The Modern GOP - The Most Dangerous Force in America
IF THE GOP HATES GOVERNMENT LET'S ACCOMMODATE 'EM
So once again, in spite of all their claims of loving America and being solely dedicated to promoting the nations best interest, the GOP has found yet another pretext to hold America hostage and twist the arm of the American people in an attempt to force the nation to accept the malevolent agenda of their corporate cronies. And this is not the first time - it’s becoming a recurring event.
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When my daughter was a teenager, and young boys started knocking at my door to profess their love, knowing that I would never be able to hold back the force of nature, I armed her with what I considered sage advice instead. I told her to "Pay no attention to what these young boys say. Watch what they DO." That advice served her well, and it seems that it is now an excellent rule of thumb for the American people in dealing with the modern GOP, because their repeated behavior and obvious disregard for what’s in the best interest of the United States comes nowhere close to matching their political rhetoric.
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Richard (R.J.) Eskow, a former executive experienced in healthcare, benefits and risk management, finance, and information technology, also a senior fellow with the Campaign for America's Future and who hosts The Breakdown, says in his Huffington Post article, "The Shutdown: Republicans Win Standoff, Shoot Hostages Anyway," the following:
. "Even some other Republicans were appalled. One House member, mixing metaphors as effortlessly as his peers mix martinis, described his fellow Republicans as ‘lemmings with suicide vests.’ . "What are they thinking? It's hard to tell, since the GOP itself appears to be in complete chaos. But make no mistake about it: That is a hostage crisis, and however long or short the government shutdown turns out to be, the hostages -- the American people -- are already paying the price."
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Eskow goes on to point out, "The economy has begun shrinking. Morgan Stanley analysts estimate that the Republican shutdown will "trim annual GDP growth by approximately 15 basis points per week of closing."
. Newsmax reported former Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine as saying the Republican Party has bowed to extreme elements, making it unrecognizable from the GOP she joined years ago. Sen. Snowe said: .
"Obviously it’s moved to the extremes. I wouldn’t characterize everybody within the tea party movement, but certainly there are broad elements within the party now that are driving their own agenda for their own advantage, irrespective of what implications it has for the Republican Party,"
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Then Sen. Snowe goes on to tell Ashleigh Banfield of CNN Newsroom, "And certainly, this isn’t a party that I recognize and the party that I joined when I first enrolled, and that’s regrettable." .
It has become clear that the GOP's 30-year assault on our educational system has finally filtered down to having a negative impact on its own politicians. You cannot dumb-down America without also dumbing down the caliber of the politicians who assume elective office, and that has clearly taken place in the Republican Party. That's why we're witnessing unprecedented stupidity in government.
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Many of these politicians fail to realize that giving political games priority over the interest of the nation is not only a blatant act of irresponsibility, but political malfeasance. That’s why this Republican congress has been rated lower than any congress in the history of this nation. They’re like a bunch of irate children. They’re stomping their feet and having a tantrum because America voted against letting them have their way.
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This is not a debatable issue. As President Obama pointed out in his response to the government shutdown, there was absolutely no reason for the Republicans in congress to shutdown the government. It serves no useful purpose other than to inflict pain upon the American people in order to punish America for not letting them have their way. The president said the following:
. "They've shut down the government over an ideological crusade to deny affordable health insurance to millions of Americans. In other words, they demanded ransom just for doing their job . . .
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"And of course what's stranger still is that shutting down our government doesn't accomplish their stated goal. The Affordable Care Act is a law that passed the House, that passed the Senate, the Supreme Court ruled constitutional. It was a central issue in last year's election. It is settled, and it is here to stay.
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"And because of its funding sources, it's not impacted by a government shutdown. And these Americans are here with me today because even though the government is closed, a big part of the Affordable Care Act is now open for business."
. So the problem is, the GOP has become so radical in its agenda that it has a vested interest in electing ideologues over anyone with any kind of intellectual acuity. In fact, the GOP’s agenda is so toxic to America to anyone with common sense that it's necessitated the Republican Party becoming openly hostile to all intellectuals, potential statesman, and even independent thought itself. In addition, their pretexts to push their agenda that is so obviously toxic to the American people has become so convoluted that they’ve become so prolific in their lies that if they ever did decide to tell the truth, it would only be in an attempt to confuse the public.
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The facts are clear to anyone who's truly interested in facts. Take a moment to ask yourself, who was the last Republican president who DIDN’T drag America under a bus? With the exception of Ike Eisenhower, the GOP has a one hundred year history of swindling the American people (http://wattree.blogspot.com/2010/10/gop-one-hundred-year-record-of.html). Period.
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That’s how we’ve ended up with what we have today - a Republican congress filled with complete idiots who are totally oblivious to tradition, limits, and what's in the best interest of the nation. As I’ve pointed out in previous articles, and with complete candor, if Al Qaeda represents a rattle snake in America’s garden, the current GOP constitutes a python in the bedroom. Because as big a threat as Al Qaeda is to America, they can only destroy buildings, but the modern GOP is out to destroy the very foundation upon which this nation rests. Thus, it is incumbent upon America to correct that situation in the very next election. It just may be our last chance.
After President Obama took the oath of office the chairman of the fed went to him and said, "If you don't do something by MONDAY, our economy is going to collapse." This was a gift from the Republican Party. These people
are not hiding the last Republican president and vice president for nothing. Under Bush, the nation was losing 800,000 jobs a MONTH. Now, just ask yourselves, who was the last Republican president who DIDN’T drag America under a bus?
