The evidence of Republican evil accumulates...

If you doubted Republicans were racists, note Arizona voting to ban classes teaching about non-white ethnic histories and to fire teachers who speak with a non-Anglo accent, and a Texas GOP US Rep comparing illegal aliens to grasshoppers- locusts, that is- instead of human beings.

If you doubted Republicans cared more about ideology than people, note a new Oklahoma law, passed over the governor's veto, requiring women who seek an abortion to get a vaginal probe ultrasound scan- including those who have just been raped.

If you doubted Republicans are more interested in partisan rule and total control of government than actually making government work well, read Ezra Klein's uncommonly observant article about how one of Utah's Senators is being run out of office for daring to negotiate with a Democrat on an alternative health care proposal.

The Republicans: the Party of Evil. Never believe otherwise.

In a Just World, Crist Should Now Be the Frontrunner...

The most evil man in America endorses Marco Rubio for the GOP nomination for US Senate.

And Rubio hasn't rejected it.

What more needs to be said?

What I Want to Know Is, What's the Chicken-Squirrel Exchange Rate?

So, the person who will almost certainly defeat Harry Reid and represent Nevada in the US Senate said this:

"Let's change the system and talk about what the possibilities are. I'm telling you that this works. You know, before we all started having health care, in the olden days, our grandparents, they would bring a chicken to the doctor. They would say I'll paint your house."

... yes, because Wellpoint will be more than happy to negotiate payment-in-kind for your insurance. Pharmaceutical companies are just eager and willing to give people their medicines and let them "work off" what they owe. And hospitals, now for the most part run by for-profit corporations, are ready and willing to take payment for your stay and surgery in livestock.

And then the Nevada Republican Party DEFENDS this woman:

Although the party is officially neutral in the primary between Lowden, former UNLV basketball player Danny Tarkanian and former state Rep. Sharron Angle, Nevada GOP communications director Ciara Turns nevertheless offered a vigorous defense of Lowden's statements, and condemned the Democrats for the way that Lowden is being attacked.

"Well it's pretty clear that they're attacking the way she conveyed her message because they can't attack her message," said Turns. "Her message is pretty clear. She was clearly trying to make the point that if we moved away from an insurance-based system and more people started paying cash for their health care, then prices would come down. But they don't want to address that. The left doesn't, Harry Reid's campaign doesn't want to address that, because it's a legitimate point that they can't argue. And so they've decided to go after the way she delivered her message instead of the substance of it."

Um, NO. The whole point of bringing in barter is, health care has become too expensive for the average person to pay cash. It's also become much too complicated and networked for any patient to negotiate fees and payment with all the many people- primary care doctor, specialist, lab technicians, pharmaceuticals, hospital corporations, clerical workers- that might be involved in their treatment.

But this is just one wingnut, right? Right?

WRONG.

Bell's made his comments last week, during discussion of a proposed state law that would attempt to nullify the federal health care insurance mandate in the state of Tennessee. Here is a transcript of a dialogue in committee between Bell and Democratic state Rep. Joe Towns, courtesy of the Nashville Scene, as Bell explained that many people get along without insurance:

Bell: They're some of the healthiest people you have ever seen. They pay cash when they go to the doctor. They work out arrangements with the hospitals if their children have to be hospitalized. This is an individual choice that we're talking about.

Towns: You're saying they pay cash? For organ transplants and cancer and heart cases, they pay cash?

Bell: I said they pay cash or work out other arrangements. I know for a fact. I know someone in the medical field who has been paid with vegetables from the Mennonite community.

Towns: That's an anomaly. That's not how the system works. I can't take a sack of vegetables down to the utility company and pay my utility bill on my house. Nobody's going to take vegetables for payment. We can't run the country on vegetables and horse trading.

The core of the Republican position is this: if you're too poor to pay cash for your health, you should only get whatever health care you can pay for in barter.

Now, I for one would be quite happy to see for-profit insurance corporations outlawed. I believe insurance is a confidence scheme made legal- you pay for a policy, and then the person who sold you the policy seeks any excuse imaginable not to pay you if you try to collect on it.

But the end of insurance has to be replaced with some workable system- otherwise everything goes crash. Doctors go bankrupt. Hospitals close. Health care at all levels suddenly becomes much more scarce- and thus much more expensive, as demand spikes above supply.

But Republicans, being rich enough to pay cash for their health care, don't care. After all, if you're too poor to pay a doctor it must be your own fault, riiiiiight?

