In the left corner, representing us, we have a true statesperson: Senator Elizabeth Warner:
When was the last time the anarchy gang called for regulators to go easier on companies that put lead in children’s toys? Or for inspectors to stop checking whether the meat in our grocery stores is crawling with deadly bacteria? Or for the FDA to ignore whether morning sickness drugs will cause horrible deformities in our babies?
When? Never. In fact, whenever the anarchists make any headway in their quest and cause damage to our government, the opposite happens.
…
Why do they do this? Because the boogeyman government in the alternate universe of their fiery political speeches isn’t real. It doesn’t exist.
Government is real, and it has three basic functions:
1. Provide for the national defense.
2. Put rules in place rules, like traffic lights and bank regulations, that are fair and transparent.
3. Build the things together that none of us can build alone – roads, schools, power grids – the things that give everyone a chance to succeed.
…
We are alive, we are healthier, we are stronger because of government.
And in the other corner, we have John Boehner and the Tea Party Tizziers:
Elections Matter!
* * *
My thanks to the Stephen D at the Daily Kos for the video link to Senator Warren (my hero).
And my thanks to one of my favorite blogging buddies, Frank of A Frank Angle for Groucho.
Are you stuck in a dead end job? No future? No expansion? No ability to grow, to expand?
Well there is a whole new field that is just opening up. And the possibilities for advancement are endless. It’s a growth area, especially here in the Washington, DC area.
Best of all, you can do it from home. Even while you keep your current job.
You can do it anywhere.
Yes, you too can become a “Disgustologist!”
Dr. Valerie Curtis is an anthropologist who studies yucky stuff: poo, vomit, maggots, rotting flesh. You know, the stuff that smells bad, hurts us or causes disease. Stuff that we avoid. This avoidance helps keep us healthy – and keeping away from disease-ridden filth is always a plus.
So in reading this article about Dr. Curtis, I saw a potential growth opportunity festering right there in front of me.
You and me will use the science of “Disgustology” to lead American voters back into voting for sensible politicians. And into voting out the disgusting ones.
Now, I know many of you are saying,
“But Elyse, American voters have proven since they re-elected George W Bush that they are disgusting!”
And you do have a point.
“But Elyse, American voters have voted in members of the Tea Party!”
And you have another point.
“But Elyse, American voters have voted for people who are destroying our humanity.”
OK, you have lots of points.
That’s where we Disgustologists come in. Plus that’s why Disgustology is such a growth industry. Because we are going to reinsert the “That’s Disgusting!” reflex back into the American voter. With pictures!
Now it’s hard to know where to start these days, isn’t it. So I started randomly, with my faint recollection that we Americans have hearts and a collective heart.
You know how we Americans like to stick together. How we’re always the first to help each other in times of tragedy. How we pull together and support each other during natural disasters? We pride ourselves on that.
So — Disgustologists – Get your feet wet with this bit of hypocrisy:
Four GOP Congressmen voted FOR Colorado Flood Relief AFTER voting AGAINST Hurricane Sandy Relief!
Here they are:
Rep Cory Gardner (R-CO)
Rep Mike Coffman (R-CO)
Rep Scott Tipton (R-CO)
Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-CO)
Now don’t get me wrong — I think we as Americans SHOULD take care of the flood victims in Colorado. And New Jersey. And victims of hurricanes. Oh and fires. We can’t forget the victims of fires. In fact, we can’t — we shouldn’t — deny aid to folks that are harmed by natural disasters. Of course we shouldn’t. We are America. The richest country in the world. We take care of our own. Right? Right? You there — am I right?
But you know, there are some folks that we just need to take care of more than others. Take that good Christian, Rep. Stephen Fincher (R-TN).
Rep. Stephen Fincher (R-TN)
Fincher was a proponent of separating the Farm Subsidies bill from the Food Stamp bill. He believes that the Food Stamp program “steals other people’s money.” He backs up his stand with the bible, natch:
“He who will not work shall not eat”
Those vile children, expecting food, an education and a future. Stone them, I say, stone them!
But guess what! Some of YOUR money is going to Congressman Fincher! Yeah, really! But, being a good, moral Christian, I’m sure he deserves it. Look at this:
Mr. Fisher is the second most heavily subsidized “farmer” in Congress under the Farm Subsidies Bill! Yahoo! I love it when my money goes to keep hypocrites in business.
