Republicans

Expect gridlock. No matter what the challenge, and there are important ones, together we are going nowhere. Republicans (R's) obstructed or watered down practically everything that Obama proposed, knowing that his success would get in the way of their election prospects. Their main objective is to oppose Obama, not to serve the public.

R's attempt to reign in spending translated to massive layoffs and a continuation of our downward economic spiral. But they still aggressively work to keep the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy from expiring. The US has again come to a gilded age. Restoring Bush tax cuts will help us toward a permanent aristocracy and there will be even more unemployment. The balanced budget amendment, at least at the Federal level, is a really bad idea despite what Heritage and talk radio tell you.

R's want to privatize Social Security, log the national forests, expand offshore gas and oil drilling, privatize highways and waterways, and continue to outsource government.

R's are tireless in protecting the rights of Corporations. Bush left his legacy on the Supreme Court, resulting in the Citizens United decision which establishes the corporate right to spend as much money as they like for elections, to fabulously fund the Congress or to fund opposition for Congressmen who do not fall into line. (Think Gun Lobby.) Republicans solidly oppose legislation that might mitigate this corporate takeover of our highly suspect elections. Mussolini (and some dictionaries) define fascism as control of the government by corporations. Do we not have that ?

R's strain to roll back regulations that restrict Banks rights to get bailed out, dole out big bonuses, write sub-prime loans, charge as much as they want for credit card interest, gamble with taxpayer insured money, and, if they don't get their way, crash the economy. The SEC might harass. say, Bernie Madoff. New regulations could get in the way of all that.

R's work hard to protect insurance companies rights to refuse health coverage for people with pre-existing conditions, to cap the amount of coverage, or to drop sick people. They work to repeal Obamacare because it would get in the way of that.

R's oppose using taxpayer money for unemployed who can't find work. Companies should be able to cut wages, benefits, and bust uppity unions so they don't get in the way. Anyway corporations can migrate most work to offshore, low-wage countries, so unions don't matter much any more. Poorly paid people are not able to support a robust economy, but then, if you got yours, it won't matter to you.

R's know that tax cuts will fix the economy...because they will increase tax revenue (Duh ?) They think the market is rational, and a guide to good decisions. Is the market (the hidden hand of the oligopoly) really a better way to make decisions than democratically elected government ? What does the Constitution say ?

R's are tough on crime. When Ronald Reagan invoked the southern strategy, declared war on drugs, privatized the prison industry, and oversaw drug running into poor communities, he not only made the US number one in incarcerations, he made the policy creating a new Jim Crow. He implemented the R's racist strategy. See The The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander if you have any doubts about US institutionalized racism. Since poor people of color overwhelmingly vote Democratic, putting large percentages of them in prison deprives them of the vote, and (along with computer hacking) assures more Republican election victories. At the same time, proceeds from drugs financed death squads in Central America. Remember Iran/Contra ?

R's responded to the 9/11 emergency by going to war in Iraq and Afghanistan then passing tax cuts for the wealthy It was difficult to make the case for war in Iraq, but that's when torture proved effective. None of it was paid for, but Cheney reminded us that deficits were not important. Although Republicans never have money for people, they can always fund war (or prisons). Security, like the military, has been a gusher of money for well connected contractors. It's their jobs program. War Profiteering has been good too. Many details are in the movie, Iraq For Sale, which you can watch on-line.

R's do not acknowledge that other developed countries have universal health care, affordable education, several weeks of vacation, generous sick time, good pension plans, maternity leave, child care, and assistance for the elderly...and we do not. Another sign of a failed state that they have created. Dismantling the welfare state (services for you) is the real price of their profligate military.

Republicans are for small government. They have no problem if their strong-man President suspends habeas corpus, disappears people, illegally wiretaps without judicial oversight, datamines internet search records, financial and commercial records, tortures, overrides the Bill of Rights, relieves Congress of its war making powers and its oversight responsibility. A strong President can override the Congress with signing statements. They especially love guns. They support all that out of respect for the Constitution. Right ?