Religious Wars in the US...

On the one side, we have people trying to institute a Christian Taliban in the United States, starting with Amarillo, Texas:

Perhaps the most insidious tactic Repent uses is trying to destroy the reputation of the swingers. In Amarillo, people can be ostracized over a whiff of impropriety. On one tape, Grisham directs followers to get the license-plate numbers in the Route 66 parking lot. “A new couple can be here three or four hours,” says Mac. “Whenever they leave, the Repent Amarillo group will call them by first and last name, know where they live, know where they work, just within a very few hours.”

. . .

They're also going after churches they believe to be insufficiently Christian (Episcopalians, Christian Scientists, Unitarians), palm readers, people who practice witchcraft, and anything and everything that might create a "demonic stronghold" in Amarillo. And they're not just threatening to pray for people: Repent Amarillo's "actions" include prayer, according to Repent Amarillo's website, "but [also] may involve more aggressive use of soldiers and prayer warriors." Check out the group's locked-and-loaded website.

Of course, these tactics would not work if not for the vast majority of citizens of Amarillo enabling these people. Tolerance is entirely lost on one whole side of the political spectrum...

... and don't look for help from the other side of the aisle.

The Department of Justice filed a notice with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit that it intends to appeal a federal court decision that found the National Day of Prayer unconstitutional.

A federal judge in Wisconsin ruled last week that the National Day of Prayer, instituted by Congress in 1952, violates the separation of church and state.

. . .

“The Justice Department today made the right decision to defend the constitutional right of Congress to establish a National Day of Prayer,” Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) said. “Setting aside a day to honor a religious practice of many Americans throughout history is in no way unconstitutional. Every American is free to either enjoy it or ignore it.”

Note: applying regulations to interstate insurance companies or international financial institutions is unconstitutional (despite Congress power to regulate both interstate and international commerce), but setting aside a day for all Americans to pray is NOT (despite the First Amendment and the total lack of any enumerated Congressional power to advocate or promote religion).

And by his actions, Obama apparently demonstrates his belief that government should promote religion.

So, one side wants government to promote religion; the other side wants government to ENFORCE religion. Neither side is willing to leave matters of personal conscience to the individual.

Whichever side wins, we all lose.

Why Today I Despair for the American Political System...

On the Republican side: Republicans signal that not even total capitulation will stop them from portraying financial reform as "permanent bailouts."

On the Democratic side, Obama is still willing to cave in and "compromise" with the Republicans, despite the Republicans saying point blank that they will not compromise. (Also, Obama's Treasury department used its voting power in Citigroup to block disclosure and transparency in derivatives at that company- proving that its calls for "more transparency" are outright lies.)

Back on the Republican side, we get proof that Republicans will destroy anyone who dares to even suggest compromise or working with the Democrats.

Back on the Democratic side, the president we elected to stop criminal conduct in office protects the lawbreakers while punishing those who blew the whistle on them.

There is no hope, no change, in either party.

I'm considering moving to England and joining the Liberal Democrats. At least every issue listed in this article, I agree with and support...

... and more to the point, there's at least a third option that has a chance, however small, to win when the big two parties both become too odious to stand.

Not So Much Cull Day, as Think About It Links

... but since it's mostly a list of links, I'll put the Cull Day tag on it anyhow.

First, file under good news v. bad news: Good news is, a ban on unmarried couples adopting is struck down in Arkansas, thus a win for gay families; bad news is, word is coming out that Obama is ordering that the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell be halted, thus yet more proof that Obama is no friend of gay rights.

Bruce Bartlett, conservative bloviator, tells us about the day he figured out that most conservatives hear nothing outside of Fox News, Limbaugh, and other right-wing propaganda outlets. Interesting reading.

Ezra Klein points out that corporations regard contracts as sacred when they're getting paid, but not so much when they have to pay employees.

Securities and Exchange Commission investigators knew "Sir" Allen Stanford was breaking the law with a Ponzi scheme... but did nothing about it for eight years. Why? Because it was too much hard work:

We found that senior Fort Worth officials perceived that they were being judged on the numbers of cases they brought, so-called "stats," and communicated to the Enforcement staff that novel or complex cases were disfavored. As a result, cases like Stanford, which were not considered "quick-hit" or "slam-dunk" cases, were not encouraged.

