage just a way to slow the debate?  So basically, while what Reid said was moronic, it is never the less TRUE!  Why would you, Sen. Reid, willingly give your foes more ammo to aid them in their tactics to kill the bill?

GOP Repeats The Mistakes Of The Left

Professor’s Classroom

Subject:  Political History/Political Science

In case anyone is confused….I have been an activist for over 40+ years and yes I was a Leftist radical in the 60’s……so I did a lot of studying of the history of the Left so I could better try to work magic in political history……well….I tried and it was disastrous….back in the day all the Left did was fight each other on who had the proper ideology….Socialists fought Communist…..Trotskyists fought Stalinists…..Maoists fought Leninists…..Anarchists fought everybody…..there in fighting made the whole movement ineffective in American politics…..

In the early days of the 20th century, shortly after the Russian Revolution, all Leftists parties, most notably the socialists, tried to get the endorsement for Lenin and the Russian Communist Party ….lots of back and forth…lots of lies about the other parties….lots of intrigue until in was given to the Communist Party-USA……..and then the jealousy and games began in earnest…..

Ideology was the battlefield…..which party or organization had the most accurate ideology on the Left…..all this fighting and bickering continued for decades….in the 50’s and 60’s purges were the rule…if people did not hold the proper ideology then they were purged from the party….there was NO compromise….either you believed the ideology of the party blindly or you were purged…..once again…..all this purity BS totally marginalized the Left in American politics…..

Why do I bring up all this “ancient” history?

Excellent question…….it looks like that the GOP may be entering into the pitfalls that the Left suffered from back in the day.  In the last election cycle…..it had begun….the purity thing…….that is if you do not hold the “proper” ideology then the far right will do everything to undermine the moderates and liberals in the Party.

Look at NY-23….the moderate candidate had to bow out because the far right did not like her stands and put up a guy they approved of….even though he could not vote in the district he was running for….he did not know the issues of the district….his ONLY qualification was that he held the “proper” ideology.

And then there is Charlie Crist, the governor of Florida who is running for the Senate and he is a Repub, but the far right endorses Rubio, once again, he has the “proper” ideology.

He should be — he’s no Republican: “This election will be a litmus test to define the will power of party leaders to return to our values,” says Armando Valladores in The Miami Herald. Charlie Crist “hoodwinked” conservatives by raising taxes after promising they would “drop like a rock,” and he trampled conservative values by appointing a pro-abortion justice to the state Supreme Court over a “more-qualified” conservative. “No Republican should vote for Crist.”
“Crist doesn’t deserve GOP support”

These are just a few of the purity issue that I see ….and it looks like it is far from over…..the far right is trying to purge ALL moderates and liberals from the Party.

The far right seems to have NO tolerance for dissenting view within the Party and is trying desperately to purge all who do not have the “proper” ideology.  But the important question is:  can they, the far right, do enough damage to the GOP to make it possible for a successful third party?

Mississippians Lose!

A Gulf South Free Press Opinion

The following post are for my friends in Mississippi….granted they do not have much to celebrate but they need to know what the morons they voted for are doing on the taxpayer’s dime.  I thought I would take a day out and report on their plight.

I saw this report on projo.com and thought I would pass it on to Mississippians for they probably did not get too much of this in their local rags that is best used to wrap fish in.

At least 14 Republican governors have recently issued, or will soon issue, similar letters urging their representatives in Congress to reject health-care overhauls that may create millions of dollars in new costs for state governments.

The Republican governors’ collective lobbying effort was reported Tuesday by the Washington-based publication The Hill, which described the move as a “coordinated attack on Sen. Max Baucus’ health-care reform legislation.”

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, the association chairman, issued a letter to Mississippi’s congressional delegation on Sept. 8, “and did share it with his Republican governor colleagues,” according to Kempe. “It was sent through the RGA policy person to our policy team, back in early September, via e-mail.”

