Texas Governor Reaffirms States’ Rights Under 10th Amendment!!!!

[The Mad Monk]

Teabaggers party at phallic WW I memorial
By Justin Kendall in Picket Lines, Politics
Wednesday, Apr. 15 2009 @ 11:05AM
libertymemorial.jpg
You know what pisses me off about tea party protesters? These mother****ers had no problem cashing the economic stimulus checks that President Bush handed out last year. No one was in the streets throwing a hissy fit and burning their stimulus checks then. But I'm never surprised by people who protest against their best interests.

Kansas City's tea party protest takes place at the Liberty Memorial at 4 p.m. Let's get this straight. There's going to be a bunch of people talking about teabagging the White House, teabagging Barack Obama and maybe even teabagging Nancy Pelosi at the phallic Liberty Memorial. Great. Guessing this didn't cross their minds when they picked a place to protest.

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Speaking of teabagging, keep an eye out for the spiky-haired skeletor who will also be in attendance for reasons unknown (the guy was born with a silver spoon).

And there's no truth to the rumor that KCTV Channel 5 won't be covering the tea party protests. KCTV 5 news director Tracy Brogden Miller tells me, "We're actually planning on covering it today." Which kinda disappointed me. The coverage of the protests has crossed over into overkill. KMBC Channel 9's Jana Corrie was all over it this morning, practically blowing sitting in studio with KCMO 710's Chris Stigall.

The Kansas City Star put the story above the fold on the front page. Derek Donovan's already hearing about it.

Great column by The Kansas City Star's Yael Abouhalkah who tries to find meaning in the protests. And TKC has filed a couple of good posts -- here and here -- about the tacit racism of the protests. It's hard to argue, especially with the teabaggers vehemently claiming Obama wasn't born in America. Bring it, birthers.

http://blogs.pitch.com/plog/2009/04/teabaggers_partying_at_phalic.php

Of course, I'm expecting plenty more like this.

[Darius871]

http://m.kansascity.com/kcstar/db_12...ex=1&full=true

Local article, for those not familiar with what is going on.

Seriously, how do these jokes bear any relation to the original tea party? What does an angry mob illegally seizing and destroying government property have to do with people driving to the grocery store to legally purchase and then destroy their own property? Whose attention is that self-flagellation supposed to get? I obviously missed the boat on this one.

[The Mad Monk]

What the hell are you on about now? We're not legitimate because we're not vandals?

[DaShi]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/13/opinion/13krugman.html?_r=1&pagewanted=print

April 13, 2009
Op-Ed Columnist
Tea Parties Forever
By PAUL KRUGMAN
This is a column about Republicans — and I’m not sure I should even be writing it.

Today’s G.O.P. is, after all, very much a minority party. It retains some limited ability to obstruct the Democrats, but has no ability to make or even significantly shape policy.

Beyond that, Republicans have become embarrassing to watch. And it doesn’t feel right to make fun of crazy people. Better, perhaps, to focus on the real policy debates, which are all among Democrats.

But here’s the thing: the G.O.P. looked as crazy 10 or 15 years ago as it does now. That didn’t stop Republicans from taking control of both Congress and the White House. And they could return to power if the Democrats stumble. So it behooves us to look closely at the state of what is, after all, one of our nation’s two great political parties.

One way to get a good sense of the current state of the G.O.P., and also to see how little has really changed, is to look at the “tea parties” that have been held in a number of places already, and will be held across the country on Wednesday. These parties — antitaxation demonstrations that are supposed to evoke the memory of the Boston Tea Party and the American Revolution — have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so.

But everything that critics mock about these parties has long been standard practice within the Republican Party.

Thus, President Obama is being called a “socialist” who seeks to destroy capitalism. Why? Because he wants to raise the tax rate on the highest-income Americans back to, um, about 10 percentage points less than it was for most of the Reagan administration. Bizarre.

But the charge of socialism is being thrown around only because “liberal” doesn’t seem to carry the punch it used to. And if you go back just a few years, you find top Republican figures making equally bizarre claims about what liberals were up to. Remember when Karl Rove declared that liberals wanted to offer “therapy and understanding” to the 9/11 terrorists?

Then there are the claims made at some recent tea-party events that Mr. Obama wasn’t born in America, which follow on earlier claims that he is a secret Muslim. Crazy stuff — but nowhere near as crazy as the claims, during the last Democratic administration, that the Clintons were murderers, claims that were supported by a campaign of innuendo on the part of big-league conservative media outlets and figures, especially Rush Limbaugh.

Speaking of Mr. Limbaugh: the most impressive thing about his role right now is the fealty he is able to demand from the rest of the right. The abject apologies he has extracted from Republican politicians who briefly dared to criticize him have been right out of Stalinist show trials. But while it’s new to have a talk-radio host in that role, ferocious party discipline has been the norm since the 1990s, when Tom DeLay, the House majority leader, became known as “The Hammer” in part because of the way he took political retribution on opponents.

Going back to those tea parties, Mr. DeLay, a fierce opponent of the theory of evolution — he famously suggested that the teaching of evolution led to the Columbine school massacre — also foreshadowed the denunciations of evolution that have emerged at some of the parties.