R's small government doesn't regulate corporations, but it can decide who gets married, the kind of procedures allowed in medical research or hospital treatments. or reach into a hospital and override those tough individual choices, such as a women's right to choose. It doesn't matter to them if there is no exception that she is in the high-risk pool. Republicans gave us the 'no-fly' list, wiretaps without court oversight, the 'Patriot Act', and, out of deep respect for the Constitution brought a new concept in Fourth Amendment rights at airports. When they advocate deregulation, they don't want to regulate corporations, they want to regulate you. Corporate media, because they are corporate and richly rewarded, will be sure that you hear only their views.

R's would downsize 'government', but never cut the budget for the military. The US spends more on its military than all other countries combined, but that is necessary to build a world dominating empire, not so much to stop a few individuals with box cutters. http://www.seconnecticut.com/empire.htm You are a lot less safe.

R's even blocked the Start treaty, which would have reduced the number of nuclear weapons held both in the US and Russia. Feel safer now ?

Republicans current initiative on immigration, while it is divisive, racist, and mean-spirited, is, according to some accounts, a block for consideration of mitigation of climate change. (Late breaking news: the climate crisis is man-made, real, and accelerating There is scientific consensus, although the tea party disagrees.)

R's know that global warming is a hoax. Ignore the pictures of glaciers melting rapidly, the polar ice caps shrinking, fresh water becoming precious commodity, fisheries collapsing, species going extinct at an alarming rate, CO2 levels at record levels, massive forest fires, reports from the IPCC or NOAA, and just ignore the models predicting much more warming and more violent storms. Now that Russia is burning, it's a good bet that as the arctic tundra melts that massive amounts of methane will be released. Methane is much more potent as a greenhouse gas than is CO2. Gwynne Dyer's book,: Climate Wars, makes credible projections why water scarcity could lead to food shortages, warming will cause sea level rise, and why poor countries, some nuclear armed, will likely go to war if they can't feed their people. Steven Hawking thinks our planet could look like Venus. Anyway R's won't want to allow any legislation capping carbon emissions. It's not cost effective to save the planet. They would destroy the planet to get reelected. So Republicans make Jim Jones look like a small-time dealer of kool-aid, where they can deliver to the entire planet. http://www.seconnecticut.com/environment.htm

Republicans brought years of disastrous governance under George W Bush. Considering the sorry condition of our election process, our mostly corporate media, and the open floodgates of corporate money, there may be no stopping them. The Republican government in waiting has the same people who lied to go to war in Iraq and they will not hesitate to go to ware with Iran. Here is the forecast.

Casino Jack and the United States of Money

This Fall's Election is about Right and Wrong (9/7/2010)

"Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us, and now we are discovering we work for Fox" David Frum

(See also Fox News and Tea Parties.)

Oklahoma Republicans and Tea Parties forming anti-government Militia (4/13/2010)

Dishonesty and Hypocrisy have become the Hallmarks of the Republican Party

The Only Republican Plan Is to Destroy Democrats, Not Solve Problems (4/2/2010)

Scary New GOP Poll Republican attitudes about Obama (3/23/2010)

An Open Letter To Republicans (3/22/2010)

Bill Moyers & Thomas Frank: How America's Demented Politics Let the GOP Off the Hook for Their Giant Mess

Hijacking Catastrophe

The Party of Cruelty (3/26/2010)

Can the Republicans Change?

GOP Dominated By White Conservatives: Gallup Poll (6/1/2009)

Republican Senate Sex Scandals Point Back to Secretive Conservative Christian "Family" (10/12/2009)

Republican Gomorrah: The Shattered GOP, Taken Over by Authoritarian Radicals, Is Incapable of Compromise (10/8/2009)

The Republican Brat Pack (9/25/2009)

Republicans are a threat to the Republic. (7/5/2009)

30 GOP Senators Vote to Defend Gang Rape (10/8/2009)

Military Coup ? Republicans may have tried it before. (10/2/2009)

Republicans: A Threat to the Republic ? (7/7/2009)

Is there an Antidote for Republican Amnesia ? (3/19/2009)

Republican Strategies for Success(Tom Tomorrow 3/10/09)

Why Misgovernment was no accident

Republicans don't like Government. They don't think it can do much, and, when in office, they are able to prove it. Their stubborn opposition to health care reform proves that they are incapable of reasoned problem solving and that their only values are about money.

