Benghazi is truly Obama’s biggest scandal. No shit. On a scale of one to ten, it nearly reaches the scale. After 472 Benghazi headlines all I learned is that republicans are equally culpable. And, yes, headline #473 brought me back to this lousy topic: Did Hillary Clinton’s Globetrotting Ways Contribute to Benghazi Disaster?

In a word, NO. In two words Umm, NO. In haiku form…I don’t do haikus, but if I did it would be 3-lines and 17-syllables of NO. Um, I guess I do do haikus (wait, Editor telling me DO DO is a NO NO). How about in Zano cartoon form?

Dear Fox News,

As for Benghazi, none of your hundreds of headlines over the last 16-months have had any relevance whatsoever to the planet Earth or its inhabitants.

Sincerely,

Reality

P.S. Although, Several Fox Anchors Injured during Latest Benghazi Bombshell was pretty impressive. Oh wait, I’m being told I made that one up.

Their audience wants blood and doesn’t care much about the particulars. And it’s not like they do retractions….ever. I did some digging this week in something called The Google to get to the bottom of this intriguing scandal once and for all.

So let’s go back in time, cue squiggly flashback sequence, and then take it away Mr. Milbank:

“For fiscal 2013, the GOP-controlled House proposed spending $1.934 billion for the State Department’s Worldwide Security Protection program — well below the $2.15 billion requested by the Obama administration. House Republicans cut the administration’s request for embassy security funding by $128 million in fiscal 2011 and $331 million in fiscal 2012.”

—Dana Milbank, October 2012.

Then…

“Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned that Republicans’ proposed cuts to her department would be ‘detrimental to America’s national security’ — a charge Republicans rejected.”

—Dana Milbank, same article.

It didn’t take over a year to get to the truth. It took about ten minutes in a place called the Monte Vista, with a nice IPA resting comfortably to my right.

So let me get this straight, after underfunding said facility, The GOP turned Benghazi into a year-plus-long Obama and Hillary slam session poor embassy security? Really? I knew republicans had blocked funding but I didn’t know the details were so damning. Do the words, what the fuck are you people talking about, ring a bell? It should. I’ve been covering your alternate reality for years now.

Summary Alert:

U.S. Embassies have been attacked on average once every two months for the last twenty years and this trend is likely to continue. Admittedly, this one is different…um, in that The GOP chose to underfund this embassy and then asked an endless chain of bullshit questions about for well over a year…er, while neglecting to ever mention the whole we-totally-chose-to-underfund-that-shit part.

If you have to rate all of Obama’s bullshit scandals, more people did die during this bullshit scandal. No one died during Solyndra or the IRS (which is still not linked to Obama in anyway) and only one person died during Fast and Furious. I think his Porsche hit a tree.

Dear GOP,

More people died during any given Bush scandal during the ten minutes it took Zano to research Benghazi.

Sincerely,

Reality

I agree this was a bad day for the Obama Administration, four people died. But, apparently, tens of thousands of people who died during a Bush lie/war is not a scandal, but five people dying can be broken out into numerous “fun size” scandals. See? Liberals could have made thousands of scandals, but instead chose to remain too fixated on something called facts.

I liked Kevin Drum’s coverage on the now debunked 60-minutes piece in his Yet Another Benghazi Story Falls Apart.

So now that the truth has been revealed—okay, we knew it all along—how about we pin it on those responsible? Here’s the headlines Fox News neglected to mention because they reside in an alternate universe. Will science discover the GOP particle? Is their world comprised of dork matter?

Why Did Republicans Block Embassy Security Funds?

Is Chris Stevens’ Blood on Republican Hands?

Clinton Warned Them! Why Wouldn’t The GOP Listen!

No Spending Cuts Until GOP Explains Benghazi Failure

Did Obama Ignore Bigfoot Benghazi Sightings?

Hint, anything going horribly wrong in our country can probably be attributed to a republican policy. This trick works every time, like magic. The only ones who haven’t figured this out yet…um, I’ll give you one hint.

My first story on Benghazi here. I have learned nothing since that story, well, except the GOP has more culpability. Hint: dangerous parts of the world are dangerous. Deep stuff.

I wanted the investigation too, not as a blame game but keep our embassies safer. The republicans want scandals, so the more who die the better. My joke headlines—the ones that often involve Bigfoot—can’t reach the levels of absurdity that Fox News has reached on this subject.

Here’s some real ones:

One Year Later, Families Have Few Answers on Benghazi Attack

Let me ‘splain: there are terrorists in Libya who hate America and during a vacuum of power the GOP didn’t want to fund the security of such facilities so one was overrun by extremists and everyone died. Does that help?

CBS May Drop Benghazi-Gate Bomb on Team Obama Sunday Night on 60 Minutes

Oh, it was a bomb all right, a career ending bomb. As it turns out that Guy too Full of Shit for even Fox News was, in fact, full of shit.

Fox News: “We Stand By Our Reporting On Benghazi”

…which, besides the above statement, consists of a series of headlines in the guise of questions that have since proven meaningless. The usual.

Cheney: Benghazi ‘one of the worst incidents that I can recall’

I recall differently, sir. (Hint: 9/11/12 would have marked the least deadly/eventful day of the Bush Administration.) Of course math is just another liberal talking point.

Here’s my answer to Cheney:

Is Cheney Lying or Suffering from Alzheimers?

Check out the Daily Banter’s The 13 Benghazi’s That Happened on Bush’s Watch Without a Peep. Back during the Bush years we didn’t have time to cover this shit, we had real scandals to contend with. Maybe next time the republicans are in power, oh that’s right, there’s not going to be a next time—at least if I have anything to blog about it. Meanwhile, here’s the real story: Fox’s Fixation on Benghazi.

