The Existentialist Cowboy: 2008-10-19

Friday, October 24, 2008

The GOP may concede the election

The GOP is already pulling the financial plug on the McCain campaign, cutting its losses, abandoning McCain, perhaps hoping to re-group for the 'future'. It's not only GOP honchos who seem inclined to cut their losses. The McCain campaign itself is 'pulling' ads in Minnesota, Colorado, Maine, Wisconsin and New Hampshire. McCain's campaign is in recession.

If these reports are true, it means that Obama's lead is substantial and widespread, perhaps beyond the ability of GOP hackers to 'steal' without tripping alarm bells. Some 'insiders' may have already concluded that Obama's lead is so well established that the election cannot be stolen 'safely'.

So far today, the polling numbers are grim reading for McCain’s campaign:
Zogby has Obama at +12 points; 52-40
Research 2000 has Obama up 51-41
The stable Rasmussen poll has expanded to a seven-point Obama lead; 52-45
Gallup has contracted a bit to a six-point Obama lead; 51-45
Hotline/Diageo is at a five-point Obama lead; 48-43
GWU/Battleground has moved from a one-point Obama lead two days ago to a four-point lead, 49-45, today, representing Obama’s strength at the end of its three-day polling cycle
Perhaps worse for McCain are some stunning results from Ohio, where McCain simply must win. Quinnipac gives Obama an astounding, 14-point, 52-38 Ohio lead and the University of Wisconsin puts the Obama lead there at 12 points, 53-41. The University of Wisconsin also shows Obama with a 10-point lead in Indiana, another state McCain must have, 51-41.
--Scholars and Rogues

With any luck, this election could represent a sea-change in American attitudes, many of which can be traced back to the immediate post WWII era, historically, the most egalitarian period in American history. Thanks to enlightened tax policies, the richest one percent most certainly did not own over 90 percent of all wealth --as is the case today. In fact, the US was at its most egalitarian throughout WWII and the post war era. Things did not change dramatically until the rise of Ronald Reagan and 'Reagonomics', the polite word given to the spreading of wealth upward to those already rich and elite.

The rise of Ronald Reagan brought with it a spreading of wealth upward to the upper classes and Wall Street insiders, in fact, an increasingly tiny elite of just one percent of the nation but own more than 90 percent of its wealth. The result is factually documented by the government's own agency. Income inequality measured by what economists call the GINI index.

Income inequality in the United States compared to other rich countries

Notice that the GINI index is highest in the United States, indicating that the growing disparities between the rich and poor are greater here than in any other country on the chart. This will prove to be the catalyst that creates a 'Third World America'.

McCain has abandoned the straight-talk express for the bullshit bandwagon that advocates the spreading of wealth upward to those who don't need it and will not reinvest it. We are talking about the richest one percent of the total population, that tiny elite that does not need nor does it deserve a tax cut of any sort. Worse than 'spreading wealth around', McCain wants to suck it up or flush it down a black hole from which it never, ever re-emerges.

McCain has abandoned his opposition to the Bush-era tax cuts and has taken up the demagogic call—in the midst of recession and Wall Street calamity, with looming crises in Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid—for more tax cuts. Bush’s expire in 2011. If McCain, as he has proposed, cuts taxes for corporations and estates, the benefits once more would go disproportionately to the wealthy.
--The Choice, The New Yorker

Sellouts by Mssrs Reagan, Bush and Bush, the US has now shares a most important economic barometer with third world nations --income inequality. The US, the most unequal, has caught the contagion best described in a recent UN report.

Halfway to the 2015 deadline for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) to lift people out of poverty, a United Nations MDG 2007 Report points to the widening economic disparities and underscores the need for political leaders to take urgent and concerted action. It projects that climate change will have serious and social impacts which will impede progress towards the MDGs.
The collective record is "mixed" in the "midpoint" report. While Asia has made dramatic progress in the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, halving the proportion of people living on the equivalent of a $ a day, there is evidence to suggest that benefits of economic growth are not being shared across different parts of the continent.
--Economic Disparities on the Rise: U.N. report, [PDF]

Not only wealth was transferred upward --spread around among the tiny elite of Bush kiss ups -- the incomes of the rich and famous increased exponentially during the administrations of Ronald Reagan/Bush Sr and again under George W. Bush who revived the corpse of 'supply side economics' in order to pay off what he called his 'base', an increasingly rich and elitist one percent of the total population.