Republicans brought on the financial crisis with deregulation that allowed markets to go out of control, privatization that removed the public from the process, tax cuts that in effect directed massive public debt into deep private pockets (banana republic), civil service destruction and cronyism placed incompetents in public office; regressive, anti-labor policies led to a general decline in consumption; a determination to build an empire for world domination requires unlimited budget for the military; a contempt for international law covered up illegal activities including torture, renditions, secret prisons; Congress did no oversight during the Bush years; regulatory agencies were captives of the industries they were supposed to regulate; industry migrated to low wage countries and not much was done to mitigate the damage; income inequality reached gilded age levels, but there was war enough for everyone. War is profitable, and in its chaos pallet loads of shrink wrapped money just disappeared. Civil liberties here in the good old US of A were cut down to size by chicken hawks who built the profitable national security state. PayGo left. The financial sector was allowed to devour the rest of the economy.

Republicans did not heed Ike's warning about the Military/Industrial Complex, because militarism now is the US primary industry. They brought on an endless war and a government that cares not for its people. They operated in secrecy that shrouded illegal activity. The CIA, without effective oversight, continued to engage in projects, including assassinations, that would never be allowed by voters.

The Party of Ideas

Some of the right wing talking heads say that Republicans are the party of ideas. They do have ideas...only they are mostly bad ones. Their stated goal is to shrink government to its bare essentials. You saw the logical outcome of this strategy after Hurricane Katrina. Bush Republicans should not be confused with conservatives.

Republican ideas are characterized by greedy policies that may be profitable in the short run, but are catastrophic in the end. They do no planning because they would argue that the market will do it. (Actually, the 'market' is really the hidden hand of the oligopoly.) You would think that tax cuts would solve all of our problems if you listen to the Rs, but, in fact, it is simply a way of not paying the bill for the world dominating military that they favor. They may talk about financial prudence, but when in office they give it no thought. What they have in fact done is to run up huge public debt for private gain. It's really about greed and converting the US into a banana republic.

They have refined personal attack politics until it has driven our most talented away from public service. Anyway, private sector salaries are much higher than government service, so who would want to do public service ? (Those of us old enough remember when our very best were delighted to work for a dollar a year, but then came Republican greed.) Now Congress is a farm team for K street.

Their policies are mean spirited and although they would claim 'family values', they have driven a large percentage of American families into poverty. Their idea of 'welfare reform' was another of their assault on the victims. Having shredded another piece of the US safety net, they have moved on to blaming a new victim...'illegal' immigrants. They obstruct all efforts to improve our dysfunctional health care.

The incentive for the Republican agenda comes from a small number of very wealthy individuals: Koch, Coors, Olin, Scaife, Walton and others who stand to benefit greatly from the removal of the 'death tax' (formerly known as the inheritance tax...they have a way with words.) From these wealthy comes the funding for the various partisan right wing 'think tanks' like Heritage, and, although they claim to have values, they have a habit of dirty tricks, election rigging, war profiteering, and other miscellaneous techniques for using the government as their very own ATM machine. These, including right wing talk radio broadcasting misinformation, are the major players in the vast right-wing conspiracy.

The free market is our decision maker...when it is profitable. When it consolidates large corporations so they are too big to fail, that is just the market making the decisions. When it loses money, (which is inevitable because consolidation brings on unsustainable debt) then the government better be there to bail them out because the consequences are too dire to contemplate. So there you have it: socialism for the rich, and the 'free market' for everyone else. (The free market doesn't care if you have health care, if you make a living wage, or even if your job has permanently left the country.) So here we are running huge federal deficits for the benefit of a few rich individuals. Just like a banana republic. Thank Republicans for this financial disaster. They will give you religion though.

Republicans don't really like government, which is why they are so bad at it. ( A note for Republicans.)

Corporate Agenda

Republicans, after all, do represent multinational corporate interests and the very wealthy. As a result we now have one of the widest disparities of income of the developed world.

