Ron Paul shakes up CPAC meeting

If their was one Republican in this world that I would vote for, it would be Ron Paul. He has always proven himself to be the most outspoken and brilliant person to happen to the Republican party in ages. Through out the recently passed Presidential campaign, Paul (who was running for the Republican ticket) proved to America that he is the only one from the Republican party with any form of common sense. Even though a few of his beliefs were a little too farfetched for me to vote for, I still was intrigued by his ideas. Sadly though, he was forced to dropout of the campaign due to lack of support (which did not surprise me one bit because this man was too radical to get any Republican support.)
This week is when the Conservative Political Action Conference meets, and Ron Paul gave a speech on Friday that made more sense to me than any other speech I have heard from the GOP. Paul (R-TX), went to on to criticize US Foreign policy extremely hard, saying that our FP costs us more than a trillion dollars a year, which is probably one of the causes for the economic chaos. He also added that the only person who could be satisfied by our Foreign Policy is Osama Bin Laden.
I am attaching the news article with this post, and if you scroll down you will find an video excerpt of the speech and I recommend that everyone see it. The applause that he gets from the Conservatives is impressive, since Republicans, especially Conservatives, are not known for criticizing war.
News Article; http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Ron_Paul_One_million_dead_Iraqis_0227.html

Bobby Jindal admits to lying

Piyush "Bobby" Jindal, the first Indian American to be the Governor of Louisiana, and the rumored 'future' of the Republican party has admitted today of lying about his role in the Katrina disaster. Jindal, claimed he "stood shoulder-to-shoulder with a local sheriff who was battling government red tape to try to rescue stranded victims", in a speech he gave Tuesday night at the GOP address to America. But after further investigation by the media, Jindal was found to have been nowhere close to the affected area during Hurricane Katrina.
In a recent interview with Politico.com, Jindal's people changed their story, instead claiming that Jindal was in recently deceased Sheriff Harry Lee's office trying to get permits for the boats used to rescue stranded people. Of course since Sheriff Lee is dead, it would be quite difficult to verify this story, but the media is still investigating this.
I have a feeling that this was just another form of propaganda by the great Republican party, I would not be surprised if we found out that Jindal was nowhere near Sheriff Lee's office (let alone standing "shoulder-to-shoulder" with anyone.)
If Jindal and Sarah Palin are being labelled as the future of the US Republican party, it is safe to say that the GOP is in a bit of trouble.
News article; http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/02/jindal_admits_katrina_story_was_false.php?ref=fp1

Elimination of income taxes?

The Economy must surely be the most important thing on people's minds right now. With polls emerging that 3 out of 4 Americans saying that they are scared about the way things are going on in the country, and the Obama cabinet recently announcing its intentions of halving the federal deficit by 2013, its plain to see how everyone is stressed about the economy.
And I was curious to see how the Republicans were dealing with these issues, so I started doing research on what alternatives that they suggested. Even though there were no real outlines established by the GOP in the wake of the economic crisis, apparently a group of 44 House Republicans apparently have decided to try and pass a bill that would eliminate income taxes.
Wait what? Get rid of a vital source of income for the US Economy? Don't income taxes make up about 27% of the Federal income of the United States? This is just ludicrous, in the wake of an economic crisis, the best alternative that the Republicans can come up with is getting rid of income taxes.
* on a sidenote; is it coincidental how the GOP started talking about eliminating income taxes around tax season? Instead of following the Treasury Secretary Tim Geitner's method of paying income taxes (which is not paying them altogether), the Republicans decided on coming with a bill that would completely eliminate income taxes? Pure humor.