Fox is not concerned with the truth, and it shows in their…er, shows. Do you know what Steve Douchey said the morning after CBS aired their eventually debunked Benghazi story? He said something like, “Why has the main stream media only started to cover this now? We’ve known about this for months!” Okay, so you knew a pack of lies to be true and you were covering said lies as truth? Okay. Can that be worked into the logo?

Fox News Lie, Blather, Repeat

How about this headline:

Doocy Makes Dookie Again

Yes, it’s that time again. It’s the post wonderful time of the year! I keep covering the GOP’s view of climate change because, if it didn’t mean the probable end of mankind, it would be downright hilarious—Discord’s latest video hilarious. You have to hand it to these folks, they aren’t going to fall for any scientific argument. It’s a gutsy move, like cross-dressing at a Tea Party rally. Never again!

If you recall, the last Koch Brother’s funded study backfired in 2011. Even their own hired research minions couldn’t deny the truth any longer. And they never did find the bodies of those researchers. So the small minority still doggedly trying to disprove any change—you know, the folks throwing around more money than Silvio Berlusconi at a bunga bunga party—failed, miserably, and yet that didn’t seem to have any effect on the debate. What can?

BSFN: Bull Shit Fox News We Don’t Just Make the Bullshit, We Ignore Any Real Facts Too

That’s because it takes decades for republicans to digest any given topic or event, which is way too long when we’re talking about the important issues of our time, like ninja porn.

Keep looking until the naked ninja appears

It’s another normalcy bias moment, or, as the Beatles put it, “Nothing’s going to change their world. Nothing’s going to change their world.”

The recent Live Science headline: Arctic Warmest in at Least 44,000 Years is immediately translated by the Foxeteers as, “My tomatoes got frost last night. Where was the warming when my tomatoes needed it?” The oceans are more acidic than in known Earth history is translated as, “Acid? I thought those hippy libs liked dropping acid?”

They attack the findings of any study that doesn’t jive with their deep-seeded denial and, when that fails, they attack science itself.

The Drudge Report links to every global warming article or study that mentions a pause in the warming. Then, if you actually read the article, you find, “Yeah climate change is still happening, it’s caused by man, and we’re still all screwed, but there’s this pause.” The GOP reads the same article and takes away only one nugget, PAUSE.

Mind the Gap

Science has now identified our deep oceans as temporarily absorbing the extra heat. Full story here. Or maybe reducing emissions and banning those chemicals most harmful to our ozone has had a positive impact. But in the Fox lands…

Pause  =  Not Happening

More accurately:

GOP  =  Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs

As my next witness, I call to the floor Captain Mass Extinction and Count Climate Changeula. Speaking of Captains, the GOP makes Captain Ahab seem downright aloof. Call me Darrell Issamael? No? How about, from hell’s heart I blog at thee? I’ll work on that one.

Here’s what pause actually means:

1. A temporary stop or rest, especially in speech or action: For an antonym see Ted Cruz’s 23-hour imaginary filibuster.
2. A cessation of activity because of doubt or uncertainty; a momentary hesitation: Like when Shep Smith squints at the teleprompter, winces, and then thinks “Is anyone really going to buy this shit? Where the hell do we find these people?”
3. Any comparatively brief stop, delay, wait, etc.: for an antonym see the line at the DMV.

And even if it stays this hot we’re in big trouble. If the pause holds, it holds at the hottest 16-years on record. Forgot that part, huh? So we’ll continue to lose glaciers, coastal areas, Eskimos, drink specials, and the world may yet become as unbearable as The Weekly Standard. The pause is simply a convenient truth to keep the GOP blindly supporting our nation’s one percent agenda (which is entirely unfair to all those whole milk products).

I’m afraid this warming trend is likely to resume soon, but the GOP’s inability to process data is likely to go on until the bitter end. We need to err on the side of, er…air. Even if there were only a 10% chance that shit’s changing, why would we gamble with the future habitability of our planet? When you factor in that it’s only 10% it’s not happening, the GOP’s position is truly absurd.

“Earth, what’s the worst that could happen?”

—John Q. Republican

To this I say:

“They call us warmers….you know, birthers with brains.”

—Mick Zano

I have posted this before, but…

The summary of the above chart is essentially this:

If you graduated some high school science class or another, or even if you just watched Bill Nye the Science Guy once—from the kitchen while doing the dishes—umm, you’ve figured out climate change is happening.

Actually this gets translated by the right as: all scientists from all universities, all over the world, are under some Al Gore mind control drug (AGMCD). An Inconvenient truth serum?

More and more people believe the republicans are incapable of any ideological course correction. I am in this camp. In fact, I built this camp. I also built this city on rock-n-roll. I did this in my spare time, when I’m not making ninja porn jokes. But it’s troubling to see an entire faction of our society locked in their seats as their ideological starship spirals into the atmosphere. Of course, in this episode, they don’t think the planet is getting closer, they think it’s some liberal trick to get the GOP to stop mining and drilling on the planet Oilcoalian-IV.

I like Juan Cole’s take:

“Abandoning coal, oil and gas ASAP is the only hope to avert disaster. We could do it if the political will existed. Certainly, all coal plants could be closed down within 10 years, and that with relatively little economic pain. Coal is especially dirty and dangerous.”

—Juan Cole (coal?)

Essentially if climatologists predict a 10cm sea level rise by such and such and it only rises 8cm, the GOP goes, “Hah! Wrong, Mister went to school and stuff.” This is part of their famous all-or-none thinking. I never thought science would get this exactly right. We’re talking about ocean currents, continent-sized glaciers, global weather systems, Al Gore…

But you know who is never going to get it right? Republicans. Well, if history is any judge.