A government that represents corporations is, by definition, fascist. (To appreciate this look here.) All major American institutions oppose democracy but Republicans have been the ones who have most damaged the Constitution.

The military-industrial complex is one of the best mechanisms to convert government into an ATM machine for the politically connected. Weapons manufacture has become an important industry with facilities in almost every Congressional district. It is a jobs program. Because they are war profiteers, Republicans are often warmongers. In his warning about the military-industrial complex, Ike was right. US media is mostly owned by war profiteers. The cold war is over, there is not much threat out there, but Republicans insist m expanding the military-industrial complex. They have dreams of a world dominating empire, but that will make it toof expensive to have civilization here at home.

Since Congress is largely money driven, Corporate tax burdens have been systematically removed, and the wealthiest among us have done fabulously well, especially thanks to the Bush regime. Just as in 1929, when we had a gilded age, the economy has crashed as a result.

The Supreme Court ruled that the purpose of Corporations is to make money for share holders, thus justifying the short-sighted, mean-spirited, destructive, anti-democratic, exploiting, corporate agenda that has crashed the economy. If the purpose of Corporations was to serve the public good, things could have been much different. As it is, Corporate activity may lead to the end of human habitability of the planet. Globalization is their technique for world domination and the suppression of democracy.

Market fundamentalism

Limited government to Republicans means rolling back New Deal social programs like Social Security and making sure that everyone is on their own. Republicans don't really care about people. because their 'values' are about money.

Market fundamentalism has led to massive deregulation and now you can see the consequences: financial instability, bank failures, bad food, market scams, deceitful advertising, commercial lying, predatory lending, absurd CEO salaries, a widening gap between rich and poor, and increasing insecurity for everyone. Make no mistake though: deregulation can kill. as you can verify in lax workplace safety enforcement, unlabelled and unchecked food products, toxic toys, downer cows, or environmental degradation. In their hypocrisy, notice that R's are all too willing that the government should bail out highly leveraged banks and brokerages. Their agenda is socialism for the rich.

Right wingers, exploiting justifiable anger at massive middle-class decline, are protesting health care reform lately. It is a triumph of corporate media that they are opposing their own self-interest, and arguing that the corporate market is a better form of organization than democratically elected government.

Republicans think the market is always right, but what it actually does is reward the already wealthy. Market driven economies are most competitive when they are in the most repressive countries: where labor is not free to unionize and cannot complain, where there is no limit to environmental destruction. Republicans have vigorously led the fight against organized labor. R's regressive policy led to deindustrialization, shrinking income, dried up consumer demand, and a collapsed economy.

R's are in denial about the collapsing environment. By the end of this century, widespread disaster will prove how willfully ignorant they are.

Deregulation

Republicans made regulatory agencies (like the FCC, FDA, EPA, SEC, etc) captives of the industries they are supposed to regulate. This allows corporations to serve their own interest instead of the public interest.

McCain’s economic advice from Phil Gramm, alone, should have disqualified him. Gramm was the architect of the Enron collapse and current financial instability. Reform is necessary to throw out the cronies, lobbyists, and incompetents placed in office by the Bush administration.

Privatization

Republican's think privatization is good policy. What it actually does is remove functions from public accountability, so it is anti-democratic. Result: Blackwater, Enron, prison-industrial complex, or, worst of all is privatized vote counting. There is now considerable doubt about election integrity. Most vote rigging is computer fraud, but there is little to prevent it.

Privatized healthcare in the US is not only the world's most expensive, it does not cover a large fraction of the people, It is highly bureacratic, and it is not particularly effective in overall quality. Even so, it is about to be cut so that Republicans can spend unlimited amounts of money for war, and not much for our civilization.

Many Republicans would privatize Social Security, and they are doing their best to privatize education as well.

Since armaments are one of the last industries in the US, it is also a jobs program. Notice that when Republicans decide it is time to balance the budget that programs to get cut are always those that actually benefit people: like healthcare, social security, Medicare, or infrastructure...not the military.

Fiscal irresponsibility

Republican policy is always regressive, and you need to pay more attention if you think they are for fiscal responsibility. Bush Jr unapologetically and unjustifiably ran up a 10 trillion dollar debt for the next generation. His tax cuts are for the already wealthy in an action that makes his 'Christian' persona a hypocrisy. The first President Bush bailed out Savings and Loans to the extent of half a trillion dollars, and Bush junior oversaw an even larger bailout.