USDA data collected in EWG’s 2013 farm subsidy database update — going live tomorrow –shows that Fincher collected a staggering $3.48 million in “our” money from 1999 to 2012. In 2012 alone, the congressman was cut a government check for a $70,000 direct payment. Direct payments are issued automatically, regardless of need, and go predominantly to the largest, most profitable farm operations in the country.
Fincher’s $70,000 farm subsidy haul in 2012 dwarfs the average 2012 SNAP benefit in Tennessee of $1,586.40, and it is nearly double of Tennessee’s median household income. After voting to cut SNAP by more than $20 billion, Fincher joined his colleagues to support a proposal to expand crop insurance subsidies by $9 billion over the next 10 years.
Soon we can give Stevie some more! I don’t know about you, but I’m DISGUSTED.
And then there’s the new kid on the block. Ted. And not the Ted of the TED Talks, either.
Senator Ted Cruz You’d think he was a Disgustologist instead of the nasty thing on the shoe
This guy is one of the leaders of the movement to shut down the government rather than fund The Affordable Care Act. “Obamacare,” a law that was passed by the United States Congress (of which he is now a member), signed by the President of the United States, and upheld by the United States Supreme Court. Last I heard those were the only three branches of the U.S. government under the Constitution the GOP loves to wave in everyone’s face (but apparently have not read).
Of course, it isn’t only that Teddy is against it because he clearly doesn’t understand the U.S. government. Nope, I’m guessing that Ted Cruz lives in some sort of vortex, because he doesn’t understand that the folks that voted him into office are the ones who need the Afordable Care Act.
Look-y here – folks in Ted Cruz’s state of Texas need Obamacare more than most.
Poverty in the US
I’m beginning to see a disgusting pattern here
And the folks who have the most to gain from Obamacare:
In America? Disgusting!
Senator Ted Cruz is just disgusting. Disgustologists? Let’s show the world.
* * *
See what I mean when I say that Disgustology is a Growth Field? Sign up today! Opportunities are everywhere.
I admit, I’ve been doing a whole lot of this lately
Google Image, I’m sure
But I was surprised how in two months during which I did almost no political posts whatsoever, that the world could have possibly gotten its knickers in a such twist. Gone end-over-end. Topsy Turvey. All akimbo.
Two months ago, my company got two projects that would take us four months each to complete. Both were due in two months. Both got done. I’ve been busy.
And I haven’t been paying attention. I promise not to let that happen again.
Boy did I miss a whole lot. I heard that they Congressman Issa cleared up that whole Benghazi thing! And that Russia kept us out of war in Syria! Somebody let me know if they admitted we’re doomed because of global climate change, ‘kay?
But the thing that has me most confused?
Apparently the country went from one where the GOP, the Republicans were interested in sticking things into women’s vaginas,
Yea, they like to do that. (Google image)
Into one where it’s the proponents of the Affordable Healthcare Act
– aka Obamacare — that want to do that!
Really! Just look’ee here:
Only this time, they’re not just targeting the womenfolk. They’re going after all the straight men, too.
Next, they’ll want to force all employees to wash their hands after using the restroom!
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!! (Google)
* * *
What sort of people campaign against people getting checkups? What sort of people promote such ignorance? What sort of stupid questions am I asking? Because we all know the answer:
[Washington, DC, February 15, 2013] Pundits were astonished today when members of the GOP-led House Committee on Science, Space and Technology announced plans to hold hearings on science and the lack of federal research into the causes of natural catastrophes.
One witness agreed to appear:
* * *
Seriously, yesterday, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) announced that he was shocked, shocked that the United States Guv’ment had not been investing enough money into scientific reasons why that meteor that exploded in the skies over Siberia, injuring over 1,000 people.
Yup, they are finally going to look at science because the sky is falling. And they’re afraid it will land on them.
In the spring and summer of 1986 random parts of my face started growing for no apparent reason. I would be at home, on the subway, or off working somewhere around DC.
First it was a swollen eyebrow. Then that would go away and a day or two later, my cheek would grow so that I couldn’t see well out of one eye.
Mostly it was my lips, though. They would grow, sometimes individually, sometimes together. I looked like a duck.
Did I mention I was also getting married in September? That September? And while John and I had a fairly small and simple wedding, I was unenthusiastic about going to the altar looking like a daisy. Especially this one.
Of course, John’s lips would have been normal. Mine? Not so much.