Track the movements of the "Bill" here; http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h25/show

Stimulus Package: New Website

The Obama Cabinet has now launched a website called Recovery.gov, which enables regular citizens to track their tax dollars in the new Stimulus Package. Ever since President Obama took office a month ago, he has promised that his cabinet will be a very transparent one, a new look for the US Government. In the Bush administration, transparency was obviously the last thing on their minds as they conducted 8 years full of shrouded cover-ups and lies.
And now, the launching of Recovery.gov is a great example of how hard the Obama cabinet is working to fix the downward economic spiral that the US is in. Even with the signing last week of the $787 billion Stimulus package brought together by Obama's economic team, people were still pretty nervous about the Stimulus package, and I am sure the launching of this site will help ease quite a few nervous minds out there. The website itself is a very efficient and organized one, and greets all visitors with a personal address given by President Obama, discussing the launching of the site.
I for one have been pretty skeptical about all the Stimulus packages and bailouts, but now my confidence is starting to build up and I find myself being more and more in favor of the package. The new website shows exactly how the Stimulus package is being allocated, and I was happy to see that $144 billion is going to State and Local Fiscal relief. This comes in light of California's big budget crisis that had dominated US news for the past week or so.
Overall, I must say that this was very positive move, and I look forward to more actions of democracy from the Obama Cabinet.
Visit the website; http://www.recovery.gov/

Keith Olbermann analyzes Stimulus package misunderstanding

Is it just me, or are some Republicans just sounding like conspiracy theorists? And now Former Lieutenant Governor Betsey McCaughey is accusing the government of setting up a correspondence between doctors and the government to "guide" your doctors decisions. Well, the statements made by McCaughey were actual quotes from the bill, but they were (obviously) taken out of context. The medical database mentioned in the bill is actually there to "provide appropriate information to help guide medical decisions at the time and place of care". The way McCaughey mentioned it almost made it seem as if the government was going to control the people's medical proceedings. And this is the main reason I am accusing McCaughey of being a conspiracy theorists.
But MSNBC quickly caught up to the mistake, and sent its best and most brutal 'debunker', anchor Keith Olbermann, to clear up the obviously incorrect statement. In my opinion Olbermann is one of the best Liberal political minds in our society, and I for one believe that he should run for office. Watch the following video to see Olbermann doing what he does best, debunk.

Sen. Patrick Leahy: The Truth Commission

Its about time that somebody brought forth a legitimate judicial stance against the Bush Administration. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D. Vermont) has started an online petition to " urge Congress to consider establishing a truth and reconciliation commission to investigate the Bush-Cheney Administration's abuses". These 'abuses' are a variety of violations such as, use of torture, warrantless wiretapping, extraordinary rendition, and executive override of laws.
Please visit the site for more info and don't forget to sign the petition! (After signing the petition, you will be asked to forward it to people you know, please forward it to as many people as possible, every signature counts!)

Sen. Leahy's petition;
http://ga3.org/campaign/btcpetition?qp_source=btc_hp

Breaking news; Agreement Reached

Even with all the ruckus created by the Republicans, the Stimulus bill has passed. And the American people breathe a collective sigh of relief.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/11/stimulus.plan/index.html

Republicans extremely unhappy with Stimulus Package

Ever since the emergence of the new Stimulus/ Bailout package brought forth by the Obama cabinet, there has been a surge in Republican protest concerning the bailout. Republicans usually tend to vote for lesser governmental involvement with business, and lower taxes (a classic case of self-interest) so I was not too surprised by their outcry against the bailout. But now, the GOP is taking a much more ridiculous stance against the bill.
All my regular readers know that I (as a true Progressive Democrat)am all for bipartisan movements within the US, and the fact that 3 GOP Senators voted in favor of the new bailout package had made me confident of continuing bipartisanship movements within the US.
But I ran across an article that made me very annoyed yesterday. Apparently a influential conservative political action committee is promising to oppose any Republican who voted in favor of the bailout, and as an outcome of this the three GOP senators are unsure if they will vote in favor of it again on the final version of the bailout (they had first voted on an earlier version of the bailout).
Now, I may not be much of a economist but it is safe to say that the US economy is in trouble . A total of 598,000 payroll jobs vanished in January — the most in nearly 35 years — and the unemployment rate jumped to 7.6 from 7.2 percent the month before, and this is just the proverbial 'tip of the ice berg' for the hardships the US Economy is facing.
And at the same time, I understand that a Republican is a Republican and must support their ideology, but if Republicans do not seem to be in favor of the bailout, what better alternative do they promote? I have not heard of any legitimate alternatives being brought up by the GOP. Do they sincerely believe that not helping the failing businesses that make up their economy, and letting such vital job creators such as Chrysler and Ford go bankrupt will fix this problem? Now is not the time for Republicans and Democrats to bicker over bailouts, now is the time for bipartisanship and economic recovery. I hope this case is cleared up before it gets out of hand.