As the Bush administration took us to war, there were unprecedented tax cuts for the wealthy. The unprovoked War in Iraq killed thousands of Americans, estimates are up to a million Iraqis, it has cost, according to Joe Stiglitz, around three trillion dollars, and the results are no benefit for anyone. (Note: Stiglitz now says his estimate was low: it's more like four trillion now that so many disabled vets are coming home.)

Supply-side economics

Bush the First once called 'supply-side' economics, voodoo economics. That lower taxes would produce more Federal revenue was never true. Tax cuts were not only contrary to common sense, they ignored the costs of Bush's war adventures, and, contrary to Christian values, they rewarded the already wealthy at the expense of the poor. They converted the fundamentalist churches into a propaganda conduit for the Republican party. They would not pay for their wars.

Union Busting

It is written in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that everyone has the right to participate in a labor union. Republicans in their continuing war on the people have made union busting national policy, and the result has been declining wages for most, shrinking (plundered) pensions, benefits, and anemic social programs.

R's do not believe in anti-trust. Even when corporate media shamelessly exploit us, Republicans, for their own propaganda purposes, have allowed media to further concentrate. That is why media pollution spills into your living room 24/7. When media lies, the Supreme Court (which invariably sides with Republicans) ruled that it is ok. The Court ruled that Corporations are people and have the full protection of the Bill of Rights, but unfortunately those same rights no longer seem to apply for actual humans. The Bush administration has all but shredded the Constitution.

Population is the driving force for environmental degradation, but Republicans are always looking for more rapid economic growth and create a fog of misinformation around environmental damage. That is wrong.

Global warming due to increased carbon dioxide levels is a simple idea. On Venus it produces a planet with a temperature hundreds of degrees, but Republicans because of their subservience to corporate interests are deniers. To continue to deny global warming the Bush administration had to muzzle mainstream scientists and it appointed political handlers to accomplish that. In addition they censored scientific papers, and they lied. It is fair to say that Republicans have waged a war on science.

Republicans thrive on divisive wedge issues like immigration, race, or religion in their typical mean-spirited, hateful, blame-the-victim mentality. Although they claim to be the party of small government, instead they have instituted massive surveillance, warrentless wiretaps, renditions, torture, invasive searches, and effectively a national security state. Talk radio sells the program. They have shredded the Bill of Rights, except for their grotesque interpretation of the Second Amendment.

Social Programs

When Republicans say they want to 'reform' Social Security, Medicare, or the UN, they mean 'destroy'. When they talk about 'clean skies' they mean they are going to pollute. Republicans call this working for smaller government. It means less for people, more for them.

Bush Republicans are human rights abusing, torturing, war criminals, who deserve to be held accountable. There was never an administration in the US that deserved impeachment more.

Limited Government

Republicans claim to be for limited government, and almost everyone agrees that smaller government would mean less expense and lower taxes. Unfortunately, instead of making government more efficient, they made it dysfunctional. Bush's Justice Department was staffed with Bible School graduates. Regulatory agencies were headed by industry representatives who thought regulation is unnecessary. Wall Street went wild and devoured the rest of the economy. With no watchdogs, corruption was rampant.

Limited government to Republicans means removing oversight from corporations. What we have seen is massive financial instability, a suspect food supply, widespread consumer exploitation, drugs that are made in third world countries with lax environmental laws. an environmental record that Robert Kennedy wrote is a 'crime against nature'.

Limited government to Republicans means allowing corporations to dump pollutants anywhere they like. That's also why they deny climate warnings and deny the scientific consensus.

But notice that they have implemented unprecedented surveillance measures including illegal procedures to wiretap in what they claimed was necessary for national security. They implemented massively expensive programs to track our own citizens. When they talk about limited government, that's not what any of the public had in mind. When they talk about 'law and order', they just don't think it applies to themselves.