But work was so completely crazy that I ignored it. I was a lobbyist/flunky at the time, and was spending long days up on Capitol Hill working on the Tax Reform Act of 1986. (And it was the perfect assignment for me; I did my own taxes – on the U.S. Government 1040-EZ form. Tax Returns for Poor Dummies.) I was in over my head, didn’t have a clue what was going on, what was important, or which way was up. I was a wee bit stressed.
Plus that summer we decided to buy our first house just so we could send my stress level through the roof of my brand new adorable little house.
But back to my problem. My ever changing facial features.
People were looking at me strangely which I understood – I often and suddenly looked really odd. But even stranger, they stopped talking whenever I would approach. These were people I’d worked with for more than six years. Something weird was going on.
And I found out what that was early one morning as I stood talking in the front lobby to my boss, also (irritatingly) named John. He was giving me instructions on that day’s most important issues, when to pay especially close attention, when to call him immediately with an update.
At the beginning of the chat, my face was normal. But as we talked, my lips spontaneously grew larger and larger. More duck-like.
“Elyse,” my boss said, “what’s happening to your lips?”
“They’re growing. Spontaneously. I don’t know why. But you’ve seen me with a swollen face off and on for the last couple of months. Haven’t you noticed? And it keep on happening. Luckily, John has promised to marry me even if I look like Daisy Duck when I arrive at the church.”
The look of relief on his face was instantaneous – he joked with me about the fat lips, about stress, about what I might be allergic to. He’s a really nice guy, and he cared about me. But it wasn’t until much later when I realized just why he had looked so relieved.
He thought I was being abused by my husband-to-be. And he, a very powerful Washington DC lawyer, who knew/knows everybody in town, had no idea what to do. He didn’t ask me if anybody was hurting me. He didn’t threaten to report John, or try to find out discretely whether folks in John’s office thought John might be abusive. No, my boss talked to other folks who also cared about me and who also didn’t know what to do to save me from what, had it been true, would have been a huge mistake.
(In fairness, they didn’t know my John at all – it wasn’t a very social office.)
And once I made the connection, I remembered feeling similarly helpless once. I thought about a secretary named Kelly who had worked with us briefly a few years earlier. She and I had become a bit friendly, even though we worked on different floors and in totally different departments. We both loved to play softball. One day I saw Kelly with an enormous black eye.
“I was playing softball with my husband’s team,” she said, shaking her head. “I should have caught the damn ball.”
“I once caught one with my left thigh,” I responded to her, truthfully, but naively. “You could see the stitch marks on the bruise.”
The next day she was gone. Obviously to everyone else her husband had been beating her, and she got help and got away.
The image of her face has haunted me. What would I have done – would I have been able/willing to help her? Would I have ever figured out what was happening to her?
My story ended well. I hadn’t had time to eat properly and subsisted pretty much on a diet of Milky Ways for two months. Woman cannot live on Milky Ways alone. Maybe ducks can. I stopped eating chocolate and looked OK at my wedding. Or at least, I didn’t look like a duck.
I don’t know how Kelly’s story ended. I never will.
* * *
Yesterday, the GOP in the U.S. House of Representatives allowed the Violence Against Women Act, which had been law since 1994, to expire. And they let it happen because it would have expanded coverage of the law to more women including immigrants and Native Americans.
Perhaps you don’t know what the Violence Against Women law does.
My bible, Wikipedia, says that it provide programs and services, including:
Community violence prevention programs
Protections for female victims who are evicted from their homes because of events related to domestic violence or stalking
Funding for female victim assistance services, like rape crisis centers and hotlines
Programs to meet the needs of immigrant women and women of different races or ethnicities
Programs and services for female victims with disabilities
Legal aid for female survivors of violence
But what it really does is help abused women. To let them know that they can get help. That they are not alone. And it can also give their families, friends and co-workers vital, life saving information about how to help. How to act. What to do besides wonder amongst everyone else but the person most impacted. Literally.
Now tell me, what’s not to like about this law? It gives vital assistance to vulnerable women – those who most need it. A place to go where they can take their kids, get help.
It gives folks who don’t know what to do or what to say a clue as to how to help women in need.
Where they don’t have to give up that last little bit of their heart.
I have stated this more often than I can stand, but the men in the GOP are not on the side of women, or on the side of men who respect women.
GET THEM OUT OF OUR LIVES
Then, Damn them to Hell where they belong
***
What you and I can do:
Contact your representatives in Congress and demand they pass the Violence Against Women Act as it stands today with expanded services: http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/
FiftyFourandAHalf 