* And on a side note, am I the only one who noticed that the Bailout is being coyly referred to as a 'Stimulus package' instead? Is this propaganda, or simply a change of name to signify that this bailout is completely different from the first bailout (which I personally thought was absurd). Just a point to ponder.

CNN article on GOP opposing its own people

Yet Another Scandal

It seems nowadays that insane political scandals are just a norm in the US. I was browsing through headlines this morning when I read an article that had me downright appalled. As a Liberal, there are not many things that will catch me off guard. The Portland mayor's scandal was a bit shocking to the Conservative world that are not used to homosexual partnerships, but since the age of the young man was legal, I did not go further and attack the mayor. Even the Larry Craig incident could have been justified seeing how it was legitimate (the soliciting of sex, without any monetary transactions is legal, as far as I know).
But now, John McCain's former Presidential Campaign in Pueblo is being accused of molesting the 5 year old son of a fellow campaign worker. The website that I got the information is not the most trusted site, and in the hopes of a undisturbed bipartisan movement in the US, I am hoping this is just a rumor.
If this rumor does end up being true, I hope this man is prosecuted the fullest extent of the law, and put through the same embarrassing fate as previous politicians with sexual scandals have faced (Larry Craig, Elliot Spitzer, Jim McGreevy etc).
Please discuss...

News article; http://crooksandliars.com/john-amato/man-who-was-led-sen-john-mccains-presid

Obama admits to wrong judgement

Even though Obama has taken office, it seems that the appointments to prominent cabinets are still going on. And today, in a unexpected turn of events, former US Senate Majority Leader and current Senator Tom Daschle (D-SD) has withdrawn his candidacy for the office of Secretary of the Health and Human Services (a seat currently held by Charlie Johnson).
This came as a bit of a surprise for me, because I had known that his time spent as Senate Majority Leader, and his general outspoken nature would have made him a favorite for the job. he also was one of the first prominent Democrats to come forward and endorse Obama, a while ago in the Presidential Campaign. But what I have to admire is the reason that Daschle gave as his cause of withdrawal, which is his belated payment of over $128,000 in taxes. Even though tax evasion is a crime, many tax evaders in US Politics have gotten away scot-free, the most recent example being Tom Geitner who got appointed to the post of Treasury Secretary last week regardless of the fact that he was facing tax evasion for his failure to file income taxes for over 6 years. (irony?)
Daschle has an impressive record as a member of the House of Representatives and as a Senator. I personally must say I am not very happy about his withdrawal of candidacy because I believe that he is the best pick for the job, and yet I am satisfied by how democratically this case was handled, and by how his case was not swept under the rug as it would have been done if it were any other prominent politician.
President Obama said in an interview today with NBC Brian Williams that he was saddened by the loss of such a good man that he personally believed would have done a good job, but justice is justice and this man committed a crime and is paying for it now.

“I appointed these folks. I think they are outstanding people. I think Tom Daschle, as an example, could have led this health care effort, a difficult effort, better than just about anybody. But as he acknowledged, it was a mistake. I don’t think it was intentional on his part, but it was a serious mistake. He owned up to it and ultimately made a decision that we couldn’t afford the distraction.”

Good move Mr. President, democracy will always prevail.
News Article; http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28994296/