Management of the economy

The 'stimulus package', mandated by the Bushies, was a colossal waste of money. With all of the challenges facing us, Republicans, with Democratic acquiescence, came up with a plan to give away money. This is spending with NO value in return. (We used to call it waste.)

Anti-Intellectual

Republicans do not turn to experts for advice, they tend to go with their gut. That's why they are mostly wrong on policy matters. Notice that the best educated communities are also the most liberal. The corporations that own talk radio have manipulated the audience to go with their gut, act against their own self interest, keep them angry and ignorant.

Religion

Hypocrisy

Republicans and Race

When Republicans are 'elected', we can pretty much count on their faithful devotion to the corporate agenda: that's how you explain the regressive economic policy, the denial of global warming, the devastating environmental policy, the short sighted population policy, or the wreckage of vital social programs. The privatization, market fundamentalism, and dismantling of the public, has created problems not seen in the rest of the developed world.

Major manufacturers are migrating to low wage countries to escape health care, pension, and union burdens. Most people are finding that health care and pensions are becoming less available. Bankruptcy law has been made stricter recently, and the lookback period for long term care has been increased. Media does not talk about excellent Scandinavian social programs. Sure they pay higher taxes, but they get what they pay for...theirs works. Republicans don't care about people.

Bush Republicans campaigning for Congress concentrate on their soundbite, all-purpose solution for all problems:" tax cuts." (See David Cay Johnston's book Perfectly Legal for insight.) They claim that they have been good for the economy and that they are saving people money,. It is a fast-talking scam. The apparent prosperity is one that comes from running large, unsustainable deficits. The tax cuts are mostly directed to the upper one percent of the wealthy so it is not just regressive. It is self-serving. Economic reality for most people is pretty bleak as health care, tuition, energy prices all take increasing portions of declining wages. As in many banana republics, large amounts of borrowed money are flowing to an elite. Republicans defend all this by saying "no new taxes".

Republicans have been pushing for privatized, concentrated media for a long time so that now we get only corporate spam, distraction, misinformation and propaganda. CSPAN sometimes offers a real insight into our plight, since it aired the FCC hearings on the matter, but that is the exception. Expensive campaigns are often extortion payments to broadcasters. The public has no say because the spectrum has been nearly completely privatized (read corporatized). Thirty second soundbites rule out discussion of issues, more and more they degrade public dialog. Right wing, hate-mongering shock jocks make any dialog all but impossible. Media is an important element in rigging US elections, and in its current form it is not only corrosive to the culture, it is suppressing democracy. Bush and his administration not only funded propaganda, but pushed for further consolidation of media. Most US media cannot be trusted. Republicans call this 'deregulation'.

Bush used 9/11 as pretext to execute his radical right wing agenda, and it has been disastrous in terms of lives, dollars, good will, or anything else. There was plenty of evidence of incompetence in the aftermath of Katrina, or, say, in the 'no fly list', or in handling of immigration issues, and many others. Corruption is widely evident. Important jobs are awarded to religious zealots and/or incompetent political hacks. Congress looks the other way.

Congress failed to provide oversight of Bush. They gave up their Constitutional duty to determine when it is necessary to go to war when they allowed Bush to invade Iraq. They didn't bother to investigate war profiteering. They severely damaged the Bill of Rights when they passed the Patriot Act. They allowed him to wiretap without oversight, to datamine internet search records, library borrowings, financial and commercial records, to torture. They thumbed their nose at the Freedom of Information Act. The concept of the imperial President may well be approved by a packed Supreme Court. Checks and balances no longer function and that is the end of the Constitution. In signing statements Bush demonstrated that he is the law, the living Constitution, and in plain language a dictator.

We are building an empire and our fate will be that of every other empire in history except now there is considerably more destructive potential. We are certainly not safer. Apocalypse, which evangelical true believers fully expect and welcome, is a lot closer. Republicans will facilitate it.

Republicans often favor a flat sales tax, sometimes called in an Orwellian sense the 'Fair Tax'.. It is backed by very wealthy and, like all other Republican policy, it is extremely regressive. Be careful what you wish for. See the tax page.

Does Bush favor Criminals in his Administration ?

Dirty Tricks

Segretti: In 2000 Segretti served as co-chair of John McCain's campaign in Orange County.