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ENTRUSTING THIS NATION AND OUR ECONOMY TO THE GOP WOULD BE LIKE ENTRUSTING OUR CHILDREN TO CONVICTED CHILD MOLESTERS.
THE GOP: A ONE HUNDRED YEAR RECORD OF SWINDLING THE AMERICAN PEOPLE
In 1921 -- eight years before the great depression -- Republicans took over the helm of this nation for 12 years. During that time there were three Republican administrations, the first of which was the administration of Warren G. Harding. History remembers Harding's administration for one thing more than anything other -- scandal. It was during Harding's presidency that the Teapot Dome Scandal erupted. His administration was considered the most corrupt administration in the history of the United States -- until Nixon's, then Reagan's, and finally Bush's.
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Next, in 1923, came Calvin Coolidge, the president that Ronald Reagan is said to have most admired. Coolidge's policies of large tax cuts, allowing business a free-rein, and his encouragement of stock speculation contributed greatly to the impending stock market crash and the great depression that was to come.
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Then in 1929 Herbert Hoover came to power. During his administration the stock market crashed, starting the great depression. In spite of the fact that by 1933 the unemployment rate was at 33.3% with 16 million people out of work, the Republican, Hoover, just sat, thinking that the economy would eventually rejuvenate itself. During Hoover's administration 15,000 WWI veterans marched on Washington demanding that they be paid what they were owed by the government. Hoover responded by calling in federal troops to throw these ex-servicemen off government property.
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Finally in 1933 Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a liberal democrat, was elected overwhelmingly. He immediately surrounded himself with a group of the finest minds in the country, including Columbia professors Adolph A. Berle, Jr., Rexford G. Tugwell, and Raymond Moley, known at the time as the "Brain Trust." After assembling these men and others he went about the business of developing a" New Deal" for the working class people of this country.
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The New Deal had two components -- one to help the economy to recover from the effects of the great depression, and a second component to give relief to the American people and to insure that they were never be placed in a position of total destitution again. To help heal the economy Roosevelt created programs that regulated business, controlled inflation, and brought about price stabilization; to bring relief to the people he signed The National Labor Relations Act which guaranteed workers the right to collective bargaining, and he created the Social Security Administration to guarantee workers some sort of income once they became too old to work. He also signed the Fair Labor Standards Act which protected workers rights and set a minimum wage for workers.
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With his New Deal in place Franklin Delano Roosevelt, this "bleeding heart liberal", not only led this country out of the worst, Republican generated, crisis that this country has ever faced, but went on to lead the free world in victory over Hitler in WWII. He then ushered in the most sustained prosperity that the world has ever known.
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One would think that conservatives would have seen the light, but their passion to further enrich the wealthy at the expense of the middle and lower classes seems to supersede all logic. Therefore, from the moment that the New Deal went into place, conservatives have been determined to dismantle it. The closest they've come to succeeding started during the Reagan administration with Supply-Side Economics, or, "Reaganomics" -- and the battle is currently raging in Washington D.C. as we speak.
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Supply- Side Economics was a scheme hatch by U.S.C. economist Arthur Laffer and the Reagan crowd which was supposed to cut the deficit and balance the budget. The theory behind Reaganomics was ostensibly, if you cut taxes for business and people in the upper tax brackets, and then deregulated business of such nuisances as safety regulations and environmental safeguards, the beneficiaries would invest their savings into creating new jobs. In that way the money would eventually "trickle down" to the rest of us. The resulting broadened tax base would not only help to bring down the deficit, but also subsidize the tremendously high defense budget. When the plan was first floated, even George Bush, Reagan's vice president to be, called it "voodoo economics."
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Reaganomics, for the most part, sought to undo many of the safeguards put into place during the Roosevelt era and create a business environment similar to that which was in place during the Coolidge Administration. What actually took place, however, was even more like the Coolidge era than planed.
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Instead of taking the money and investing it into creating new jobs, the money was used in wild schemes and stock market speculation. One of these schemes, the leveraged buy out, involved buying up large companies with borrowed funds secured by the company's assets, then paying off the loan by selling off the assets of the purchased company. This practice cost the citizens of this country its industrial base. In addition, the bottom fell out of the stock market. On Monday, October 19, 1987 the Dow-Jones Average fell 508.32 points. It was the greatest one-day decline since 1914 - 15 years before the Great Depression.
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And what about Ronald Reagan's promise to balance the budget and lower the deficit? By the time he left office he was not only the most prolific spender of any president, but he also added more to the deficit than all of the other presidents from George Washington to his own administration combined. And what does the Republican Party propose to do about that? One of the Republican proposals was their "contract with America," a capitol gains tax cut -- for the rich.
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Due to the continued freewheeling fiscal policies of conservative Republicans, between 1986 and 1989, spanning the presidencies of Reagan and Bush Sr., the FSLIC had to pay off all the depositors of 296 institutions with assets of over $125 billion.
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Then in 1988 Silverado Savings and Loan collapsed, costing the taxpayers $1.3 billion. It was headed by Neil Bush, brother of George W. The investigation alleged that he was guilty of "breaches of his fiduciary duties involving multiple conflicts of interest." The issue was eventually settled out of court with Bush paying a mere $50,000 settlement.
