Tales of a Modern-Day Cassandra with a Philosophy Fetish
On the morning of Friday, January 25, 2019, dark and early, NPR popped up on my clock radio and Steve Inskeep said the following words: “Roger Stone is set to appear in federal court. He was arrested in Florida.” Continue reading “The Art of Distraction…”
Through the genius of the Wayback machine that is the Internet, let me refresh your memory.
http://www.thecassietimes.com/2013/10/05/spineless-i-dont-think-so/
http://www.thecassietimes.com/2013/10/08/it-all-comes-down-to-this/
I’ve been chewing on a blog post for about two weeks that takes on where we are now. It’s churning the way a slice of cheap freezer-style pizza with fake pepperoni churns at 3am and you can’t find the antacid because it’s still too dark to see. Continue reading “Aftermath (Part 4): The end of the beginning…”
“Financial Armageddon.”
The Washington Post says so.
I just went back in time and checked, and I’m pretty sure this is what I’ve been saying for the last four and a half years, give or take a day or so.
Don’t believe me? Continue reading “Connecting the Dots, Part 6…”
ex·tor·tion [ik-stawr-shuh
n]
noun
1. an act or instance of extorting.
2. Law. the crime of obtaining money or some other thing
of value by the abuse of one’s office or authority.
3. oppressive or illegal exaction, as of excessive price
or interest: the extortions of usurers.
4. anything extorted.
Yesterday on Facebook, this little gem popped up in my feed. I was nearly done for the night, and with all Facebook’s recent monkey business and tampering with the way news filters through, I might have missed it. But no, it hit me about this time last night and I…I couldn’t stand it anymore.
I’ve been quiet, trying to concentrate on getting through school and the holidays, but I have to say I could not have imagined the depths the GOP will stoop to relieve us poor saps of the one thing that could get them unseated in November. Not until last night, at least.
It wasn’t enough just to believe PoliticsUSA, though. I needed to find corroboration that didn’t link back to the original article, so imagine my surprise when I found this.
Here’s the whole clip from C-SPAN2.
Seriously? Okay, folks. I’m back. Miss me?
This is why the GOP pulled benefits from our Veterans and those suffering from long-term unemployment? (That, by the way, includes me. I fell off the unemployment ranks three years ago. That’s why I’m back in college again, even though I have a perfectly valid B.A.)
There’s no polite term for extortion. It’s illegal. Why aren’t these gentlemen going to prison for violating Federal law? Because someone told them it was okay to do this.
Well, get this. We have just shy of nine months to let these criminals know they can’t pull this crap and get away with it. Show them the door.
Mitch McConnell is up for re-election THIS November. So are roughly one-third of the other Senate seats and ALL the Representatives in the House.
If you allow these thugs to stay the course, you’re just as guilty as they are.
Do something about it.
You have nine months.
This is important and you need to see it. If you really want to know what drives me to write the pieces I do, read the post below and watch the clip.
November 9: Cabaret ~ Tomorrow belongs to me
And consider this: In the world today, neo-Nazi and neo-Confederacy groups are working hard to control American politics. Our country is in the same place Germany was when the Third Reich rose to power. We are still putting so-called conservatives in power because many people in the south miss their rich, fat incomes thanks to the destruction of slavery. Some of them believe slavery was a good thing.
Think I’m making this up? Think again:
Arkansas Lawmaker Concludes That
Slavery Was Actually Good for Black PeopleCPAC Participant Defends Slavery At Minority Outreach Panel:
It Gave ‘Food And Shelter’ To Blacks
Look into our prison system, in restaurants, fields, garment factories (where they still exist) and in other places where menial labor means hard work for little pay, and you’ll find modern slavery, “human trafficking.”
It’s all well and good to view our nasty Civil War history through rose-colored filters, but then folks like Steve McQueen (director of “12 Years A Slave”) come along and blow all that rose-colored fantasy away.
Imagine for a moment what would happen if the Tea Party got its way and actually rose to power, with a representative in the Oval Office and enough of a majority to squash the actions of the Senate the way they do the House. Unthinkable, right?
We have less than a year to the 2014 elections. While I don’t see a lot of change in who’s seated in the Senate, there’s a whole mess of trouble in our House of Representatives. In case you’ve forgotten, the next government shutdown threat is scheduled for December. And unless I’ve missed something major in the news, we are no closer to a budget deal than we have been in the last five years. Where’s the discussion? Nobody’s talking. There hasn’t been an update since the end of October. Well, okay, there’s this:
Paul Ryan warns budget talks doomed if members argue about taxes
Now, maybe it’s just that they’re trying to work hard and keep the press out of the discussion, or maybe it’s that there hasn’t been any progress. I’m sure everyone would be happier knowing we’re not going to wind up with another shutdown just as the Christmas season gets underway, but I’m not willing to bet we’ll be any further along than we were on the 17th.
How does this all tie in together?
Here’s a massively oversimplified description of the events that led up to the rise of Hitler:
But that really misses the bigger picture. The US wasn’t the only country to suffer in the Great Depression. It was global, no better in Germany than it was here. And that’s the key.
We are in the same depression recovery the Germans suffered in the 1930s. Look at Detroit as a clear example of what our depression has done to the people today. Who’s running Michigan, anyway? Oh, right. Rick Snyder. Not an extremist Tea Party member (in fact, they’re mad at him for promoting tax money to cover infrastructure), but a member of the GOP and a venture capitalist on the side of corporate America.
