When Lame Ducks Attack!!

Unemployed Scott Walker (ask me how much I love saying that!) is trying and failing - to remain relevant after his defeat in the midterm elections. This was evidenced by one of the most absurd, poorly thought out tweets that he has ever made:

Just what America needs...an out-of-touch liberal law professor who thinks government is the answer to our problems. True freedom and prosperity don’t come from the clumsy hand of government, they come from the dignity of hard work!  https://t.co/fYne6ZcUYh

— Scott Walker (@ScottWalker) December 31, 2018

The absurdity of this line of attack is apparent on many levels.

As Alternet.org points out, Warren easily won her reelection bid while Walker is begging conservative stink tanks for a job:

Walker’s criticism of Warren as “out-of-touch” is more than a little rich given that Warren just won re-election by 24 points, whereas Walker lost his bid for a third term to superintendent of public instruction Tony Evers.

If any politician could be characterized as “out-of-touch,” it would be a politician like Walker, who runs on a conservative agenda, loses, and then on his way out the door signs a bunch of lame-duck bills stripping his incoming, liberal successor of several executive powers. Or maybe it’s one of the large number of Republicans, including Walker, who tried and failed to convince their party in the 2016 presidential primary that they were a better choice than Donald Trump. It’s not Warren, a senator who has spent her career advocating for working people over Wall Street, and who helped design a pro-consumer federal agency that 74 percent of voters support.

Ed Heinzelman at Blogging Blue also points out some of the absurdities:

I would like to remind Governor Walker that the clumsy hand of government gave us the tax payer giveaways to Foxconn and Kimberly-Clark, hobbled 21st C rail travel in WI, and removed authority and power from the incoming governor that he himself enjoyed the past eight years.

P.S. essentially Scott Walker has never worked in the private sector having been in public office since his first election victory at age 22. Who might be the one out of touch?

Indeed, the lame duck weasel Walker has been a professional politician for nearly three full decades. It seems to me that he's done alright for himself, thanks to the government.

But wait, there's more! With all things Walker, there's always more.

Walker attacking Warren for being a "liberal law professor" had me rolling on the floor, laughing my ass off. This is hilarious because Walker never graduated from college, much less taught in a university. I would remind the gentle reader that Walker didn't drop out of school, but was kicked out because of his unethical conduct during an election for school president.

One would think Walker should be spending his time trying to find a job and a homeless shelter that will take in his family instead of constantly proving himself to be a fool. We already knew that beyond a doubt.

Some Presidential Primary Tidbits

By Jeff Simpson 

After coming back from vacation, time to close out some tabs that have been open regarding the presidential primary.

1.  Hillary is on record saying she will compromise with the GOP on abortion.  That makes me fear for my daughter as she grows up in this crazy world of rich white men trying to legislate a woman's life.  I do not believe that any other Democratic politician could politically survive saying this,

Again, I am where I have been, which is that if there's a way to structure some kind of constitutional restriction that take into account the life of the mother and her health, then I'm open to that. But I have yet to see the Republicans willing to actually do that, and that would be an area, where if they included health, you could see constitutional action.

2.  For all of Hillary's tough on gun stances, she helped give Remington Corp a hundred million dollar contract while Secretary of State.  

Hillary Clinton presents herself as a tough advocate for gun control. But the State Department she led for four years helped approve more than $100 million in weapons sales for a handful of companies — including the manufacturer of the AR-15 semi-automatic that Adam Lanza used to kill 20 children in Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012.
The sales to foreign nations, noted in Defense Department documents, include $4.2 million in receipts from the Remington Arms Co., which was sued by families of the Sandy Hook victims. They argued that the company was culpable because it marketed military-grade weapons to civilians.
During the 2016 campaign, Clinton has accepted contributions from financial firms that own sizable stakes in the gun industry while criticizing rival Sen. Bernie Sanders as soft on gun safety. She has cited his opposition to laws that could hold gun manufacturers liable for mass shootings, explicitly invoking the Sandy Hook massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, to make her case. 

3.  By the way, Ms. Clinton has not always been tough on guns, just 8 years ago ---

4.   Its not just Hillary, lets look at Wisconsin Primary winner Ted Cruz: 

Ted Cruz seriously sent out a fundraising email telling his supporters about the massive sacrifice he is making to run for President.

Yesterday @TedCruz sent a campaign email whining about the “significant sacrifice” he’s made to run for President. pic.twitter.com/yKtLpWG0Ou

— Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma) April 19, 2016

Senator Warren went off, on this and made Ted Cruz look like the fool he truly is.  

Elizabeth Warren 

✔‎@elizabethforma

Are you kidding me, @TedCruz? We’re supposed to pity you because trying to be the leader of the free world is hard?! 2 words: Boo hoo.

It gets better, check out the link! 

5.  Quick observation - with Ted Cruz winning WI, thanks to the talk radio and elected official collaboration and watching Scott Walker spend $7 million dollars in 71 days to end up with 0.0% support.   That shows our own brand of Wisconsinite right wingers are not mainstream throughout the rest of the country.  They are amateurs who run our state but have no ability to carry their extremist views to the rest of the country.   