What do good Americans know ?

What do good Americans know ? They now know that their government wiretaps, tortures, builds secret prisons, disappears people worldwide using renditions.

The Bush administration thumbed its nose at international law: the Geneva Conventions, the International Criminal Court, and the UN. The President thinks he is above the law. He avoids Congressional oversight not only with the support of his own party, but by using hundreds of signing statements. He claims executive privilege just as Richard Nixon did. He wiretaps illegally with the collusion of telecom companies. He continues to push for further consolidation of media to keep the right wing propaganda machine spouting info-pollution into our homes. He has the most secretive administration in US history. People are probably not informed enough to participate in a real democracy any more. If you are not convinced, just watch late night television one evening.

Privatization initiatives have been spectacular failures in healthcare, in war, in schools, and, most starkly, in the case of New Orleans. Profiteering and corruption have flourished as uncontested government contracts have been doled out to Republican crony corporations. Infrastructure is crumbling. Probably worst of all is the privatization of vote counting.

Deregulation resulted in poisoned toys, bank instability, wide-ranging consumer problems, and fueled the carnival of corruption: Enron, Tyco, WorldCom, etc.

The huge borrowing binge that appeared to be Bush's prosperity went straight to the oligopolies that now are our real rulers. A government which is controlled by corporations is, by definition, fascist.

Aside from that, US government has failed its own people. Income disparities, already poor, have been exacerbated by Republicans regressive policy.

Since it made no attempt to pay for the war, we are seeing obvious signs of financial instability. The Euro was valued at about $.87 when Bush took office, but now it is worth more than $1.50. Much of our domestic industry has bled away to Asian sweatshops, and about all that is left are defense contractors. That helps to assure that the military-industrial-media complex will continue to expand. It is about jobs. Naomi Klein's book "The Shock Doctrine" explains how much of this occurred.

The Bush administration provoked two wars and there are indications that it is contemplating another. Congress surrendered its Constitutional authority to declare war and, since it did no oversight, made history of those 'checks and balances'. The Bill of Rights has been shrinking since Bush took office, and it appears unlikely that it will ever be restored to its former self. Packed courts can see to that. Allowed to persist, we will no longer have a Constitution than matters.

The US is building an empire. It has all but bankrupted itself creating a military budget that exceeds all other countries combined. At the same time, Iraq, like Vietnam, demonstrates that an advanced military can not win against a population determined not to tolerate an occupying army. World opinion of the US has plummeted.

Republicans can and should take the blame for all of this. Their party controlled all branches of government including the fourth estate. If they are not defeated in elections (pretty much rigged), we will likely continue to avoid real problems like environmental degradation, public health threats, overpopulation, financial instability, or even the new arms race.

Our kids will be in debt from skyrocketing tuition, shrinking wages, vanishing benefits, and they will have to fight the endless crusades. Since the country has been de-industrialized, their only career choice may be the military. The draft will be economic.

You surprised that New Hampshire's Republicans are leaving the party ? Did you know that New Hampshire also refused to comply with Real ID ? Do you really think that the illegal immigration is not yet another wedge Republican issue...that can create an underclass in detention camps that are already being built ?

We ought to boot out the secretive, fascist, war-mongering, empire-building, human-rights abusing, Republicans.

Michael Moore on Republicans

We should oppose Republicans in government and on talk radio. They are a threat to democracy, the economy, the Constitution, civilization, and the habitability of the planet.

Bibliography

From Raleigh Myers

Are You Now Or Have You Ever Been GOP ?

We have to ask because of the slant the GOP puts on everything. You
can't believe a thing they say or want. The corruption is so rampant the
GOP are just a group cover-up in locked step. http://www.buzzflash.com/farrell/05/11/far05001.html

The GOP put everybody through that sort of embarrassment with their HUUAC
in the fifties where they were looking for so called Communists when it
was the anti-fascist dissidents they were after. Today the terrorist is
the alleged target when it's the dissidents and the first amendment they
want to compromise. Today we really have an the same GOP infiltration
with a seamless path all the way back to NAZI Germany.
http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/randy/swas5a.htm