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Then there was the Lincoln Savings and loan scandal in 1987, involving John McCain. The scandal was very similar to the one that is currently playing out on Wall Street. He was one of a group of senators dubbed "The Keating Five" involved in a scandal by the same name.
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In 1976 Charles Keating moved to Arizona to run the American Continental Corporation. In 1984, shortly after the Reagan era push to deregulate the savings and loan community, Keating bought Lincoln Savings and Loan and began to engage in highly risky investments with the depositors' savings. In 1989 the parent company, which Keating headed, went bankrupt, and it resulted in over 21,000 investors losing their life savings. Most of the investors were elderly, and the loss amounted to about 285 million dollars.
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After having received over a million dollars from Keating in illegal campaign contributions, gifts, free trips, and other gratuities, the Keating Five--Senators John Glenn, Don Riegle, Dennis DeConini, Alan Cranston, and Sen. John McCain--attempted to intervene in the investigation into Keating's activities by the regulators. Later, they were admonished to varying degrees by the senate for attempting to influence regulators on Keating's behalf. Charles Keating ended up being convicted for fraud, racketeering and conspiracy, for which he received 10 years by the state court, and a 12 year sentence in federal court. After spending four and a half years in prison, his convictions were overturned. But prior to being retried, he pled guilty to a number of felonies in return for a sentence of time served.
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Then came the George W. Bush administration that caused close to a million people to die uselessly in an illegal war in Iraq, robbed the American people blind, whose fumbling ignited the longest war in American history in Afghanistan, and whose greed came very close to sending the nation into yet another depression.
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Now, after all of their repeated efforts to deplete the national treasury, they're unanimously voting against every piece of legislation that the Democrats propose to repair the damage they created, and to bring relief to the American people. Then they have the audacity to claim that they're doing it because they're concerned about deficit spending.
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They're against affordable health care for American families; they're against any kind of spending to put Americans back to work, and they're against extending unemployment insurance to relieve the burden of America's unemployed. What's particularly telling, however, is they're also against any kind of strong legislation to prevent the financial community (them) from being able to rob the American people in the future.
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The fact is, what they really want is to maintain the status quo, and make damn sure that the American people suffer until the 2012 elections so they'll have a chance to regain power and raid the treasury again. That's their one and only agenda - period.
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This is not just political rhetoric. Here is the activity of the Republican congress who ran in the 2010 election on their claim that their number one priority was to bring economic relief, and create jobs for the American people:
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History is clear. The conservative Republicans don't mind spending money, they just don't want to spend it on those who need it - us. Remember, they're the party of Alexander Hamilton, one of this country's founding fathers who believed that only those who owned property should even be allowed to vote. He also said:
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"All communities divide themselves into the few and the many. The first are the rich and wellborn, the other the mass of the people.... The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge or determine right. Give therefore to the first class a distinct, permanent share in government. They will check the unsteadiness of the second, and as they cannot receive any advantage by a change, they therefore will ever maintain good government." Debates of the Federalist Convention (May 14-September 17, 1787).
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So, let's set the record straight. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, that "bleeding heart liberal", not only brought the nation back from the Great Depression and saved the world from Hitler during his life, but his "New Deal" for the American people gave us the greatest prosperity we've ever known, and allowed him to reach back from the grave to save the nation from Ronald Reagan 50 years after his death.
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That isn't to say that the liberal Democratic philosophy corners the market on what is in the best interest of the nation -- it is clear that both parties have had illustrious moments in the past -- but rather, this is one of those defining issues in American politics that determines whether this is to be a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, or a government where the citizens or nothing more than disposable resources for big business.
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In the past the Democratic Party has always been there to draw a line in the sand on this issue, but in recent history the liberal philosophy has been distorted to the point that even Democrats are distancing themselves from their own political philosophy.
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But what makes America great, are those dramatic moments in American politics when that one individual has the courage to put everything on the line to defend, protect, and save the American people from disaster. And the annals of modern American history will clearly show that during those moments, it was a "bleeding heart liberal" that stepped up to the plate. First FDR, then Bill Clinton, and now Barack Hussein Obama.
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Thus, future historians will record that there is nothing more honorable in American politics than a bleeding heart . . . because their hearts bleed for America.
A Radical Conservative Perspective: America Would be Better Off Without Black People
I rarely get into the debate over the lingering racism in America, because I feel that the vast majority of the American people have made an honest and concerted effort to put racism behind us. So as long as it’s not blatant or damaging to individual or collective African-Americans, I look upon it as merely a distraction used to keep the American people divided and unaware of the most insidious threat to America - the gross assault on the poor and middle class.
But all too often when African-Americans complain of racism that is indeed blatant and damaging to their financial or emotional well being, they’re met with rolling eyes and the implication that it’s a figment of their imagination. Confirmed racist are aware of this situation, and often use that knowledge to ply their passion for constant, but subtle racism. As a result many African-Americans are forced to go through life constantly being subtly harrassed by people like the individual below. It's like going through life with a tenacious fly buzzing around your head. It won't kill you, but it's quite irritating, and it has a direct causal relationship to what’s been dubbed the “angry Black-man syndrome.”
Thus, subtle racism is a very effective device for keeping America divided, because virually every Black person in America is aware that the mindset illustrated below lingers just beneath the surface of polite society. And unfortunately, more often than not, it's the innocent White person, making a completely innocent remark, who's forced to bear the brunt of the resulting frustration - and the GOP has become masters at this game.