This is what World War II looked like through the lens, as compiled by The Atlantic in 2011:
Why am I telling you these things?
Because of this:
Swastikas, Slurs and Torment in Town’s Schools
Pine Bush, N.Y., School District Faces Accusations of Anti-Semitism
It’s not theoretical racism. We are not immune. And unless we start to realize and do something about it, we’re going to wind up just like Germany 75 years ago.
A few weeks ago, we were on the brink of a financial meltdown thanks to the Tea Party. Back then, I said there was plenty of evidence that the Tea Party is rising on the unhealed and unreasonable belief that the South should have seceded.
I got into a fight with a former friend over the subject when it became apparent that she was convinced it was one wacky yahoo with a misplaced view of reality, and that such whack jobs were not the norm.
I begged to differ, but there wasn’t enough proof other than my strong and growing belief that the proof was out there.
Mother Jones appears to agree with me. Right here.
GOP Senate Candidate Addressed Conference Hosted by Neo-Confederate Group That Promotes Secessionism
From the article, posted October 23rd:
“Mississippi Republican Chris McDaniel, who is challenging Sen. Thad Cochran and backed by the Senate Conservatives Fund and the Club for Growth, took the stage with a historian who says Lincoln was a Marxist.”
When you read that these people fear the government is coming for their guns, it is founded in the paranoid belief that without them, the South will not rise again. Far from maintaining guns for personal safety, the most extreme of these hold firm to the belief that they stand any sort of chance against the US military because, after all, that’s what their forefathers did in the last Civil War.
No matter how much distance the traditional GOP try to give to the Tea Party, there’s always someone who brings it home that the Tea Party is a part of the GOP and that they are inextricably linked. Like, for example, former VP Dick Cheney:
Washington Times: Dick Cheney calls tea party a boon to GOP
Think the mess is over just because the government is back to work? Think again.
Still a year to go before the next general election. My prediction: It’s going to be an ugly, ugly year.
Just in case you missed it, because it sure hasn’t been discussed in the news yet.
This video was published on Oct 12, 2013.
The notes regarding the video say:
Late in the evening on September 30, 2013, the House Rules Committee Republicans changed the Rules of the House so that the ONLY Member allowed to call up the Senate’s clean CR for a vote was Majority Leader Eric Cantor or his designee — all but guaranteeing the government would shut down a few hours later and would stay shut down. Previously, any Member would have had the right to bring the CR up for a vote. Democracy has been suspended in the House of Representatives.
Repeating: The House Majority Leader is the ONLY person who can bring Senate bill to a vote. The House Majority Leader is Eric Cantor.
Read the transcript of the activity here: http://clerk.house.gov/floorsummary/floor.aspx?day=20130930
Who voted how: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2013/roll505.xml
Was there a doubt in your mind as to what’s driving the continued shut-down of our US government? Wonder no more.
Unless Eric Cantor or his designee feels like it, this resolution will not come to the floor.
If you thought there was obstruction before, here it is, in black and white. With votes.
Disgusting.
UPDATED:
But wait, there’s more.
There’s a growing movement to “Throw the bums out” again. Or Rascals. Whatever.
See, I remember this rallying cry because it’s an echo of decades past. Two decades, in fact.
Do you remember when Newt Gingrich rose to power? When was that? Oh, yes, in 1994. The Gingrich Revolution, it was called back then, and it came in midterm elections during Bill Clinton’s second term. Their agenda? Destroy Healthcare Reform.
Sound familiar?
In that year, the GOP rose to take the House, and they kept it firm until 2006, when the Democrats finally got a toe back in. It lasted just four years. By 2010, the Tea Party retook the House and set us up for the mother of all obstructionist battles.
This isn’t a fight months in the making. That’s horse manure. This is a fight 20 years in the making. That’s why Gingrich has resurfaced to warn the House that they’re playing with fire. He’s reliving history.
We have just four days left before we go over the Debt Ceiling cliff and pull the world economy with us, and the House has rigged the game so that only they can vote, and then only if Eric Cantor decides it’s okay.
Don’t give me this “both sides are equally guilty” crap. It’s a lie. This is a GOP-sponsored plot to destroy the US Government.
And the seven Democrats who voted in favor of the bill?
Elections are coming in 2014. Please take note.
You know, the more I think about this, the more I wonder. Is the President waiting for default to declare actual sedition against the members of the Tea Party and GOP who are pulling this stunt? They can try to impeach him if they want, but they don’t have the foolproof 2/3 majority they would need in the House anymore, and I imagine they’d be hard pressed to find Democrats who would back such a measure. Meanwhile, driving the country over the Debt Ceiling cliff could well be the seditious action required to arrest the key members who brought the country to its figurative knees over this.
Arguing about what sedition means, I found two links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sedition
and within that,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seditious_conspiracy
So, do we need to wait this out and see if the GOP pulls up? Is that why the Koch brothers have suddenly changed their tunes?
Might be a very good reason to backpedal, in public….
Trouble is, all you really have to do these days is follow the money. The New Yorker figured it out way back in August of 2010. It’s just not that hard to draw the lines between the dots.
On Facebook a few days ago, Matthew Rose posted this public status that’s making the rounds on my list of friends. Continue reading “It all comes down to this…”