Last but not least: it turns out that the tea parties don’t represent a spontaneous outpouring of public sentiment. They’re AstroTurf (fake grass roots) events, manufactured by the usual suspects. In particular, a key role is being played by FreedomWorks, an organization run by Richard Armey, the former House majority leader, and supported by the usual group of right-wing billionaires. And the parties are, of course, being promoted heavily by Fox News.

But that’s nothing new, and AstroTurf has worked well for Republicans in the past. The most notable example was the “spontaneous” riot back in 2000 — actually orchestrated by G.O.P. strategists — that shut down the presidential vote recount in Florida’s Miami-Dade County.

So what’s the implication of the fact that Republicans are refusing to grow up, the fact that they are still behaving the same way they did when history seemed to be on their side? I’d say that it’s good for Democrats, at least in the short run — but it’s bad for the country.

For now, the Obama administration gains a substantial advantage from the fact that it has no credible opposition, especially on economic policy, where the Republicans seem particularly clueless.

But as I said, the G.O.P. remains one of America’s great parties, and events could still put that party back in power. We can only hope that Republicans have moved on by the time that happens.

[Lorizael]

What the hell are you on about now? We're not legitimate because we're not vandals?

No, you're not legitimate because the majority of the protesters involved in this event are probably too stupid to understand the substantive difference between the Boston Tea Party (a protest against an unlawful government imposing taxes on a population that had no representation) and these "tea parties" (whining about the way your taxes are being spent).

[The Mad Monk]

As I said, I expect plenty more like that.

[The Mad Monk]

They were protesting a government that had gone out of bounds. So are we.

(a protest against an unlawful government imposing taxes on a population that had no representation)

It was plenty lawful at the time. They made the laws, after all.

[Lorizael]

As in, you realize the total douchebaggery of this whole protest but your own particular brand of protest is better, or as in you don't realize the douchebaggery and you think the people pointing out your douchebaggery are douchebags?

[chequita guevara]

The protest was about taxation without representation. We have representation. We even chose it ourselves.

[Lorizael]

They were protesting a government that had gone out of bounds. So are we.

It was plenty lawful at the time. They made the laws, after all.

Actually, no. One of the reasons for the protest was that Americans felt they were due their lawful rights as Englishmen, which included the right to representation in Parliament if they were to be taxed. There were actual written laws about this in Britain, and Britain ignored those laws in favor of taxing us.

[Ben Kenobi]

The protest was about taxation without representation. We have representation. We even chose it ourselves.

Wasn't it Coolidge who said taxing more then absolutely necessary is theft?

People should be outraged with how their money is spent. Put it this way, the state is like having an extra child that you are supporting with your own money. A child that you don't get to hold, raise, or have any contact, yet you still pay the bills. A child that won't be off the dole in 20 years. A child that gets more expensive as the years go on, 50 percent in the last 3 years. A child that I never got to conceive or any of the fun stuff, yet I am still responsible for until the day that I die, and will receive a portion of my estate.

Now, we have people in favour of abortion because they say that the child in the womb is a parasite. Why then can people not call for an abortion of this child that the people did not consent to raise? How much longer must people pay child support for the state?

[SlowwHand]

Ben, that makes entirely too much sense.

[Zkribbler]

Now, we have people in favour of abortion because they say that the child in the womb is a parasite.

Actually, they'd never say it was a child.

[Lorizael]

Put it this way, the state is like having an extra child that you are supporting with your own money. A child that you don't get to hold, raise, or have any contact, yet you still pay the bills. A child that won't be off the dole in 20 years.

True. But it is a child that magically paves roads, builds schools, defends your country, and secures the livelihood of your parents and grandparents. I wonder how it does all that?

A child that gets more expensive as the years go on, 50 percent in the last 3 years.

Err, really? Because my tax refund has only gotten larger in the last 3 years. What's up with that?

[Ben Kenobi]

True. But it is a child that magically paves roads, builds schools, defends your country, and secures the livelihood of your parents and grandparents. I wonder how it does all that?

1. Paves roads? I take it you are referring to roads in Vancouver.

2. Builds schools? I can't recall the last school built. They have closed down about 20 percent of the local schools.

3. Defends my country? I live in Canada. We couldn't even defend ourselves from a concerted invasion by anybody.

4. Provides for who? My mom's parents are both supported by the income my grandfather made as a logger. Ditto my dad's folks for his pension as a cement truck driver.

Here is what my money is really going for.

1. Health care expenditures. This includes abortion, and all manner of elective procedures.

2. Social Security. Something that I won't see, or my parents won't qualify for and my grandparents worked hard in their life so that they don't have to rely upon.

3. Welfare. For able-bodied people who choose not to work, particularly seasonal workers on the off season.

4. Disability, which I can't collect as I am 'employable'. Technically another term for anyone who can get themselves declared unemployable.

5. Road improvements and construction for urban communities, where I don't live unfortunately.

6. Education for urban communities.

We already have to fend for ourselves.

Err, really? Because my tax refund has only gotten larger in the last 3 years. What's up with that?

Because you make more and your withholding has went up? You need to get a better accountant.