Warren Whacks Walker

As the gentle reader is already aware, Scott Walker is catching hell for his inane comment comparing Wisconsin workers exercising their First Amendment Rights to extremist terrorists,

Walker should catch hell for it. He also should publicly apologize for it.

One of the more cutting remarks came from Senator Elizabeth Warren, who, in one sentence, cut through all of Walker's malarkey:

Indeed, who are Walker's friends?

There are the ultra conservative billionaires and millionaires like Sheldon Adelson and the Koch Boyz (even the fake ones). Walker has his nose so far up their butts he could tell you what they had for breakfast.

Another good friend of Walker's is Michael Grebe, head of the Bradley Foundation. Grebe also served as Walker's campaign chair. One doesn't have to go farther than that to see why Walker is gutting public education and opening the state to a hostile private takeover of the state's education system. The Bradley Foundation has spent millions of dollars to push school profiteering, including the Bell Curve, a study that says that poor children - most of whom are African American - are "incapable of benefiting from an education."

Not all of Walker's friends are rich and infamous. Some are poor and infamous.

Two glaring examples are Tim Russell and Brian Pierick.

Russell is a lifelong friend of Walker's. Russell served in various positions under Walker during his time as Milwaukee County Executive, as well as working on most of Walker's campaigns.

Russell was convicted of stealing money from a veterans fund and from two political campaigns. He used that money to go on lavish vacations and to meet with then presidential hopeful Herman Cain.

Russell was just released from prison after serving a two year sentence. He actually got off pretty easy, considering how many other things they could have gotten him on, including illegal politicking and setting up a secret router in order to avoid FOIA requests.

Pierick, who is/was Russell's business and life partner, was convicted of trying to entice an underage boy during a sexting exchange. (Warning: The dialogue is very graphic.)

The ironic thing about Warren's tweet is that Walker would agree with her. Just one year ago, Walker said pretty much the same thing:

Asked how voters might judge governors who bid for the presidency, Walker replied: “Governors should be defined not just by what they do and say, but who they surround themselves with, making sure to have the smartest person for a particular task or to head a specific agency. They should be judged on that basis and who they take advice from.”

It's safe to say that Walker has failed on all accounts.

The Unemployment Blues

By Jeff Simpson

Recently the Senate failed to pass unemployment insurance for our friends and neighbors who are out of work.  

Fifty-nine senators, including four Republicans, voted to advance the legislation, falling one vote short of the 60 needed to break a Republican filibuster effort.

Republicans and Democrats, many from the nation’s most economically depressed states, had been trying to reach a solution that would allow people who have exhausted their unemployment insurance to continue receiving benefits as long as the government offset the $6 billion cost.

Ultimately, how to pay for the program proved too big a hurdle for senators to overcome.

“We’ve given them everything they wanted. Paid for,” said Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, flashing his irritation at Republicans who blocked the bill.

Republicans holding our recovery hostage......Who knew?  Will someone tell Russ Holton that his buddy Ron Johnson let him down. Again:

"Imagine that, a 44-year-old man crying while watching TV," he said. He had watched the vote on C-SPAN 2. A day later, his cable provider cut him off because he hadn't paid the bill.
Holton is one of the 1.7 million long-term unemployed people missing out on federal benefits because Congress stopped providing them in December. Six years ago, he was making $85,000 per year at his job in tech sales. Today, the seams of his life are fraying.
He applied for food stamps and broke his contract with Verizon to get a cheaper, pay-as-you-go phone. His electrical company nearly cut him off before a friend helped him make the minimum payment. His Internet remains connected, but that's the next to go. Filling up his gas tank would be impossible if not for the gift certificates he's gotten from friends. He's borrowed money from his parents to stay afloat, but he shudders at how dire his financial situation may eventually get.
"It is probably an inevitability that I will have to file for bankruptcy just to get out of it all," he said.

 Wisconsin's own Ron Johnson is THE vote that is keeping extending unemployment to 1.7 million Americans!

Notably, Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson did not join other Republican senators such as Indiana's Dan Coats and Ohio's Rob Portman in voting to open up a debate about addressing an issue that shouldn't even be an issue.
Instead of listening to the calls from Wisconsinites of all political backgrounds for action on the jobless issue, Johnson was busy promoting a gimmicky lawsuit objecting to the implementation of the Affordable Care Act.
There are at least some Republicans who recognize what is at stake for working Americans — and for those who are out of work.

Heck even our very own Paul Ryan (R-Wall St.) joined in the act:

 "hammock that lulls able-bodied people to lives of dependency and complacency, that drains them of their will and their incentive to make the most of their lives." That's what Paul Ryan says, at least, and as the Chairman of the House Budget Committee, he's supposed to know these things, right?

