Cognitive Dissonance: A Republican Affliction

Where Republicans are concerned, I am not entirely certain how to regard them.  Obviously, they are utterly out of tune and, for the most part, unwitting dupes of huge international corporations with no loyalties other than to their own unrestrained growth and unregulated profiteering.

Maybe it's ignorance that causes otherwise, seemingly, rational human beings to forsake logic and take such outlandish positions or do so many deplorable things as do Republicans.  Ignorance?  Well maybe.  But, with the amount of real information available and easily accessible, mere ignorance does not quiet fit the description.  Well then, maybe willful ignorance?  You know, that's when someone refuses to allow facts, logic or reason to alter their mindset.  But, what I think best describes it is "cognitive dissonance".  That's when one knows the facts but just doesn't get it!  You know the type, someone who, for years, has been beating themselves on the noggin with a ball-peen hammer in expectation of curing a headache and who never succumbs to the obvious knowledge that they are the source of their own pain.  See!  Cognitive dissonance.

Either that, or the bozos are all, each and every damned one of them, dumber than a gunny sack filled with wet Neches river mud and muck!

But Shane you say, surely that doesn't apply to all Republicans, and, by the way, surely you must have some Republican friends.

To which, grinning my very best spider to the fly "gotcha" smirk, I reply.  Yes it does, and no I don't!

Certainly I know some Republicans, and even socialize with them on rare occasions, and can't help but regard some as acquaintances, but friends?  Hell no!  You see my friends don't try to cripple Medicare and undo health reform at the behest of Drug Oligarchs and Insurance Tsars.  My friends don't engage in race and gay baiting.  My friends don't try to vilify the President and undermine the will of the majority.  My friends try to build unity between all people rather than working to keep them apart and angry, afraid and mistrustful.  My friends don't try to force their narrow religious views upon society as a whole, and certainly recognize that religious expression can take many legitimate forms.

My friends do not view single working moms and dads, older Americans, the unemployed, and working families as leeches simply because they make use of the various social and economic safety nets we've put into place to offset the disparities of wealth created by a perniciously competitive economic system.  My friends do not try to rip asunder those safety nets in the spurious name of economic responsibility.

See, that's why I have no Republican friends.  The bastards are out to get me and I am not about to extend any sense of friendship to them.

Do those descriptions fit all Republicans?  Well, let me put it this way.  You bring to me one registered Republican in support of protecting Social Security as it is right now, preserving and improving Medicare, and extending unemployment benefits with free job retaining and relocation support to the unemployed and I will shake that new friend's hand in Nieman Marcus's window on Christmas Eve.

The Right-Wing Scam in Your Mailboxes

Let's say that, as an older American you get something in the mail from an organization calling its self the "Christian Seniors Association", you, I think, would be disposed to view them rather kindly...wouldn't you. Maybe even send them the $12.95 membership fee. After all the name Christian Seniors Association sort of conjures up mind images of grey-haired folks holding pot-lucks and planning raffles in the church basement.

Well, don't you believe it for an instant. It is just another scurrilous, fund-raising scam perpetrated by a family of right-wing homophobic zealots who find it easier to rip-off seniors by preying on their fears than to travel about the country selling crankcase oil as driveway black-tops or aluminum siding. It's a different scam, yeah. But, the end result is the same.

Let's take a moment to examine who and what is behind the scam which is lurking in mailboxes near you. But, first...The Letter & Pitch. The letter opens with this question: "Do you SUPPORT or OPPOSE the far-Left Agenda now being pushed into law by President Obama, Liberals who control Congress and AARP?"

Yeah, that well-known, undercover cell of the Communist Party, AARP. OK, OK I know I'm being a bit snarky, but for crying out loud, the AARP as a far left organization? Gimme a break, will ya!