Gov. Barbour?  Yep the man in Mississippi….the governor that did not want stim money to help put people to work…..the governor of a state that has about 12% unemployment…..the governor of a state where about 20% of the population is uninsured…. a state where damn near 30% of the population lives in poverty…….The GOP in Mississippi are doing nothing to make the lives of the people in this state any better….could that have anything to do with the large number of minorities in the state?  After all the GOP has become and will always be, in the South at least, the party of old white guys that are still stuck in the 50’s and not in the good way.

As long as Mississippi continues down this disguised “racist” path, it will continue to be a backwoods society….maybe we should try to change the state motto to read, “Welcome to Mississippi…set your clocks back a hundred years”.

The Summer Of Hate

Make no mistake….it has been a Summer of Hate.

Forty years ago there was the “Summer of Love” when the generation was going to change the world with peace and love…that got crapped all over….and after a generation of political games we have come to this summer, the ” Summer of Hate”.

The politicians and their on-air pundits have turned on sector the political scene onto the other sector…it has to name calling, lies, trickery, misinformation ands a total lack of professionalism.  All this was years in the making but it came to the forefront in the 90’s with the Clintons and has carried on from admin to admin…..

Probably one of the most hateful things uttered by those on the far right was done by a preacher…yes a man of God…at least that is what he would have us believe.  Thanx to thinkprogress.com for the below report:

Arizona Pastor Steven Anderson has received national attention for dedicating an entire sermon to “Why I hate Barack Obama,” and for having a parishioner who brought an AR-15 to a protest outside a speech delivered by President Obama. Calling Obama a “socialist devil” and a “murderer,” Anderson declared, “I’m not gonna pray for his good. I’m going to pray that he dies and goes to hell.” A CNN analyst said last week Secret Service agents had likely visited Anderson because of the content of his sermons. In the face of all the controversy, Anderson decided not to apologize or retract his remarks, but rather, he escalated his rhetoric yesterday:

I hope that God strikes Obama with brain cancer so he can die like Ted Kennedy. You know, and I hope it happens today.

Hate is hate and this summer has given Americans more hate than they have had since the early days of the civil rights movement.  This hatred is coming from all sides on the right, the wingnuts, Senators, Reps and even religious figures.  People that should have more intellect than to sort to hate to make a point.

The use of words like Nazi or socialist are nothing more than a hate buzzword to be used in place of the truth and valid information.  I am personally ashamed of the American people, on both sides of the spectrum, that they would resort to name calling and hatred to have a debate on an issue.

There is more!  Today the Prez will be addressing school kids, well only if the school system allows it.

The speech, to be delivered live at noon on the White House’s Web site and C-SPAN, was released on the White House’s Web site Monday. The address made no reference to politics or any divisive subjects that some foes had feared. Instead, the speech — which is optional for districts — urges students to work hard, set goals and pay attention in school.

Somewhere one of the morons on the Right decide that this sounded like an indoctrination or something just as sinister….the Prez will tell kids that they need to work hard and help the country out of its doldrums and oh yeah, that they, the kids, should write the Prez and tell him what they think he should do to help the country……now all that sounds pretty damn sinister to me……but yet back in 1991, I believe, then Prez George I made a similar speech and yes to school kids….but NO where did someone on the Left call it indoctrination or brainwashing or whatever term the morons will use to degrade the speech.  Actually many thought it was a helluva idea to try and get the kids more involved with the country….but that was then and this is now.

For about 15 years since the days of the new “conservative” revolution when the Repubs took the Congress and the vile utterings of people like Newt, DeLay, et al; a new more venomous form of political hatred has taken over political discourse and debate, to the point that very little is now done in a way bi-partisan way.  Instead of working for the good of the country these dickheads spend their time misinforming and lying….all they do is create confusion and hatred…I am pretty sure this is not what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they started this system.

The summer ends but not the HATE!

Ron White says it best, “you cannot fix stupid”.