The divide between rich and poor was much less apparent before Reagan helped the nouveau riche move to absurd and pretentious suburbs. The 'Bedford Falls' of "It's a Wonderful Life" or the "Grover's Corner" of "Our Town" no longer exist. And it is a pity. The great paintings of Norman Rockwell seem to us to be relics of a simpler, better time.

The spreading of wealth upward to the GOP elite is achieved two ways.

Strategy of disguised redistribution of national resources from the bottom to the top is carried out by a combination of:
drastic hikes in the Pentagon budget
equally drastic tax cuts for the wealthy.
--COUNTERPUNCH

Before the Reagan/Bush/Bush [RBB] apocalypse, the US had viable industries. "General Motors' did not 'outsource' the making of cars; it actually made them in Detroit, a city that is but a shadow of its former glory, a city better known for the Detroit Lions. Manufacturing jobs paid well and American cars often competed with those made in Europe. The US made Corvette was a sensation. For a bit less money, an ambitious young man could drive a very cool, shiny red Mustang with a stick shift, hold down a part time job and still have enough money to go to college. Today --fuhgetaboutit!

Thanks to the Four Horsemen of GOP Apocalypse, going to college is strictly out of the question for millions who were born too late. Going to college with a car is out of the question for those who can afford neither. Millions are stuck in declining neighborhoods and increasing crime. It is against that reality that Pain-McCain poke fun at 'spreading the wealth around' even as they defend 'spreading it upward' to those who don't need it and don't deserve it and do nothing productive with it when they've gotten it EXCEPT to spread it around from various bank accounts, short-selling, speculative margin 'investment's and dubious ponzi schemes!

The rich are parasites, leeches who live off the value that is always created by the act of doing real work. By the way, the Four Horsemen of the GOP apocalypse are unemployment, declining wages, recession, and a weak dollar!

The older citizens of Rome --under Augustus specifically --may have recalled with fondness a simpler time, before the assassination of Julius Caesar, a time in which Roman coins were still worth something, a time in which a craftsman could still make a living and yeoman farmers had not yet lost their little farms to Roman nobility and slick money changers.

Published Articles

Subscribe

GOP, Bush, Evil, Tyranny

Spread the word

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Evidence that the GOP Plans to Steal the Election

Police departments across the country are 'beefing up their ranks' in anticipation of violence, civil unrest or peaceful protests on election day. Police merely 'gearing up' for unrest is one thing. But a combat brigade has been withdrawn from Iraq for the stated objective of dealing with 'civil unrest'. That's something else! It's against the law.

Clearly --the police powers of established 'government' anticipate that the GOP will steal another election. Cops and troops probably know what we are left to fear: another GOP attack on the Constitution, Democracy and legitimate government.

Police departments in cities across the country are beefing up their ranks for Election Day, preparing for possible civil unrest and riots after the historic presidential contest.

Public safety officials said in interviews with The Hill that the election, which will end with either the nation’s first black president or its first female vice president, demanded a stronger police presence.

Some worry that if Barack Obama loses and there is suspicion of foul play in the election, violence could ensue in cities with large black populations. Others based the need for enhanced patrols on past riots in urban areas (following professional sports events) and also on Internet rumors.
--Police Prepare for Unrest

Another stolen election is cause for 'civil unrest'. Another stolen election destroys the very legitimacy of government. Another stolen election is the only way McCain gets into the White House. Another stolen election is --in fact --a treasonous 'coup d'etat'.