But that's not all: the head of the Fort Worth office of the SEC's enforcement division was in Stanford's back pocket:

The OIG investigation also found that the former head of Enforcement in Fort Worth, who played a significant role in multiple decisions over the years to quash investigations of Stanford, sought to represent Stanford on three separate occasions after he left the Commission, and in fact represented Stanford briefly in 2006 before he was informed by the SEC Ethics Office that it was improper to do so.

And, finally, a very interesting and thought-provoking story that points out why the fundamentalists are absolutely determined to defend the literal text of the Bible as the direct word of God Himself:

Because if God wrote it, personally, then its authority cannot be questioned. And wielding authority that cannot be questioned is what this story is all about.

This is a story about control. It is about, in the unintentionally candid terms of one of the main actors, "absolute authority" and the desire to wield that authority over a text so that the text, in turn, may be used to wield absolute authority over others.

This is very intriguing to me because, in no small part, it explains why fundamentalism is so strongly associated with the South. After all, politics in the South- indeed, every single aspect of the antebellum South, and most aspects of the post-Reconstruction South- centered around control, around making sure no one got above his or her proper station in life. From colonial days right down to the present, the South was split between the few who gave the orders and the many who obeyed- the few who organized the lynchings and the many who either carried them out or became the targets, the few who controlled the government and the many who voted as they were told to vote.

For these people, religion is merely a tool to maintain their control over society- and to defend that control when it is threatened by change.

So- read these links, and think about what they have to say.

It's not a threat- it's a WARNING.

So, today being the anniversary of Lexington and Concord (and Waco and the Oklahoma City bombing), all the militia groups (including a lot of teabaggers) are holding protests across the country.

Two are being held in the Washington, DC area, and they couldn't be more different; one is a simple Second Amendment rally, whose organizers are deliberately keeping out anyone who might actually bring a gun into the District or threaten the government.

The other one, being held just across the river in gun-legal Virginia, is more or less the exact opposite:

According to the Washington Post, protesters at the "Restore The Constitution" rally will take advantage of new gun laws signed by President Obama allowing the carrying of firearms in national parks to make an armed stand for liberty today.

Rally organizer Daniel Almond put the event together "because he is upset about health-care reform, climate control, bank bailouts, drug laws and what he sees as President Obama's insistence on and the Democratic Congress's capitulation to a 'totalitarian socialism' that tramples individual rights," the Post reports.

Almond will be packing heat, and he's calling on others to join him. The park is just a few miles from downtown D.C. and, on a clear day, the Capitol dome is visible from the location.

This second rally is so extreme in its orientation that even the organization calling for the military to mutiny against the federal government withdrew its support:

An Oath Keeper's board member explained his group's decision to pull out of Almond's event April 12 to the Post.

"It had gotten to the point that it would be dangerous to attend," the Oath Keeper told the paper. "There are people out there willing to do anything to create chaos in an uncontrolled situation, and [the event] is wide open for disaster."

Yeah, when an organization that waits with breathless anticipation for civil war with a "tyrannical" federal government doesn't want to be part of an armed anti-government rally, you can bet there's trouble.

The thing to remember, though, is that this second protest is absolutely NOT an isolated fringe group. It's part and parcel of the modern conservative movement- and especially the Republican Party. Remember, these people elect representatives who call for their constituents to be "armed and dangerous" in opposition to federal laws, who appear in the South and praise efforts to "rise again" in either ignorance of history or support of rebellion.

And, of course, these are the voters without whom the Republican Party would fall to the ranks of the "third" parties. In part, the armed rally within sight of the capitol is a reminder of this: do as you're ordered, or next time we won't bother with an election.

These are people who, more and more, are coming round to the idea of an armed rebellion against the elected government of the United States.

Granted, there is a little bit of good news about this. In my home state, the governor who said Texas might need to secede is in a tight race against a Democrat... and, by the way, that three-point lead is from a polling outfit with a six-point Republican bias, as (repeatedly) proven by FiveThirtyEight.com . And the Democrats are on the attack, mocking the neo-secessionists and militiamen:

Barnes, in particular, took aim at what he characterized as Republicans’ frivolous pursuits since they took power, such as making it illegal to implant a microchip in a person without his permission and threatening to secede from the U.S.

“Do they not know that the Yankees have got the atomic bomb now?” he joked. “We won’t make it through Bull Run.”

So perhaps there's hope.

But in the meantime... maybe it's time to organize gun owners who SUPPORT the currently elected government for a rally of our own.

Someone needs to make it clear that, if these loonies go to war to overturn an election, they WILL be opposed.