The most recent example of the GOP engaging in subtle racism is when Mike Huckabee claimed that President Obama viewed the world from the perspective of the Mau Mau. Then when it became clear that he'd crossed the line, he claimed that he misspoke and didn't understand what all the uproar was about. In spite of the fact that he's composed an entire scenario indicating that President Obama is un-America, he tried to dismiss it with rolling eyes and the implication that his racist remark was a figment of our imagination. But the fact is, he betrayed the true attitude that the GOP harbors toward African- Americans, an attitude that is more graphically reflected in this exchange that I recently had over the internet:
Pepe says: March 24, 2011 at 1:39 pm (Edit)
I agree blacks have destroyed this country and they are the reason we never evolved into a great nation. We have to feed and clothe 30 million lazy ass blacks that dont want to work and dont know who their daddy is. We could save this country by sending their asses back to Africa and sending the Mexicans back to Mexico closing our borders and live in peace and harmony imagine a white america for whites only.
Reply Eric L. Wattree says: March 24, 2011 at 2:23 pm (Edit)
Hey Pepe,
Spoken like a true fascist. It sounds to me like you’re the one who doesn’t belong here. You’re views are un-American. Aren’t you smart enough to see that? If America was filled with people with your mentality, it would no longer be America.
Even if you got your wish that America was all White, with the kind of people that you represent, the right-handed people would start discriminating against everybody who was left-handed. You see, you’re suffering from an inferiority complex. You probably lack talent, and you’re comment clearly demonstrates that you lack intellect. So due to your insecurity over your shortcomings as an individual, you have an innate need to feel like you’re a part of something special that’s bigger than yourself - being White. Psychology 101.
If you had any kind of brain at all, you’d realize that you’re advocating the very same philosophy that countless Americans died to abolish. So again, by definition, you’re un-American. Thus, every headstone in Arlington Cemetary attests to the fact that your very presence desecrates this veteran’s site.
Reply Pepe says: March 24, 2011 at 2:48 pm (Edit)
pls save all that bs for someone else look at japan. They have a great society bcs they didnt let hordes of third world savages in. little crime and high employment above average living standards. It’s called quality of life buddy. If we don’t send them back to Africa give them half a state and see how they do. Have you been to Atlanta. What a shithole. Anyway grow up so our kids can have a better future safe from mindless idiots that smoke blunts and drink 40 oz beer all day. Spreading diseases and having abortions like crazy. this is insane.
Reply Eric L. Wattree says: March 24, 2011 at 3:39 pm (Edit)
You know, Pepe,
A mind is a terrible thing to waste. Have you ever heard of a logical syllogism? You probably haven’t. That’s why you’re such an inefficient thinker. Your entire philosophy of life is based on an ILLOGICAL syllogism. Black people are like any other group. There are good and bad, brilliant and ignorant within our ranks, and your very existence suggests that the same is true among Whites. Yet, your thinking suggests the following:
All dogs have fleas. My cat has fleas. Therefore, my cat is a dog. That’s clearly inefficient thinking. But you continue to embrace that philosophy in spite of clear evidence to the contrary for the reasons cited in my previous post.
You have this gnawing need to feel superior in order to dress your wounds of insecurity. And the very existence of a Black man like myself is a direct assault on your delusions of grandeur. So you’re desperately trying to hold on to your self-esteem by insisting that you’re superior by virtue of your race, in spite of the fact that it’s abundantly clear that you’re nowhere close to my intellectual equal. I can handle people like you on one brain cell. It’s like dealing with a child - and you know it. Thus, all of your hostility.
Your delusional portrayal of ALL Black people is inconsistent with the facts. I’m a former Marine, and my son had a distinguished career in the Air Force and he’s now a federal agent. The Air Force and several federal agencies were literally fighting over him. So tell me, Pepe, when was the last time America fought over you?:
23 April 2002
MEMORANDUM FOR OFFICER TRAINING SCHOOL SELECTION COMMITTEE FROM: 92 SFS/SFO 2 E. ARNOLD STREET FAIRCHILD AFB, WA 99011 SUBJECT: Recommendation for Staff Sergeant Eric L. Wattree
1. I wholeheartedly concur with Staff Sergeant Wattree’s request to attend Officer Training School. He represents the enlisted ranks with the highest standard and will bring that dedication and professionalism to the officer corps.
2. Eric continues to lead a stellar military career; his enlisted performance reports speak for themselves. His leadership and experience, especially in contingency environments, remains a vital asset to our unit and wing. As one of my primary Phoenix Raven team leaders, he’s propelled to the forefront of all major deployments throughout the world. He’s repeatedly secured aircraft and crews, supporting a wide variety of missions, in the most austere and terrorist-ridden environments where security is severely inadequate. The diversity of these missions never limited SSgt Wattree’s capacity to adapt to each situation. For this reason, Eric was selected as our 2000 Outstanding Phoenix Raven Member of the Year and the 2001 Air Force Reserve Component Airman of the Year for the 92d Security Forces Squadron.
3. Whether operating under peacetime or contingency operations, Eric easily assumes control and tackles every situation with meticulous tenacity, a quality highly desired in our Air Force officers. Requested by name, Sergeant Wattree, provided security for presidential Banner missions throughout Greece, Peru and Viet Nam. While deployed to Afghanistan, he flew numerous combat missions in our nation’s pursuit to eradicate terrorism through Operation ENDURING FREEDOM. Additionally, he provided round-the-clock force protection for aircraft in other high-threat environments including Uzbekistan, Pakistan and Oman.