Obama is addressing climate change and finally starting a proper War on Coal. People need to remember which political party got every important issue of the 21st century wrong. The GOP still denies global warming and defends coal…in 2013…Earth. I do believe in clean coal, I do, I do! Meanwhile, every time a coal plant opens a fairy dies…usually at one of those nearby redneck bars.

That joke is my cue to wrap this shit up. Suffice to say,

“Hey, who needs the EPA during a time of mass extinctions and climate upheaval?”

—John Q. Republican

Aren’t they cute? And by cute I mean certifiable.

I would rather be inside a besieged embassy right now donning a certain Danish cartoon T-shirt than discussing Benghazi again, but if six months of endless headlines haven’t really netted you anything meaningful, please stop. People with a reading comprehension above a squirrel don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. Make love not scandals. Besides, new scandals are emerging with teeth. Clue Alert: they’re being covered by something called “the media”.

Republicans have successfully painted a four year narrative that brings Obama down to the level of Satan. Bravo.

And perception is reality (ask Joseph Goebbels). There are scores of people in Real America who think this week’s events mark Obama’s 27^th, 28^th and 29^th scandal, respectively. He’s losing the War of Ideers’. No wonder he’s desperately trying to fund education.

Here’s what we’ve learned after covering Benghazi since the late Pleistocene:

The State Department and the CIA had a difference of opinion on how best to present the embassy attack to the media. Wow, deep linguistic stuff involving verbiage.

“You have to bend yourself into several pretzels to even understand what the Benghazi thing is about. All the emails Obama And Turkish PM Erdogan Meet At The White House released show what amounts to a classic inter-agency conflict, resolved dispassionately by Ben Rhodes, in a period of considerable confusion.”

—Andrew Sullivan, The Dish

Or, as the GOP put it, “Impeach Obama!”

This has been a witch hunt from the get-go. Here’s the recap of the Hillary witch trial:

1. It’s the lead up to Benghazi! No wait, we blocked the security funding for that.
2. It’s what Obama didn’t say the next day in the Rose Garden! Oh, wait he called it terrorism. Shit.
3. It was…oh wait, the independent investigation found no wrongdoing.
4. Wait, I know! In hindsight, we could have saved those people! Really? …we couldn’t have?
5. Umm, I got it, they’re hiding the truth!

…which I addressed recently here:

“Yes, we’ve been trying to paint a very different picture of what happened over there: a group of Libyans, who love America as much as anyone, accidentally overran our embassy and killed everybody with glitter and bunnies…glitter and MFing bunnies, people!”

—Mick Zano as Barack Obama

I can’t wait to hear the rest of the alphabet. This isn’t about keeping future embassies safe. The truth is the Obama Administration is being PC. They are quite averse to creating terrorism through ignorance (QTTI). Abu Ghraib likely created more terrorists than Bush ever captured or killed. Obama, not one to repeat a mistake, wants to avoid spiking American hatred in the Middle East needlessly. In fact, that’s a primary reason I voted for him, or…glitter and MFing bunnies, people!

Meanwhile, the GOP is calling this Watergate. They were calling it that before the…umm, nice-Libyans-who accidentally-killed-us even left the embassy. I guess they just smelled a scandal.

Fun Fact: frequent meth use can result in olfactory hallucinations and can permanently damage one’s sense of scandals. Have that checked out.

“[T]he one advice I give to Republicans is stop calling [Benghazi] a huge scandal. Stop saying it’s a Watergate. Stop saying it’s Iran Contra. Let the facts speak for themselves. Have a special committee, a select committee. The facts will speak for themselves. Pile them on but don’t exaggerate.”

—Charles Krauthammer

Later Roger Ailes pulled Charles aside and said, “Psst. We don’t do that here but, don’t worry, our viewers don’t seem to notice.”

“This whole thing with Fox (on Benghazi) would be funny if it weren’t so damaging. A lot of people only watch Fox News, and while it’s easy to mock Fox for being so reality-deficient, so clearly wrong so often, the fact is for millions of people Fox is their sole news source.”

—David Weigel, Slate Magazine

Yes, there is something under this stone, and it’s you! The biggest part of this “scandal” is an email from the State Department that turned out to be doctored bullshit, here. And, even if the initial reports of this insidious wording proved true, it would still rate a whopping:

Scandal Level raised to who gives a flying F—?!

I am not making light of this situation, but after reading dozens of related articles, if we do run out of helium I think this scandal could be a backup source. The real story, as usual, is how fewer and fewer republicans exist outside of the bubble. Did you ever see The Blob with Steve McQueen? I envision the last few sane republicans currently holed up in that old fashioned diner.

Think of me as a GOP-stopper. George Will and Peggy Noonan, two individuals I once respected, have officially joined this bubble of non-reality. I agree with Sullivan on this one, their conclusions from Benghazi are “unhinged”.  So the GOP just lost another 10% of their clout. Hint: that’s about all they had left. Good thing they don’t believe in math.

Benghazi should be about learning from any mistakes and making future Americans safer abroad, nothing more. Every point the republicans are trying to make on this subject is, and remains, semantics. When similar shit happened under Bush…well, take it away Juan:

“By the way, does (Paul) Ryan always consider attacks on US embassies a sign that an administration’s foreign policy is blowing up in our faces? For instance, if the US embassy in Athens, Greece, was attacked in 2007, would that have been an indictment of George W. Bush’s foreign policy? What about if the US embassy in Serbia was burned down early in 2008? If the US embassy in Sanaa, Yemen, were attacked in September 2008? If the US consulate in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, was attacked in 2004? What if thousands of anti-American Iraqis were regularly demonstrating and even shelling the Green Zone in Baghdad where the US embassy is in 2008? Did all that mean that Bush’s foreign policy, the most recent foreign policy outing of the Republican Party, blew up in our faces, according to Ryan?”