Then it goes on with some phony questionnaire/ballot throwing about all the far-right's buzz and code words: "far-left", "socialism", "Socialist Agenda", "traditional moral values", "fighting for religious values", "AARP aggressively promotes homosexual lifestyle", "Crushing Burden On Our Grandchildren" and other equally profane and ridiculous bilge.

Then it moves into its main purpose. An appeal for membership at $12.95 and an "additional gift, above and beyond your regular membership dues...."10, $15, $20, $50, $100, or perhaps even more.

Sound faintly familiar? Well it ought to. This letter preying on frightened and unwary seniors comes from none other than Rev. Lou Sheldon, his daughter Angela and son-in-law, Jim Lafferty.
Sheldon is best known for his bug-eyed homophobic attacks on homosexuals through his umbrella front-organization, the Traditional Values Coalition and for his role on the Republican Congressional Committee and leadership in the Lindsey Graham for Senate campaign.

Son-in-law, Jim Lafferty is well-known Republican flack who served as Tom Delay's press-secretary from 1994-1995 and was a senior adviser to that frightening specter of wrath, she of the make up applied with a trowel, former Florida Secretary of State, Katherine Harris. Yeah her. The one that paved the way for that dry-drunk sociopath, George W. Bush to ascend into the White House.

Daughter Angela, one assumes, licks stamps and stuffs envelopes when not serving as Katherine Harris's make-up advisor.

A very unsavory lot and about as Christian as the pimple on a donkey's butt. Which is to say, not at all Christian.

And, now let us play the right-wing Republican game of guilt by association and implied menace through clever juxtaposition of words and letters: Christian Seniors Association, yep CSA. One has no problem envisioning them draped in the Stars and Bars.

Rove - Cheney: Destroying the Republican Party

Would each of you please help me out a bit and take it upon yourself to sit down with any Republican acquaintances you might have and explain to them that “elections have consequences” and that they lost in 2008.

Lost really big at that!

Earlier this month we endured Karl Rove insisting that the right must oppose anyone Obama picks to fill the Supreme Court seat soon to be vacated by David Souter’s retirement. Indeed, this is the same (still not yet indicted) Karl Rove, who while Bush (the second) was president, told the Washington Post that “the President was owed deference to choose a qualified nominee and the opposition party had a “responsibility to back” that pick”

If you can, set aside the hypocrisy of these utterances and give thought to this simple summation. The Republican right wing, does not know whom Obama will choose, but whomever it is they are planning to throw sand in the gears. Loyal thoughtful Americans that bunch.

And yesterday we hear Dick “Darth Vader” Cheney on Face the Nation saying that he prefers Rush Limbaugh’s brand of Republicanism to that of Colin Powell. "If I had to choose in terms of being a Republican, I'd go with Rush Limbaugh. My take on it was Colin had already left the party. I didn't know he was still a Republican", Cheney said.

He also claims that we, you and I, and all of America are less safe because of Obama, “… getting rid of certain harsh interrogation techniques or a terrorist surveillance program reduces the flow of good intelligence.”

Got that? The Torturer in Chief wants a return to the Days of Darkness despite the facts that most credible experts say that information coming from torture is not reliable and can best be obtained in other ways. But, putting that aside, we had an election in which this issue was decided—Americans do not condone torture!

And he prefers the politics of a drug-addled blowhard to those of a man who distinguished himself in war and peace and who has served his country both as a warrior and high ranking cabinet member. It really is a matter of values.

So please do this thing for me. No, do it for yourself. For the good of all of us. Take a Republican to lunch and explain to them that elections have consequences and that they lost the last election because, among other reasons, men such as Rove and Cheney do not reflect that which is good and decent about America. They are the foul, rotting underside of the worst sort of politics and if Republicans do not cast them aside and move on, there will soon be no Republican party, as it is known today!

I have a solution to the bailout mess!