4. Sergeant Wattree motivated his personnel during the worst conditions and raised the level of esprit de corps to integrate personnel from other Air Force specialties into a cohesive team. His leadership, integrity and devotion to our Air Force play an integral part in our future leadership. Eric has what it takes to become a commissioned officer and earns my full support to attend Officer Training School.
FRANK HELLSTERN, JR., Captain, USAF Operations Officer
After serving six years in the Air Force the agency that Eric’s currently working for obtained a same-day discharge for him with just a phone call so he could begin Special Agent training at Quantico, Virginia.
I raised that young man. So I put forth the proposition that if America had more people like me and fewer like you, and whoever raised you, that this would be a much better country – and I have the evidence to back that up. What do you have?
Eric L. Wattree says: March 24, 2011 at 5:27 pm (Edit)
On Tue, Mar 22, 2011 at 11:15 PM, Reni Ashton wrote:
From: Reni Ashton
To: Eric Wattree
[Only] 14% of blacks marry. [Seventy-four percent]74% don't know who their fathers are. Their contribution to the arts is gangsta rap, nasty, foul chattering, that passes as music. [Ninety-six percent] 96% voted for Barack Obama, who is the worst fraud and fake ever to set foot in the US. Per capita, blacks represent 80% of prison population violent crimes segment. Billions have been spent on blacks in the US to mainstream them to no avail.
Blacks vote democrat for only one reason. Democrats are most likely to give the most welfare, so blacks can keep popping out welfare babies, smoking crack, and jiggering in clubs. As a black man you have no defense and no room to criticize.The Rev. Dr. Manning is the only one of you who has ever made any sense, publicly, other than Bill Cosby. Your criticism of the white race is nothing short of biting the hands that feed you, and unfortunately, one of the biggest drains on the US middle class is your own people and their incessant and eternal need for huge chunks of tax money in the form of welfare. Most of you then blame white people for your own failings.
Your article is nothing but yet another way to say, I want more welfare. You've got Obama in the (former) white house now. Hope you get lots of that magic negro money. I know my19 year old daughter, trying to support herself, gets over $100 taken out of her measly paychecks every week, who can't afford school and drives a 25 year old car. That's your welfare money, black man. Hope you like impoverishing the young people of America.
Reni Ashton
Eric Wattree to reni:
Thank you so much for this, Reni,
You've made my point of why Blacks reject the conservative movement much more profoundly than I ever could. This is a keeper.
Reni, I can’t help but wonder where you got your statistics. Did you simply snatch them out of thin air, or were you informed by Glenn Beck and FOX News? That’s another reason that Blacks reject conservatives, by the way - you tend to lie a lot. Here are the actual facts:
United States Census Bureau
64%
Among households with a single-race black householder, the percentage that contained a family. There were 8.6 million black family households.
44%
Among families with single-race black householders, the percentage that were married couples.
44%
Nationally, the percentage of households with a householder who was single-race black who lived in owner-occupied homes.
84%
Among blacks 25 and older, the proportion who had at least a high school diploma in 2009.
19%
Percentage of blacks 25 and older who had a bachelor's degree or higher in 2009.
So again, Reni, I want to thank you so much for this response. I couldn’t have gotten a more powerful reinforcement of my thesis if I had gone out and purchased it. So of course, I’ll be posting it liberally (forgive the pun) on the net to see just how many Americans agree with you. I would love to see your views become a subject of national debate, because I’m sure it would open Americana’s eyes to exactly what we’re dealing with inside the GOP.
Take your contention that "74% [of Black people] don't know who their fathers are," for example. That’s a radical conservative gem, since according to the U.S. Census Bureau 64% of Black children are likely to be living with their father, or at the very least, 44%. So that's a lie that ranks right up there with "death panels."
At this point I could go into an in depth analysis of the gross dysfunction of both your motivation and thinking. Or alternatively, I could respond as “the angry Black man,” which I’m sure is what you sought. But contrary to what seems to be popular belief in your circle, MOST Black men do more thinking than they do feeling under these circumstances - that’s how we’ve managed to survive.
Most Black people were taught at an early age that in order for you to show that you’re superior to me, you’re also going to have to show that you can out think me. You see, God made birds to fly, fish to swim, and man to think. President Obama is doing a fine job of demonstrating that principle, and I’m sure he’s having a great time with it. That’s one of the reasons he’s so reviled in your circle. He constitutes a direct threat to your delusion of grandeur. But I don’t think you even realize that - at least, on a conscious level.
So I’m not going to taint what is surely to become a monument to radical conservative thought with my own commentary. I going to allow your racist and inefficient thinking to sink under the weight of its very own profound stupidity.
Sincerely yours, and with deep regards to your incredible shortsightedness,
RE: Why Black Americans Reject the Conservative Movement
Mr. Kuhner,
My name is Eric L. Wattree. I'm Black, and I’ve been a independent voter all of my voting life. I was recently referred to an article that appeared in your publication, written by Tracey L. Wells, entitled"Why black Americans reject the conservative movement."
After reading the article I was both insulted and appalled. Not only did I find the article to be a gross generalization of all Black people, as though we lack the ability to engage in independent thought, but the tone of the article was grossly condescending toward the Black community and totally lacking in any substantive facts to support her thesis. In fact, the article itself serves as a monument to why many Black voters reject the conservative mindset.
In addition, Ms. Wells states the following:
"Blacks are influenced by five major myths in their voting patterns. When black conservatives attempt to introduce fact and research into a political discussion with a black Democrat or liberal, we soon realize that getting our opponent to acknowledge these myths is like asking someone to give up their favorite sports team and root for the rival team. Simply put, an overwhelming majority of blacks continue to vote Democrat."
After reading the above assertion I was fully prepared to hear some of the "facts and research" she spoke of - after all, she had the floor, and since Ms. Wells is representing herself as a writer I assumed she understood that after making an assertion, she should start backing that assertion up with facts in the following sentence, or no later than the following paragraph. English 101.
But instead, she began to spue Republican talking points, indicating that Black voters were simply following the influence of others, as though Black voters are simply being led like mindless cattle - which, by the way, is an assertion that she can't possibly substantiate, that is, unless she's also a mind reader. Thus, I found her assessment in this regard to be not only less than insightful, but again, condescending and insulting.
Therefore, I'd like to offer two of my own articles, linked below, in rebuttal to Ms. Wells. As a realist, however, I have no reason to believe that you’re going to publish either of the two articles. They are, after all, inconsistent with your agenda. But I offer them nevertheless, if for no other reason than for your own education. But I will take this opportunity to sum them up.
Black people reject the conservative movement because we’re not stupid:
Finally, please see to it that Ms. Wells receives a copy of this response just in case she may want to respond. I'd love to hear from her. Perhaps we could collaborate on a piece debating the issue.
Personally I take the position that it’s not the Black community that is out of touch, but Ms. Wells. Granted, we have many problems in the Black community, but thank God, being idiotic enough to vote Republican is not among them.
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Actually, what’s both curious, and insulting, is why conservatives can’t understand the reason that most Black people see the GOP in exactly the same light as the GOP sees Al Qaeda. After all, the people who lynched Black people in the South may have called themselves Dixiecrats, but the bottom line is, they were radical conservatives, and they eventually migrated to the Republican party. So why should Black people hate radical conservatives any less than the GOP hates Al Qaeda - they killed many more Blacks, and for a much longer period of time? The only logical reason that conservatives can’t seem to grasp this very simple concept is that they obviously believe that the lives they took were not of equal value to the lives taken on 9/11.
At this point conservatives would start to argue semantics. They’d say, “It wasn’t Republicans who were lynching Black people in the South, it was Democrats.” But the fact is, during the fifties the Democratic Party came out in support of the Civil Rights Movement. As a result, during the fifties and sixties the Southern Dixiecrats became disenchanted with the Democrats and migrated to the Republican Party. At the same time, many Southern Blacks began leaving the Republican Party to become Democrats.
Thus, the Republican Party is now a coalition of three separate constituencies with confluent interests. The first group is made up of traditional conservatives. These are highly patriotic Americans who believe in limited government, the primacy of the people over government, and fiscal responsibility. Black people have no problem with this faction of the Republican party. But the other two groups that have coalesced within the GOP are much more malevolent - international business interests, and social bigots. It is these two groups in which Black people have a problem, and will never support.
Contrary to popular belief, Blacks have a much better grasp of the English language than we’re often given credit for. The term “conservative” indicates that the GOP has a vested interest in preserving the American values of the past. While most Americans have a laundered view of what those values represent, Black people are under no illusions. Call it cultural intelligence, but Black people understand that “preserving traditional American values” is conservative politispeak for dragging America back to a racist, sexist, and genocidal dark age. In fact, even worse, because now the corporatist also want to oppress poor and middle-class White people as well - this time they’re not going to leave any “bleeding hearts” around to go to war over the issue.
But Black people have an intimate understanding of the conservative mindset. We have a cultural memory of Southern bigots running out of church with picnic baskets to watch Black men being lynched. We can also see that the conservative predisposition has not changed. If they can condone invading an innocent nation and killing nearly a million people, then condemn an entire religion as “Islamofascists” for the actions of a handful of zealots, they’re undoubtedly still Judeo-Christian fascist themselves.
That’s the actual reason that Black people reject the conservative movement, because we see them as brutal, self-serving, and un-American. And very soon many more Americans are going to join us, because the true nature of radical conservatism is now coming out in Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, New Jersey, Florida, and literally all over the country. It has become clear that the actions of the GOP are neither pragmatic nor spontaneous. It is also becoming increasingly clear that radical conservatives are now engaged in a conspiracy to enslave all poor and middle-class Americans, regardless of race.
THE GOP: A ONE HUNDRED YEAR RECORD OF SWINDLING THE AMERICAN PEOPLE
In 1921 -- eight years before the great depression -- Republicans took over the helm of this nation for 12 years. During that time there were three Republican administrations, the first of which was the administration of Warren G. Harding. History remembers Harding's administration for one thing more than anything other -- scandal. It was during Harding's presidency that the Teapot Dome Scandal erupted. His administration was considered the most corrupt administration in the history of the United States -- until Nixon's, then Reagan's, and finally Bush's.
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Next, in 1923, came Calvin Coolidge, the president that Ronald Reagan is said to have most admired. Coolidge's policies of large tax cuts, allowing business a free-rein, and his encouragement of stock speculation contributed greatly to the impending stock market crash and the great depression that was to come.
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Then in 1929 Herbert Hoover came to power. During his administration the stock market crashed, starting the Great Depression. In spite of the fact that by 1933 the unemployment rate was at 33.3% with 16 million people out of work, the Republican, Hoover, just sat, thinking that the economy would eventually rejuvenate itself. During Hoover's administration 15,000 WWI veterans marched on Washington demanding that they be paid what they were owed by the government. Hoover responded by calling in federal troops to throw these ex-servicemen off government property.
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Finally in 1933 Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a liberal democrat, was elected overwhelmingly. He immediately surrounded himself with a group of the finest minds in the country, including Columbia professors Adolph A. Berle, Jr., Rexford G. Tugwell, and Raymond Moley, known at the time as the "Brain Trust." After assembling these men and others he went about the business of developing a" New Deal" for the working class people of this country.
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The New Deal had two components -- one to help the economy to recover from the effects of the great depression, and a second component to give relief to the American people and to insure that they would never be placed in a position of total destitution again. To help heal the economy Roosevelt created programs that regulated business, controlled inflation, and brought about price stabilization; to bring relief to the people he signed The National Labor Relations Act which guaranteed workers the right to collective bargaining, and he created the Social Security Administration to guarantee workers some sort of income once they became too old to work. He also signed the Fair Labor Standards Act which protected workers rights and set a minimum wage for workers.
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With his New Deal in place Franklin Delano Roosevelt, this "bleeding heart liberal", not only led this country out of the worst, Republican generated, crisis that this country has ever faced, but went on to lead the free world in victory over Hitler in WWII. He then ushered in the most sustained era of prosperity that the world has ever known.
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One would think that conservatives would have seen the light, but their passion to further enrich the wealthy at the expense of the middle and lower classes seems to supersede all logic. Therefore, from the moment that the New Deal went into place, conservatives have been determined to dismantle it. The closest they've come to succeeding started during the Reagan administration with Supply-Side Economics, or, "Reaganomics" -- and the battle is currently raging in Washington D.C. as we speak.
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Supply- Side Economics was a scheme hatch by U.S.C. economist Arthur Laffer and the Reagan crowd which was supposed to cut the deficit and balance the budget. The theory behind Reaganomics was ostensibly, if you cut taxes for business and people in the upper tax brackets, and then deregulated business of such nuisances as safety regulations and environmental safeguards, the beneficiaries would invest their savings into creating new jobs. In that way the money would eventually "trickle down" to the rest of us. The resulting broadened tax base would not only help to bring down the deficit, but also subsidize the tremendously high defense budget. When the plan was first floated, even George Bush, Reagan's vice president to be, called it "voodoo economics."
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Reaganomics, for the most part, sought to undo many of the safeguards put into place during the Roosevelt era and create a business environment similar to that which was in place during the Coolidge Administration. What actually took place, however, was even more like the Coolidge era than planed.
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Instead of taking the money and investing it into creating new jobs, the money was used in wild schemes and stock market speculation. One of these schemes, the leveraged buy-out, involved buying up large companies with borrowed funds secured by the company's assets, then paying off the loan by selling off the assets of the purchased company. This practice cost the citizens of this country its industrial base. In addition, the bottom fell out of the stock market. On Monday, October 19, 1987 the Dow-Jones Average fell 508.32 points. It was the greatest one-day decline since 1914 - 15 years before the Great Depression.
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And what about Ronald Reagan's promise to balance the budget and lower the deficit? By the time he left office he was not only the most prolific spender of any president, but he also added more to the deficit than all of the other presidents from George Washington to his own administration combined. And what does the Republican Party propose to do about that? One of the Republican proposals was their "contract with America," a capitol gains tax cut -- for the rich.
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Due to the continued freewheeling fiscal policies of conservative Republicans, between 1986 and 1989, spanning the presidencies of Reagan and Bush Sr., the FSLIC had to pay off all the depositors of 296 institutions with assets of over $125 billion.
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Then in 1988 Silverado Savings and Loan collapsed, costing the taxpayers $1.3 billion. It was headed by Neil Bush, brother of George W. The investigation alleged that he was guilty of "breaches of his fiduciary duties involving multiple conflicts of interest." The issue was eventually settled out of court with Bush paying a mere $50,000 settlement.
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Then there was the Lincoln Savings and loan scandal in 1987, involving John McCain. The scandal was very similar to the one that is currently playing out on Wall Street. He was one of a group of senators dubbed "The Keating Five" involved in a scandal by the same name.
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In 1976 Charles Keating moved to Arizona to run the American Continental Corporation. In 1984, shortly after the Reagan era push to deregulate the savings and loan community, Keating bought Lincoln Savings and Loan and began to engage in highly risky investments with the depositors' savings. In 1989 the parent company, which Keating headed, went bankrupt, and it resulted in over 21,000 investors losing their life savings. Most of the investors were elderly, and the loss amounted to about 285 million dollars.
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After having received over a million dollars from Keating in illegal campaign contributions, gifts, free trips, and other gratuities, the Keating Five--Senators John Glenn, Don Riegle, Dennis DeConini, Alan Cranston, and Sen. John McCain--attempted to intervene in the investigation into Keating's activities by the regulators. Later, they were admonished to varying degrees by the senate for attempting to influence regulators on Keating's behalf. Charles Keating ended up being convicted for fraud, racketeering and conspiracy, for which he received 10 years by the state court, and a 12 year sentence in federal court. After spending four and a half years in prison, his convictions were overturned. But prior to being retried, he pled guilty to a number of felonies in return for a sentence of time served.
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Then came the George W. Bush administration that caused close to a million people to die uselessly in an illegal war in Iraq, robbed the American people blind, whose fumbling ignited the longest war in American history in Afghanistan, and whose greed came very close to sending the nation into yet another depression.
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Now, after all of their repeated efforts to deplete the national treasury, they're unanimously voting against every piece of legislation that the Democrats propose to repair the damage they created, and to bring relief to the American people. Then they have the audacity to claim that they're doing it because they're concerned about deficit spending.
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They're against affordable health care for American families; they're against any kind of spending to put Americans back to work, and they're against extending unemployment insurance to relieve the burden of America's unemployed. What's particularly telling, however, is they're also against any kind of strong legislation to prevent the financial community (them) from being able to rob the American people in the future.
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The fact is, what they really wanted was to maintain the status quo, and make damn sure that the American people remained miserable, hungry, and divided until 2012 elections so they'd have a better chance to regain power and raid the treasury again. Republican Senate minority leader, Mitch McConnell, was frustrated and reckless enough to say it out loud - "Our No. 1 priority is to make this president a one-term president" - not to save America, or to bring relief to the American people, but to make Barack Obama a one-term president. Flag pens in lapels and patriotic rhetoric notwithstanding, that says it all about the GOP's lack of concern for America, or the American people.
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Now that they've lost the election, their agenda has shifted to making sure that President Obama is not successful, because if he is, and you combine that with the rapidly changing demographic and Hillary Clinton's popularity, that could spell doom for the future of the GOP - and it should, because they're grossly out of touch with reality, and, America's best interest. They're out to create a corporate feudalist society. The government shutdown alone, clearly demonstrates that they have absolutely no respect for democracy.
. And this is not just political rhetoric. Here is the activity of the Republican congress who ran in the 2010 election on their claim that their number one priority was to bring economic relief, and create jobs for the American people:
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History is clear. The conservative Republicans don't mind spending money, they just don't want to spend it on those who need it - us. Remember, they're the party of Alexander Hamilton, one of this country's founding fathers who believed that only those who owned property should even be allowed to vote. He also said: . "All communities divide themselves into the few and the many. The first are the rich and wellborn, the other the mass of the people.... The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge or determine right. Give therefore to the first class a distinct, permanent share in government. They will check the unsteadiness of the second, and as they cannot receive any advantage by a change, they therefore will ever maintain good government." Debates of the Federalist Convention (May 14-September 17, 1787).
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So, let's set the record straight. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, that "bleeding heart liberal", not only brought the nation back from the Great Depression and saved the world from Hitler during his life, but his "New Deal" for the American people gave us the greatest prosperity we've ever known, and allowed him to reach back from the grave to save the nation from Ronald Reagan 50 years after his death.
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That isn't to say that the liberal Democratic philosophy corners the market on what is in the best interest of the nation -- it is clear that both parties have had illustrious moments in the past -- but rather, this is one of those defining issues in American politics that determines whether this is to be a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, or a government where the citizens or nothing more than disposable resources for big business.
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In the past the Democratic Party has always been there to draw a line in the sand on this issue, but in recent history the liberal philosophy has been distorted to the point that even Democrats are distancing themselves from their own political philosophy.
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But what makes America great, are those dramatic moments in American politics when that one individual has the courage to put everything on the line to defend, protect, and save the American people from disaster. And the annals of modern American history will clearly show that during those moments, it was a "bleeding heart liberal" that stepped up to the plate. First FDR, then Bill Clinton, and now Barack Hussein Obama.
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Thus, future historians will record that there is nothing more honorable in American politics than a bleeding heart . . . because their hearts bleed for America.
wattree.blogspot.com Ewattree@Gmail.com
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Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.
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Strive To Become Your Own Hero... Then Let No One Remove Your Cape.
BIO
Eric L. Wattree is a writer, poet, and musician, born in Los Angeles. He’s been a columnist for The Los Angeles Sentinel, Black Star News, The Atlanta Post, and is a member of the Sigma Delta Chi Society of Professional Journalists (http://www.spj.org/). He’s also the author of "A Message From the Hood."
Some of the greatest minds I’ve ever known held court while sitting on empty milk crates in the parking lots of ghetto liquor stores, while some of the weakest minds I’ve ever known roamed the halls of academia in pursuit of credentials over knowledge.
Am I a hater, you ask? You're damn right I'm a hater. I hate injustice. I hate hypocrisy. I also hate demagoguery, apathy, and the stupidity that allows it to exist. Hater? Absolutely. I'm a big time hater. I hate what I see happening to this country, and I hate watching the development of a culture that embraces ignorance with a stupid sense of pride. So yes, I am indeed a hater, but not only that - I'm a hater with a very low threshold for bullshit, so step off.
So the problem is, the GOP has become so radical in its agenda that it has a vested interest in electing ideologues over anyone with any kind of intellectual acuity. In fact, the GOP’s agenda is so toxic to America to anyone with common sense that it's necessitated the Republican Party becoming openly hostile to all intellectuals, potential statesman, and even independent thought itself. In addition, their pretexts to push their agenda that is so obviously toxic to the American people has become so convoluted that they’ve become so prolific in their lies that if they ever did decide to tell the truth, it would only be in an attempt to confuse the public. 
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