—Juan Cole

And I’m sure after each of these attacks, which Bill Maher claims totaled 13, Bush told the people all the details accurately and concisely—within seven or eight seconds after each incident. Well, after he put down My Pet Goat. Hey, it was just put onto Kindle then and he was at a good part.

I never covered a word about those attacks, why? Well, for one I was still working on my GED, but I understood how other parts of the world are dangerous. Deep stuff. Besides, we had plenty of real scandals to contend with at the time.

On cue, here’s the shit hitting the net:

Meanwhile three of these do not reach the level of scandal. They certainly don’t reach the level of significant scandal, and the other two broke five minutes ago. The GOP doesn’t jump to conclusions, they immediately warp to the planet Methane. Sorry, Star Trek is in theaters.

Here’s the Cliff Notes on past Obama “scandals”:

Solyndra – Please invest more in solar power, sir, but try not lose money this time

Fast & Furious – Why did Bush start such a program? Only six months into office—and dealing with two wars and the worst financial collapse since the great depression—I guarantee you this wasn’t on Obama’s radar. But, sure, let’s not do that anymore. In fact, since we’ve been running arms through multiple countries for the last fifteen or so administrations, maybe we should stop that.

Benghazi – Huh? Whaa? Can I be reimbursed for all the bullshit articles I had to read? I found more meat at that vegan donut shop Bald Tony took me to in Vegas.

And, if I made a similarly cute little Bush scandal cartoon:

1. I could not fit them all on such a small picture.
2. I would not need to invent any.
3. I would be forced to narrow it down to huge scandals, some warranting impeachment, others the death penalty.
4. Oh, and Bush was directly responsible for these scandals—none of this ‘other agencies misbehaving’ crap.

The good news is the GOP is convinced Obama is directly responsible for these new scandals so David Corn, channeling yours truly, came up with this great tweet:

“Dick Morris says IRS scandal could lead to Obama’s impeachment, which means it won’t.”

Yeah, I should sue for plagiarism, but instead solidarity, brother! Since you can set your watch to their wrongness that means Obama will likely skate.

Irony Alert: Only if the GOP started to defend Obama will he resign in disgrace. 

To imply this stuff is impeachable—especially when one considers what this bunch let slide under W—is astounding. Meanwhile, the IRS thing has yet to be linked the White House. If a connection is found, Obama is in big trouble. That is not the case today, nor am I predicting a connection will be made. But that won’t stop the GOP. I can’t wait until they get desperate:

Fox News Alert: A guilty mid-level IRS accountant, not only voted for Obama in 2004 and 2008, but he visited a city in Kenya believed to be Obama’s birthplace.

Impeach!

Fun Fact: most people with an education, aka, college professors, IRS accountants, journalists and the like are generally not huge Tea Party fans. So I’m afraid that’s going to spill over into shit now and again like British Petroleum engineer on mescaline.

Am I excusing the IRS’s behavior? Certainly not—heads should roll and will. The only valid scandal at the moment is the Associated Press thing, which is directly linked to the one big, real, scary problem facing our liberties. Hint: it’s the one I’ve been warning about for a decade or more.

This includes Obama’s secrecy, the treatment of whistleblowers, no oversight for drone strikes, no habeas corpus, and the expansions of executive power which are straining our system to the brink.

So you want to impeach Obama for the AP scandal? Sorry, what he did is legal. Is it extreme? Yes. Is it pretty scary? Yes. But this shit is now a tip toe through the tulips for big bro. In fact, it’s known as the Gonzales Special in the beltway. What the Justice Department did is permissible under law. Check my 2010 article, Funny Thing but Breaking Something Called the Justice Department Might Have Consequences for Something…er, Called Justice.

The only thing that may bring down this whole house of cards is Eric Holder. Cheney would have handled this situation thusly:

“It’s legal, I’m keeping you safe, so shut the F-up”

—Dick Cheney

I have had only one staffing suggestion for Mr. Obama over the years, lose Holder. He’s an idiot. It’s one of the only four valid GOP points in the 21^st century, though the other three escape me.  I have no idea why Obama is sticking with him and it may yet be his undoing.

“Someday you (Obama) will thank us for this expansion of power.”

—Dick Cheney

Apparently that day is today:

“Thanks, Dick.”

—Obama

Here are the dots—and if only the GOP had the wherewithal to connect them. Our problems stem from the FISA Amendment (2008), The Patriot Act (2003), and the utter Politization of the Justice Department (2005-2007). The very things that signified the end of any semblance of our liberties.

The Bushies and Foxeteers got this shit to pass post 9/11 with a two-pronged approach:

1. Vote for these or you are not patriotic.
2. We need these tools to keep your sorry asses safe.

And they all fell for it. These items were all nearly unanimously supported by the GOP. Who was in charge then? I’ll refrain from saying the B word, but with all the histrionics and blather from the right, did any one of them really see this coming? Did they understand what they were voting for? Maybe the Pauls did and certainly the Zanos, but I’ll try not to strain anything patting myself on the back.

I said in 2008 “Obama will have a coronation, not an inauguration.” And I predicted he would not restore the rule of law (many times on this site)—nor will anyone for that matter.

GOP translation: You’re wrong, Zano!

Granted, I am not as angry with Obama as I should be, but once these expansions occurred while fighting a nebulous, endless war…it was over. It still doesn’t make it right, but you don’t run for president if you don’t like power. I’m not giving Obama a free pass, I’m just being realistic.

You didn’t think the shit Bush broke would have consequences? Could you imagine this power in the hands of a Tea Partier? Or back in the hands of another Neocon like Cheney? Cheney, if you recall, downloaded all of Google and was later discovered—not hunting down Al-Qaeda with this info—but checking up on his political adversaries. All legal like. And someday the republicans will return to power and I rue that day, as should we all. A republican president with this power is the kind of shit that keeps me up at night…well, that and meth.

Here’s what I wrote a couple of weeks ago, right before these latest scandals broke, here:

“The GOP believed something which turned out to be bullshit. Then the GOP believed something else which turned out to be bullshit, and while everyone was fixated on this aforementioned bullshit, we completely missed ___________ which, as it turned out, had profound implications for our liberties and our future.”

I could have focused more on the real problems if I hadn’t been chasing Rep. herrings for the last four years. Critiquing the likes of Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity is a fool’s errand. I was actually working on the first part of this post, the Benghazi part, when these other scandals surfaced. Meanwhile the Right feels somehow vindicated. Finally, they have scandals to discuss with people outside the bubble.

News Flash: climb the F-back in the bubble!

We need Republicans weighing in on current events like the Dow Jones needs the Ryan Plan. Ninety percent of the GOP is still suffering from Gross Insight Deficit Disorder (GIDD). Far too many republican views are shaped by a fear of out-members, as covered here, and an unswerving ability to support all of society’s sociopathic and suicidal tendencies, here. Until they address their own shortcomings how can they help?

Actually, pains me though it may, it’s time we worked together on addressing this expansion of power.  It’s a huge issue regardless of who is in the White House. It’s been exceedingly tough to focus on the meaningful when nearly half the country is obsessing over the trivial. Instead, let’s all focus on restoring the rule of law. If we can pull that off I would be very happy to write that retraction. I just don’t know how the Foxeteers can ever climb out of the ideological hole they’ve dug for themselves.

Okay, here it goes…I am reaching across the aisle right now and hoping to God I don’t hear another clown horn.

Look, just remember, the other two Obama scandals are hot off the press. Let’s take a page from the Hammer of Kraut and see where the investigations go. Watching the GOP pursue a scandal is like watching North Korea develop a missile program. You want the truth? You can’t make up 758 things and then expect to find the truth. It’s like finding a Beetle in a Sleestack.

Wow…that is the single worst groaner in Discord history. Mr. Winslow could shut me down for—

Both D and R believe, rather strongly, that their counterparts are certifiably insane. So who’s right? Liberals are finally fighting for what they believe in, but their ideological drift in recent years has been relatively small. And, unfortunately, they still tend to elect presidents who govern slightly right. Meanwhile, the GOP will go down in history as moving so far right they’re now sending back pictures as they pass the Ort Cloud on the outer edge of our solar system.

I think if you say a certain group of people are crazy, you should at least have facts to back up these claims. I do…and I’m just a pseudo-spooferest. The right, especially on AM radio, is always saying, “Those crazy liberals think”…and, “How can they possibly believe…?” They then typically follow this inflammatory statement with some combination of revisionist history, lies or hyperbole. Although, historically that’s probably a false exaggeration (badum bum).

Is the Tea Party the biggest obstacle to our recovery? I don’t think the Tea Party destroyed America; they only assisted with our bond downgrade and then cock-blocked us from any meaningful reform. Actually, Bush destroyed America. Naah, I’m still being factious. We just need to do the exact opposite of whatever Sean Hannity says. Yeah, I’m STILL being factious, because he did make sense last week when he told Ann Coulter, “We must hold the Norquist line,”…umm, am I being facetious? Is there a stronger word for facetious, like Mega-F, or omni-facetious? Hannity was so batshit that Ann Coulter somehow morphed into the conservative voice of reason.

Unless I have an ample supply of Nexium, I can only stomach about 15 minutes of the fair & balanced channel, but this week I happened upon a really interesting exchange. The “highlight” of this waiting-for-the-commercial-to-end-on-another-channel was when Ann told Sean, “Umm, we lost the raising taxes on the rich thing, so let’s focus on the battles we can win.” She’s right. And to all the rest of you, who haven’t figured that out yet, seek medication. This means a huge chunk of Republicana remains to the right of Ann Coulter…let that sink in for a minute. There’s someone named Michael Moore on the left, but most Democrats aren’t left of him. See the difference?

Look, Obama ran on raising taxes for the rich, loud and clear. His tax hikes are not dissimilar to Simpson-Bowels, which the GOP covets without actually understanding. And please enjoy my next post Ann Coulter: Voice of Reason. Yikes. It’s like when a psych ward is overrun with zombies so you decide to follow the chick who just got her antipsychotic injection. It’s the lesser of two inmates.

So who’s crazier right or left? Well, one of my main premises has always been this: the GOP’s destructive impulses are measurable. They’re already in the history books; they were horrible and they were many: from Iraq, to our bond downgrade, to alternate street parking. Their decisions fundamentally impacted our collective future, our collective prosperity, as well as our Constitution. Meanwhile, the Right’s main beefs always draw a whaaah? out of me, like, hey, Obama’s using the Patriot Act effectively! WTF? Or, Obama listened to the advice of the intelligence community on the wording of a press briefing! The nerve of that guy. Yeah, that shit keeps me up at night all right…going waaaah?

The woes of the GOP are generally propaganda generated fears (PGF) and projections that have yet to manifest. Obama’s going to take our guns…er, despite the fact he has a better 2^nd Amendment record than your last candidate, or Obama’s going to break our economy, when it was already broken.

Over the years, I have further distanced myself from Republican “thought” and, yet, I have a much stronger grasp on what they’re supposed to be doing during these fiscal negotiations. They seem to have no idea. It’s like when you find a boy in the woods raised by monkeys, who would love to become Tarzan but is neurologically on par with George of the Jungle on ‘ludes.

Here’s what you’re supposed to be doing. Here’s what, if you were a remotely competent group of individuals, you would be doing. After all, you still have the House, for now. Well, no matter what happens in the mid-terms, remember, you’ll still have House reruns. Can you believe that last diagnosis?

The plans:

Obama’s line is that top line. It’s where the negations are supposed to begin…on this planet. It’s nonsense, of course. Obama’s cuts are based on decreasing projected increases, which is a fancy way of saying slower increases, not cuts. Regardless, tax cuts for the rich are not on the table. You lost to America as well as to every credible economist. Better luck next proposal.

Hint: next time you nation-build in two countries, one of them entirely unnecessarily, let’s try to pay for that shit first, huh? And let’s end fecal conservatism once and for all.

If you make over $250,000, come January, life will still be swell. Of course, the GOP refers to these as taxing the job creators. After they say this, they must drop to their knees and face the Koch Brother obelisk to begin the ablutions. Meanwhile, these “job creators” were just fine under the same tax levels in the 90s…er, or any other time in history…er, or in any other country. Damn you facts!

Another key point of the Right’s “argument” is that taxing the rich will only run the government for four months, or for three months, or for 10 days, or for 11 minutes, because our government goes to 11! Umm, even Fox News has admitted it’s about 3.5 months, but by the time that point is translated by your average Foxeteer, you can subtract 90%.

Revenues to the tune of 3.5 months is close to the Zano proposal from way back when. I always favored some ratio close to the deficit commission or Simpson-Bowles. The bottom line, the Ryan plan, or the Tea Party plan, is clearly the worst strategy. If implemented, that plan would cause a double dip recession within about eleven minutes, because our solvency as a nation goes to 11! This is why voting for Romney was such a bad idea, besides the fact he couldn’t find China on the map with both aides. Every European country that went too austerity-heavy double dipped. It happened here too in the 30s and it happens every time someone decides to forgo reason in favor of some deranged version of Foxeterianism. Is there any other kind?

England, amidst their own austerity plan, believes such a lopsided approach has never worked:

“The IMF report argues that the best way to reduce borrowing, pay down debt and stabilize the economy is to boost low and middle incomes. This isn’t a new idea. In the US of the 1930s, Roosevelt’s New Deal raised incomes by putting millions of people back to work. But, as during the Great Depression, it’s a solution which is still reviled by the rich, the politicians they have bribed and the voters they have brainwashed.”

—The Guardian

Sound familiar?

Simpson Bowles is a little austerity-heavy and might have triggered a double dip, but Obama’s proposal is not in the right zone either. This is precisely why we needed healthy Republicans. They should be trying to get us to that sweet spot between Obama’s plan and that Simpson-Bowles line. Currently Obama can ignore the GOP, and will, because they are batshit and only they seem unaware of this fact. This is a bad thing. We need them to take off the dunce caps and sit down at the table, or any real cuts will remain imaginary. If Obama does not do something real to change the trajectory of our debt by 2016, his legacy will suffer and so will our country. Regardless, I don’t think he’s going to make those hard choices without some prompting, so if no one on the Right even knows where to begin the negotiations, umm, we’re kind of screwed.

Despite the election, the GOP remains a haven for radical ideologues. They need to purge the zealots among their ranks and they need to do it now. Movement toward sanity is happening, but waaay to slowly. Hint: climate change is happening more quickly than GOP growth. I know, I know GOP growth is a hoax. I call people who think they’re reforming Growthers.

Face it, having a few more people come out of the Republican closet is not going to cut it. In fact, it won’t cut anything, as we will see soon enough.

Obama started the negotiations right where he was supposed to and, as usual, the GOP is….well…um…er…they’re so far out there…but, hey, that’s a lovely picture of the Voyager satellite, Mr. Boehner. While you’re out there can you take out that map that shows aliens how to find Earth so they come here to harvest our planet for brains, blood, and other body parts? That would be great.

Yeah, I know, but the rest of us have brains, Mr. Speaker, and we’d like to keep them.

It’s absurd what’s happening today, and not just because of my last post about the Facebook Nazis. We are in dire straits, folks, and, Mark my words, I have had a Knopfler. (The Sultans of Swing Voters?) Sorry. Half our country can’t motivate and the other half probably shouldn’t. The Occupy movement remains rudderless and the Tea Party has charted a clear and exact course toward some jagged rocks.

Why are we increasingly polarized? Is it based on real differences, or is it by design? We need to get on the same page, folks, and soon. As Dylan and Hendrix warn us, “The hour’s getting late.”

Check out Dictionary.com’s definition of polarized.

Po·lar·ized   /ˈpoʊləˌraɪzd/ Show Spelled[poh-luh-rahyzd] Show IPA

(who should I show my India Pale Ale to?)

adjective

1. of or pertaining to a medium that exhibits polarization.

2. (of an electric plug or outlet) designed so that the plug and outlet fit together in only one way.

Check out definition number two. We are designed to see the world in one of two ways: progressive or regressive, positive or negative, D or R. Neither side has a monopoly on the truth, yet we have been pigeonholed into black or Romney thinking.

How did so many get so misinformed? Most of the blame rests with our entertainment in the guise of news journalism. Damn you Daily Discord, damn you! If you followed the Scott Walker recall coverage, umm, it was appalling.

“Given this blatant partisan coverage, it was absolutely impossible to watch either network [MSNBC or Fox] and weed out any clear understanding of the actual significance of the event, much less what effect it would actually have on the 2012 presidential election.”