Not that they care what you think, but I highly recommend contacting Paul Ryan and Ron Johnson and tell them to extend unemployment benefits immediately:

Janesville office - Paul Ryan
20 South Main Street, Suite 10
Janesville, WI 53545
Toll-Free: 1-888-909-RYAN (7926)
Phone: (608) 752-4050
Fax: (608) 752-4711
@reppaulryan

• Milwaukee Office - Ron Johnson
  517 East Wisconsin Avenue
  Suite 408
  Milwaukee, WI 53202
  Phone: (414) 276-7282
  Fax: (414) 276-7284 
  @Senronjohnson
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Luckily for the American People, we have Senator Elizabeth Warren on our side!
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
   
  
  

Mitch McConnell - Sexism Expert

For anyone unaware, not only is Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell the world's biggest ass, he's also the words biggest sexist.

When discussing potential Democratic forerunners for the 2016 presidential nomination, he summed it up as it looking like the Golden Girls:

"Don’t tell me Democrats are the party of the future, when their presidential ticket for 2016 is shaping up to look like a rerun of the Golden Girls,” McConnell said."

Watch out everyone, we've got a comedian on our hands!

Pictured: Four fictional women with bigger brains and cojones than Mitch McConnell.

                            
What truly puzzles me is that time and again, my gender is attacked by the right-wing for the way we look. CPAC speaker and wing nut extraordinaire Ann Coulter mocked Sandra Fluke for the way she wears her hair. Proof positive in how petty and disgusting the Republican party is. Republican men are always afraid of strong, educated women and believe the only way to knock them down is to insult their appearance. Too bad for them that this tactic fails 100% of the time. It also causes them to get their behinds handed to them in elections.

In the 2012 presidential election, one of the main groups to propel President Obama to a second term was the women's vote (with 55% of support.) When we vote, we do it with purpose. We vote in droves. We don't take the limiting of our biological freedom lightly. We don't find jokes and bogus claims about rape funny. We don't appreciate that every single male GOP senator voted against the Violence Against Women Act. If the GOP was smart (LOL) they'd know that not only do they need our support, they need to start VOTING like they even want it. The Tea Party rode into congress in 2010 on the premise of job creation. The first thing they hacked away at on day 1 was abortion rights. Can't make this stuff up.

And as for the next presidential election, I don't know about you, but I'd be more than thrilled to see a Clinton/Warren ticket in 2016.

What Now Brown Cow!

When Hillary Clinton said she was done serving her country so honorably as Secretary of State,the republicans saw that as opportunity.   They had recently lost the MA Senate held by Scott Brown to a true progressive in Elizabeth Warren.   The rumors that John Kerry was being considered as her successor, allowed them to pounce into action! 

The plan that Reince and the rest of his team came up with was, allow John Kerry to be confirmed as Secretary of State and then have Scott Brown win the special election to fill his seat and gain an important seat for the next 5 years in the Senate! 

We all know what they say about the best laid plans......

First off President Obama wanted to nominated the very distinguished Ambassador Susan Rice for the position.   This would have kept the Senate seat in Kerry's  hands so that was unacceptable.  The republicans like they always do, ratcheted the rhetoric up to an 11, and personally attacked Susan Rice as often and as loudly as they could.   John McCain and Lindsey Graham led the outright racist and sexist attacks, forcing Ambassador Rice to eventually withdraw her name from consideration. 

That obstacle out of the way, they were then faced with a new one that they did not know how to overcome: Scott Brown does not want to run again! 

“Over these past few weeks I have given serious thought about the possibility of running again, as events have created another vacancy requiring another special election. I have received a lot of encouragement from friends and supporters to become a candidate, and my competitive instincts were leading in the same direction,” Brown wrote.

“Even so, I was not at all certain that a third Senate campaign in less than four years, and the prospect of returning to a Congress even more partisan than the one I left, was really the best way for me to continue in public service at this time. And I know it’s not the only way for me to advance the ideals and causes that matter most to me,” he added.

“That is why I am announcing today that I will not be a candidate for the United States Senate in the upcoming special election,” his statement ends.

The primary is April 30 and the special election June 25.

Let me interpret for you - it  is very taxing for a moderate republican to try and keep the "tea party" base happy.   So thanks but no thanks, someone else can have that headache!  

Now for the punchline. 

The republican are so flummoxed that Brown does not want to run, they are at a loss to find someone else.  

Things are so bad under Reince's reign that they are considering asking people in the Romney Family to run.   

Massachusetts Republicans are desperately scrambling to find a strong Senate candidate to replace Scott Brown, with some even trying to persuade Mitt Romney’s wife or son to jump into the race to avert another electoral disaster.
The former GOP senator’s decision to stay out of the June 25 special election surprised and angered some Republican leaders, who said it will make it much harder to beat a Democratic opponent without Brown on the ballot.
“I’ve had several people call me and ask about Ann Romney,” Ron Kaufman, a longtime friend and aide to the former Massachusetts governor and 2012 presidential candidate nominee, told the Herald.

......

Other GOP leaders also raised the prospect of Mitt’s eldest son, Tagg, launching a surprise Senate campaign. Tagg Romney was a close campaign adviser and surrogate for his father and is a successful businessman living in Belmont.

As a progressive, I am ecstatic that the republicans have decided to keep Reince in charge!  

Dynamic Duo!

Picture of the year: