Jon Stewart Makes Some Observations

Pretty clever, and pretty fair-minded.

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Nod to Angry Alex

The (tea) party's over

The head tea-partier in charge, Mark Meckler, is a scary dude. Check out this snippet from a Q&A with him:


Is there any scenario where you think it would be OK to raise the debt ceiling?

"No".

What do you think is the ideal solution to this impasse right now?

"The ideal solution is to cut spending so that we stop spending beyond our means. The ideal solution is what you would have to do if you were in the same situation personally that the country is in. The ideal solution is what each of us as citizens have to do when we get in financial trouble personally or what companies have to do, or what states have to do or what cities have to do. Frankly, the only entity in our nation that continues to defy reality is the federal government. It’s just time to pay the piper".

So, Mr. Meckler is advocating a 1.6 trillion dollar cut in spending THIS YEAR out of a 3.8 trillion dollar budget? In other words around a 40% reduction in Federal spending this year?

That's really his solution to the issue?

Nowhere in the interview does Meckler say what he would cut to hit this kind of target. Those pesky details are left as an exercise for the reader I guess.

What a freakin' moron.

People, I am a big fan of small government and low taxes. I would welcome Federal spending being capped at say, no more than 20% of GDP (perhaps as an average over each presidential term). But you can't get from where we are to where I'd like us to be in one year. No way, no how.

This Meckler guy is a clown.

Tea Party Article, and Stewart/Colbert Article

My man Sheldon called, and we had a nice talk. And then he wrote it up in the newspaper...

And then my man David called, and we had a nice talk. And then he wrote it up in his newspaper chain, McClatchy.

You want to know anything, just ask. We can have a nice talk!

Tea party article

Did an interview with McClatchy Papers yesterday.

About Tea Party, and November elections. Write-up is here, and likely also in a paper near you. There are LOTS of McClatchy newspapers.

Tea Party: An Effect

Okay, so I have been saying for months that the Tea Party has yet to have had any noticeable effect. When I ask self-described TPers, they say want change, but then point to support for incumbents or the Republicans in Congress. That's not change.

But, okay, Tuesday we got change. Most noticeably, Joe Miller in Alaska. Dave Weigel asked, in a tweet, "Thinking of the 100 profiles of Alvin Greene that were written while Joe Miller was ignored."

Well, there was no way Joe Miller could win. Except that he did, it appears, though still very close.

I give you....Joe Miller. West Point grad, Yale law, masters in Econ. Considerable experience as a judge at both the federal and state levels. This guy is SO much better than that pirate from a pirate family Lisa Murkowski, in terms of qualifications. Sure, I disagree with him on most things, but there is no question that this is a Tea Party win. So, okay.

Besides, he has 8 kids with wife Kathleen. All the boys have names starting with J, all the girls have names starting with K. At least he didn't name them all "George."

UPDATE: Ha! Weigel is en fuego. I think that is going to leave a mark.

My NASA budget

People, it's exactly 0 dollars and 0 cents. If I was king, getting rid of NASA would be one of the first things I would do. Instead, President O has found room somewhere in his newly announced 3.8 trillion dollar austerity budget to bump NASA's funding up to 19 billion dollars. Now I know 19 billion doesn't amount to a hill of beans when considered in the light of a projected 1.6 trillion dollar deficit, but hey, you gotta start somewhere.

My second choice for a zero budget is the Transportation Security Administration. There's another 7 billion or so we could stop smacking ourselves over the head  with every year.

Who's got next?

Los Partidos del Te

Boy, once you get in the old Rolodex...

Article in El Mercurio, Santiago, Chile. Excerpt:

...el republicano terminó por quedarse con el estado que perteneció a Kennedy por 47 años, y el Tea Party se anotaba su primera victoria política.

"Para nosotros no se trata tanto del apoyo a Scott Brown, sino sobre la idea de que si colaboramos en masa podemos ganar cualquier asiento (parlamentario) en el país", dijo Eric Odom, del America Liberty Alliance, otra institución bajo el paraguas del Tea Party.

Y es que así funciona el movimiento: es descentralizado, se organiza espontáneamente, y carece de un manifiesto claro. Hasta el momento no se consideran parte del Partido Republicano.

"Sería un error pensar que son una fuerza capaz de dar un apoyo continuo. No son un partido, son una masa acéfala que puede ser peligrosa incluso para quienes la abrazan", dijo a "El Mercurio" Michael Munger, director del departamento de Ciencias Políticas de la Universidad de Duke.

¿Qué unió entonces a Brown y al Tea Party? El mismo descontento que ha hecho a este último impulsar a miles de ciudadanos a protestar en los últimos meses contra la administración Obama. Decirle que "no" a Washington y a los demócratas, y representar el enojo contra el sistema político contra el plan de salud, los paquetes de estímulo y el desempleo.

ATSRTWT

(I'd translate, but my Spanish is terrible. And, hopefully, Mr. Autodidakto will do the honors...again)