—Dylan Byers Politico

When Mr. Olbermann started acting out, MSNBC told him good night and good luck. I imagine it won’t be too long before Ed I-know-nuszink Schultz follows suit. But here’s the rub, radicalism equates to promotions on the Right. Ideology is rewarded with viewers. Oh, and lie all you want, you’re audience doesn’t care. Fox is never having to make a retraction.

I want to retract that, Mr. Winslow. See? Even I can do it. Oh, he’s printing it anyway. Well, it’s the thought that counts and someday the Right will have those.

What can we do about this? There’s obviously a slew of people who want to watch this shit, facts be damned. Certainly one of the consequences for this station was a W. second term. Could you imagine if all you had was Walter Cronkite types? Bush would have been impeached, not re-elected. But, you can’t shut down Fox, you can only choose to shut it off, and that’s not likely to happen with the current caliber of their viewers.

“It’s a 66-Magnum….It shoots through truth.”

—Joe Piscopo

As predicted, the Tea Party was hijacked by Fake News, and, whatever it manages to accomplish, God help us. Then there’s Occupy, which has thus far been meaningless. The Discord’s version sums it up.

We are Discord! We occupy space

In this environment, can any grass roots movement really lead to more political parties and/or genuine reform? Face it, this is not exactly an independent-thought-friendly-era (ITFE). That was part of the initial inspiration for the formation of the Transcosmetic Party in the first place…and, of course, stories about Facebook Nazis.

Our two party system has us by the short hairs (I knew I should have manscaped). I fear Occupy is going to get rough and tumble at some point. And if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao…sorry, Beatles flashback. If I were a betting man, I’d say we have some riots in our future. I just want our ire to be channeled toward those responsible. And is that likely to happen? Occupy can be summarized thusly, “We’re mad but not sure why” and the Tea Party can be summarized as “We’re mad and supporting those destroying us.”

Well done everyone. How about we take a deep breath and think about shit before we start gnawing off each other’s faces.

“I’m taking my cannibalistic talents to South Beach!”

—LeBron James

Some of the misinformation is directly impacted by the dumbing down effect so prevalent today. Here’s a recent excerpt from NPR.

“The sophistication of federal lawmakers’ speech patterns is on the decline, with members of Congress now talking, on average, at the level of high school sophomores. According to a new report by the Sunlight Foundation, Congress has fallen by almost a full grade-level since 2005.” [and] “The members speaking at the lowest grade levels tend to be freshmen Republicans.”

If this is true, I would like to temporally channel a young sophomore Congressman Zano. I’m sure we’ll be interrupting him from his important endeavors back in high school…actually, let’s not. He just left for a Judas Priest concert with a bottle of Yukon Jack and a baggie of stems and seeds (a real Norman Rockwell moment).

We really don’t need to talk to him, er me—let alone allow him, er me to govern. This is a key aspect of Fox’s false assumptions, dumb is the new smart (the Palin Effect?). I have covered this disturbing phenomenon for yerbs. That’s what The Right is calling years now. It’s OK, I’ve gotten usett to ip.

“That depends on what your definition of ip is.”

—Bill Clinton

I wouldn’t be concerned about a bonefied Mr. Smith marching off to Washington but this isn’t about Jimmy Stewart, or principles, or anything remotely patriotic. Today, Mr. Smith doesn’t need to go anywhere near Washington. No coherent or compelling speech necessary. He—clearly in the minority— can simply filibuster shit from his iPhone enroute to the Judas Priest concert with the aforementioned bottle of Yukon Jack. This typically occurs after a memo and an enclosed check from the Koch Brothers. Yeah team America! Activate form of nullification.

If being inarticulate were their only drawback, we would welcome these new voices into Congress, but, as it turns out, that’s their only endearing quality. The worst part is their persistent all-or-none thinking. Let’s have a contest here at The Discord. If you can find something repeated over and over again on Fox News that is not based on a false assumption, you could be eligible for cash prizes! …or a bottle of Yukon Jack.

I’ve been diligently searching for scraps of truth on that side of the aisle since long before the Discord’s inception, but, like my evenings spent at the Bellagio, I keep coming up empty. Kidding! I’m barred from the Bellagio.

No grass roots movement is likely to remain viable amidst this two party tyranny. The main problems?

1. The media won’t allow it. See Ron Paul’s coverage on Fox or MSNBC.
2. Our two glorious parties won’t allow it.
3. Our country is waaaay too full of Regressive Conservatives armed only with ideology and a romanticism bordering on delusional. In fact, why don’t you and the 1950s get a room? (I left the Schmuck’s Capacitor for you back in the DeLorean.)

Before Andrew Sullivan named it ‘The Cocoon’ or Bill Maher started his ‘Dispatches from the Bubble’ bit, I was covering the alternate reality I named The Neococoon’. In the end, I predict the Tea Party may actually do Occupy’s bidding. I think the problem with Occupy is they are vying for a full blown collapse, which they can’t seem to bring about, despite their organized camping initiative (OCI). The only way to bring about a collapse today is by repairing our existing system through stupidity.

Enter the Tea Party…

As for Occupy’s current tactics, you can count me out of any activity designed to simply hurt small businesses…that’s the Government’s job. But a full blown collapse is looming and the Tea Party’s current policies are likely to bring about Occupy’s desire—aka, starve the beast, block any payment on our bloating credit cards, downgrade and destroy.

Activate revolution form of Inept Reforms.

“I just cannot see how that argument wins against the logic that this sacrifice needs to be shared, that we all need to do our part, that, at this stage in the debt-binge begun in earnest under Reagan, we should double down on supply side economics in the face of massive evidence that it doesn’t fucking work. You need some kind of intravenous injection of Jude Wanniski to get this argument off the ground and in the air.”