Normally, a coup does not seek to destroy the basic structure of the existing government, which is more typical of a revolution or a war for liberation. Instead, Luttwak explains, those undertaking a true coup d'etat "want to seize power within the present system, and [they] shall only stay in power if [they] embody some new status quo supported by those very forces which a revolution may seek to destroy." 6 (Emphasis in original.)

In other words, the coup takes advantage of the governmental structure itself, as well as the bureaucratic nature of modern governments. There is an established hierarchy, an accepted chain of command, and standard procedures that are followed when instructions come down this pipeline. So long as the instructions come from the appropriate source or level of authority, they will almost always be followed even if from a new, and illegitimate, holder of that authority.
--John Dee, Coup 2K

The framers of the US Constitution did not make the DC bureaucracy 'sovereign'. The Constitution, rather, establishes as a matter of law that it is the people who are 'sovereign'.

The raison d'etre of the government bureaucracy is that of serving the 'sovereign' i.e, the people collectively. [See: Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution] Therefore, I deny that the police or US combat troops, withdrawn from Iraq for illegal use against American citizens, have legal or legitimate reasons to curtail or restrict in any way any protests of another obvious election theft![See: How the GOP Steals Elections]

As Che Guevara pointed out:

Where a government has come into power through some form of popular vote, fraudulent or not, and maintains at least an appearance of constitutional legality, the guerrilla outbreak cannot be promoted, since the possibilities of peaceful struggle have not yet been exhausted.
--Che Guevara, Chapter I: General Principles of Guerrilla Warfare

But --another stolen election --may be pressing the issue. Again, Che Guevara put it this way:

"When the forces of oppression come to maintain themselves in power against established law, peace is considered already broken.
--Che Guevara, Chapter I: General Principles of Guerrilla Warfare

Thomas Jefferson had said the same thing in the Declaration of Independence:

...whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it.
--Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence

Jefferson was not just writing pretty words. Like Che, Jefferson was a revolutionary. He meant every word. Unlike modern, primarily conservative 'politicians', Jefferson was literate. He had, to paraphrase Churchill, gotten into his bones the structure of an English sentence.

Certainly --the peaceful resolution of the disputed 'election' of 2000 was subverted by a gang of GOP 'brownshirts' who rioted and attacked vote re-counters in Florida. The act violated US criminal codes. It was, in fact, an act of 'seditious treason' under US law. No one was arrested. No one was prosecuted. The fix was in.

The peace was broken with that act and the Bush government merely confirmed its illegitimacy with its every blatant and arrogant violation of the Constitution and US Federal statutes and its overt determination to rule by decree. If it was difficult to believe at the time that the GOP was stealing the government, that fact was made clear in retrospect with Bush's every decree, his every blatant, overt disregard for the very principle of the ''rule of law".

I will be surprised if the GOP allows a peaceful transition to a Democratic regime. I hope I am proven wrong. Having gone to so much trouble to trash the Constitution --a 'goddamned piece of paper' --Bush, in cahoots with the endemically crooked and treasonous GOP, are sure to attempt another coup d'etat! The idiot --Sarah Palin --does not reassure one when she calls for 'divine intervention' to reverse the GOPs recent precipitous decline into oblivion.

Palin is turning into a prophet now as she expects God to intercede on Nov 4 and turn the election to the GOP. “It is that intercession that is so needed,” she said. “And so greatly appreciated.
...
Sarah Palin told Dr. James Dobson of “Focus on the Family” that she is confident God will do “the right thing for America” on Nov. 4.

Dobson asked the vice presidential hopeful if she is concerned about John McCain’s sagging poll numbers, but Palin stressed that she was “not discouraged at all.”
--Palin: God will do the right thing on election day

Whenever a fascist idiot expects 'divine intervention', I am predisposed by experience and skepticism to grab a gun with one hand and my wallet with another. I don't 'smell' divine intervention. I smell GOP rats, white-shirted thugs, clean shaven criminals, vote machine hackers, and idolatrous pundits spinning the science of statistics, pushing the frontiers of probability theory, subverting the Constitution, trashing the rule of law, thumbing their snotty noses at Jefferson and Madison.