Alright, I'm going to confess myself right up front as an effete, elitist, and whatever the other pejorative du jour for liberals happens to be right now. I had a pedicure on Tuesday, after visiting my dentist for a new bridge on Monday, and on my lunch hour today, I got a facial. Hardly conservative activities, unless you're a Senator or Congressional Representative well out of sight of the folks back home, then you might even be going in for a belly, back and chest waxing.

Hell, I'm betting that those folks leave the piney woods of their districts and acquire the taste for silken pajamas and sipping pink daiquiris no matter the level of their conservative outrage at liberal doings when they're back home.

Now, bear with me here, because all this has something to do with something. And that something, is conservative phony outrage.

Here's some recent examples of what I'm taking about. Their latest uproar is that Gwen Iffil, an accomplished, distinguished and award winning journalist who has written an unreleased book whose theme seems to be about how African-American political expectations have changed and come to fruition leading to Barack Obama standing for the presidency. This, has been common knowledge for some time, and certainly should be no surprise for anyone--but, the Republicans are claiming they've been blindsided and Palin will not get a fair shake from Iffil as the debate moderator. Seems, I predicted this several days ago.

Here's another example of their phony outrage, if there are "too many" foreign policy questions in tonight's debate, it will be proof of the media's and Iffil's bias against Palin. Or if she is pressed for specifics, then the "blood thirsty" media is being sexist.

Meanwhile, they, along with a coven of gutless Democrats, are cranking the carcass of our mostly-dead economy through a meat-grinder, rendering up a pork-laden, bailout sausage that promises to do little more than allow some failed banks to operate a little longer and special interests to get their piece of the action.

If one were a conservative, one ought to be frothing at the mouth, and if one were a liberal, one's hair should be on fire over this deal. It is a stark monument to politicians corrupted by lobbyists and owned lock, stock, and pink silk pajamas by their corporate contributors. They natter about "Main Street", and I ask when was the last time you saw any of yours strolling down "Main Street", unless they were trolling for votes or money? Main Street? Don't kid me, like they could find it, without a GPS system?

OK, I'll grant you it's not enough just to gripe, one ought to offer up a solution. OK, here's mine:

First, we need affordable housing that that does not create the need for extreme, unaffordable mortgages and high-risk credit.

Two, we need jobs creation with wages that enable working people, single-moms, seniors, and low-income families to earn enough to buy decent affordable homes without strapping on outrageous mortgages.

Three, here's the how. We loan to those institutions and entities needing the bailout the money they need to get their business straight. But, we take a mortgage on all their assets, not just the bad debt. Every damned thing they've got, including club memberships, corporate jets, cars, villas, vacation homes, real-estate, buildings, bonuses, stock holdings, and the silverware in the executive dining rooms. This will include all but one home and one car of the executives down to vice-president. Every asset of the company, and it's top executive, will be collateral for the loans. Everything! They default, and it is all ours, and we sell it to the highest domestic bidder.

We make the loan to them at cost plus 10% interest. This means, if we have to borrow to make the loan, they pay us the principal, plus the interest we had to pay to get them the damned loan, plus any administrative and legal costs associated with the loan, and 10% on top of that. We will set them up on quarterly payments; a day late, and they're in default, and it is all ours and on the auction block.

During the loan period no executive can earn more than $300,000 a year, and will have to buy their own car and home, and receive no bonuses or "Golden Parachute" exit packages.

We will need the GAO to supervise and audit their operations until their loans are paid, so we will have to add staff in order to accomplish this. No problem, we'll add a surcharge to their quarterly loan payments to offset our added costs.

Our earnings from the interest, and default auctions will be put in a lock-box Superfund to protect Social Security, improve Medicare, create jobs in rebuilding infrastructure and building fair-priced (cost plus-rather than market driven) affordable homes.

Now, since I've solved this financial mess, excuse me while I go get my eyebrows darkened. I just hope I don't run across any Republican politician while I'm there--I might yank his pink daiquiri out of his manicured hands and douse my hair--because right now it is on fire!

And, I'll tell you what That's real outrage about a really outrageous thing.