—Andrew Sullivan

No, you just need Fox News and their ilk. They are the wind beneath our sails…of the just ate too much Mexican food variety. This coming from the man who wrote The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How We Can Get It Back. I don’t think it’s coming back, Andrew. Here’s what Sully recently said over at The Dish about the inspiration behind his book:

“I truly had no expectation that my book on conservatism would have an iota of an impact on the current GOP. But I wrote it anyway, as a marker to myself of what I believed, as a way to clarify for myself – and anyone else interested – what conservatism is for me, and why today’s GOP has so brutally assaulted the tradition whose name they claim.”

I promise not to go all Ted Nugent on these peeps until they impact the micro brew and specialty coffee shipments coming into my town. When that happens, no promises. I also vow to blog about my subsequent visit from the Secret Service. My actions will make Guy Fawkes look like Ghandi, MFs! Sorry, I just felt the need to top Ted for a moment. Urge to kill fading…

None of us should be defending either party anymore. Can’t we all agree on that? No? I didn’t think so. The Right is always too busy defending the indefensible and making up shit about their political adversaries (isn’t it a shame that’s too long for Fox’s slogan?). The left is ready to throw in the towel. Meanwhile, the Right is ready climb back in with Sandusky, towel or no (what, too spoon?).

Romney’s economic advisor was on Fareed Zakaria this week, A.U. Sterity. He described Romney’s approach as Simpson-Bowels without any revenue generation. To me it sounds like an austerity-only cluster-fuck. Maybe Republicans should try the animated version, Simpson-Griffin? Doh!

Look, I never claimed to know a lot about economics…just more than a Republican. Cut from the same cloth, Paul Ryan’s Budget doesn’t address defense spending or revenue generating either and is designed to be as cruel and inhuman as possible, their usual M.O. I would actually sign off on their shit, if there was a chance in hell it would work…but, the only people impressed with their record at this point seems to be them.

Meanwhile, support for Occupy has dropped in half over the last few months. Therefore, many believe this movement is DOA….umm, those people are wrong. Admittedly, they do suck at the moment. In fact, I tried to contact the organizer in my town to ask, “Why aren’t you Occupying Facebook Meetups?” Using the internet to mobilize is the only thing the Tea Party got right. Yet I couldn’t even reach the guy. Hmmm. See the Discord’s important coverage of one of those local Occupy events here.

The Tea Party will die when they get the blame for the next Standard & Poor’s downgrade and officially gridlock us into oblivion. This will likely ignite a more formidable Occupy resurgence—too late to save our economy, of course, but fun and eventful nevertheless. And those with a clue will shift teams. Ultimately, Occupy has the potential to change the political landscape forever. It might alter how society functions and I hope a key focus will remain on sustainable energy and sustainable resources, as well as an emphasis on capitalism with a conscience. Yeah, that’s me dreaming again, but er, my dreams of tomorrow have proven to be more accurate than the Republican’s grasp of reality today.

Sociopaths can no longer be our CEOs and our leaders. Gordon Gekko must die! I know the Right has posed that Obama is a sociopath, but there’s currently little evidence. However, there is growing evidence that this man makes Gordon Gekko look like, well…. a community organizer.

I realize sociopaths are the Right’s champions, but my take on that sad piece of reality here.

It doesn’t take an Einstein to predict this shit, but it does take an Einstein to make people believe the exact opposite. Kudos Herr Ailes. Could you imagine a Michele Bachmann or a Rick Santorum with the ability to target anyone anywhere with a drone strike? That is when I will move myself and my family over to virtual Canada over at NHL.com (the puck stops here?).

The image of Bachmann with unlimited drones should keep you up at night. What will keep you up, you ask? The near constant explosions as our Government targets our gay and atheistic neighbors. (Studies suggest Explosion Therapy more effective than Conversion Therapy?) I’m being a bit facetious here but Presidents have more powers than ever before and they now want dangerously incompetent people to inherit these powers? One drone to rule them all…

Matt Drudge over on The Drudge Report is jumping on the Dem’s recent disillusionment. I think this shows the ability of the Left to assess and interpret facts. How quaint. Objectivity on the Right officially died during a recent episode of Hannity. RIP. Hey, maybe Giraldo can bury it in Al Capone’s vault. There’s also a chunk of our population who believes the Right’s appraisal of Obama’s performance thus far, which has little to do with reality.

Republicans didn’t mind deficits until they drove ours into the stratosphere. Their plan remains to counter our economic situation with their dumber than W plan. Sounds lovely. And, sorry, if you think returning to an incompetent foreign policy and an irresponsible economic plan is the way out of this mess, you’re more delusional than my prior posts suggest.

Kidding, I’ve had this bunch pegged all along.

The only thing that remains consistent in this freakishly bad economic period is the right’s unwavering ability to misread the tea bag leaves. In this environment, how can they do anything but hinder our recovery? How can they do anything but Fox-block a proper revolution? The answer is, they can’t—not if they insist on approaching each issue from the perspective of, “What would Mr. Burns like me to do?”

Good luck with that. If you find any policy or issue where Fox strays an iota from this theme, hit our contact button and I will post your comments. Good luck with that. I think you would have better luck finding a Mormon in a hash bar, or a Jew in Damascus, or an Iranian gay pride parade (Pricilla, Ayatollah of the Desert?).

At the end of the day, Republicans would rather allow the union to collapse than return to 90s level tax rates…and collapse it will. The Dems role in the demise of America is destined to be a footnote, but the Republican section will make War and Peace look like a haiku.