Featured Stories
Mary Steenburgen IS Jan Brewer
August 22, 2012
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by David Safier
Dead-on satire of Jan Brewer by Mary Steenburgen on Funny Or Die. You can view it below the fold or on the Funny or Die site.
My BfA “Blogger Beat” on the Buckmaster Show
August 22, 2012
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by David Safier I spent an enjoyable few minutes talking with Bill Buckmaster on his show today. We discussed the importance of recess to elementary school students, the one cent sales tax initiative, the Barber-Heinz race and a few related issues. You can listen to the show here. My segment begins around the 30 minute … Read more
Mike’s Cocktail Minute
August 22, 2012
Apropos of nothing, save praising a worthy local business here in Tucson, I bring you the Southern Gravity from 47 Scott's cocktail bar Scott & Co. Our own local speakeasy has been named one of the 10 best new bars in America by Food and Drink magazine. The cocktail is in the old fashioned style … Read more
The Mexican Border is Relationship, Not a Barrier
August 22, 2012
By Karl Reiner With the possible exception of many of those in Arizona, U.S. political leaders tend to agree that it is in the national interest to have a prosperous and democratic Mexico on the other side of the southern border. Although Mexico’s development issues have been a low foreign policy priority, the relationship between … Read more
DNC Convention Preview: List of speakers (Updated)
August 22, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: The first two days of the 2012 Democratic National Convention, Tuesday, September 4, and Wednesday, September 5, will be held at Time Warner Cable Arena. The final night of the convention, Thursday, September 6, will be held at Bank of America Stadium. Former President Jimmy Carter will address the 2012 Democratic National … Read more
Robert Reich on Romney-Ryan economic plan
August 22, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
It's been a week for whiteboards. Willard "Mittens" Romney was ripping off the White House Whiteboard series, and Robert Reich who also does a whiteboard series.
In his latest video, Robert Reich explains 5 Reasons The Romney-Ryan Economic Plan Would Be a Disaster:
Robert Reich breaks down the Romney-Ryan economic plan into 5 measures that all spell disaster for America.
1. More unemployment through austerity measures.
2. Taking from the poor to give to the rich. Higher federal taxes on lower income taxpayers, slashing medicaid, food stamps, and children's health care in order to give up to a $500k tax cut to millionaires and billionaires.
3. Turns Medicare into vouchers that won't keep up with the rising cost of health care and shifting the burden onto seniors, ending their guaranteed health care, and leaving them at the mercy of private insurers. By contrast, Obama's Affordable Care Act saves money on Medicare by reducing payments to providers such as hospitals and drug companies.
4. Add money to defense spending. The plan would add money to defense spending while cutting spending on education, infrastructure, and basic research and development.
5. Debt: The Romney-Ryan budget doesn't even reduce the federal budget deficit. While adding to military spending, giving tax cuts to the rich, and stifling economic growth by cutting spending too early, the plan would push public debt to over 175% by 2050.
Video below the fold.
Kris Kobach writes anti-immigration plank in GOP platform
August 22, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie: Willard "Mittens" Romney's anti-immigration adviser, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach (formerly with the Immigration Reform Law Institute (IRLI), the legal arm of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) and the author of Arizona's SB 1070), has made the GOP platform on immigration harsher. POLITICO reports, GOP platform gets tougher on … Read more
The death of ‘compassionate conservatism’
August 22, 2012
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
In 2000, GOP pollster and message-meister Frank Luntz invented a new term for the George W. Bush campaign: "compassionate conservative." Like his father George H.W. Bush before him, it was meant to put a "kinder and gentler" face on the always angry rabid right — the Newt Gingrich led mob that had shut down the federal government and impeached a president for the very same sexual peccadilloes they themselves enganged in, after a relentless witch-hunt against Bill and Hillary for eight years.
This messaging had the shelf life of one campaign. After 9/11, you were "either with us or against us," and anyone who questioned the intelligence for an unnecessary war in Iraq saw their patriotism questioned and were condemned as un-American or even a traitor. The always angry rabid right was back, "big time" as Darth Vader Dick Cheny would say.
The Bush Years Were a Lost Decade of economic and job growth, followed by the speculative real estate bubble of casino capitalism bursting with the Bush Great Recession — the worst economic catastrophe since the Great Depression. When times are difficult, compassion turns hard, and people fight over scarce resources and opportunities.
And so we have witnessed the rise of a new brand of conservatism, an odd blend of Ayn Rand, who rejected all forms of faith and religion, and rejected Christian altruism for "moral nihilism" (morality does not inherently exist, and any established moral values are abstractly contrived) and "ethical egoism" (people should act in their own self interest); and Gordon Gekko: "Greed is good." In short, a philosophy of "I've got mine, f#@& you!"
The Rev. Susan Brooks Thistlehwait, former president of the Chicago Theological Seminary (1998-2008), and a a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, writing for the Washington Post's "On Religion" feature, published this opinion recently. The Icemen Cometh: Romney-Ryan and the future of compassion in America:
We are falling prey, in the United States, to the temptation to equate “freedom” with selfishness.
This is ultimately a counsel of despair and the direct antithesis of the biblical values of love and compassion.
The selection of Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan as Mitt Romney’s pick for vice president throws this problem into stark relief.
