The BigotBasher

Bronze Age Mutant Ninja Turtle Mitch McConnell just can not put his name to the destruction of the World economy so desired by the drooling Tea-baggers he helped to elect in 2010.

After swimming through their tongue drippings McConnell has come up with a plan that could avoid him getting shot at by lunatics on his side. The Tea Party Terrorists of course want him hung drawn and quartered as a result and if it were a liberal site, “Red State” would be getting a visit from the men in black. They want him burnt in effigy. Of course as they are Rethugs they are more likely to burn themselves and end up as a blue suicide statistic.

Of course as a Rethug articles like this are perfectly acceptable to “leftist” media CNN.

The current Bronze Age Mutant Ninja Turtle proposal is to revert to from. Deficits do not matter. Even if it is a Democratic President. Republicans would agree to make a series of three debt ceiling votes this year, but the default on each of those votes would be that the debt ceiling would get raised unless the House and Senate denied the move by a 2/3rds vote. And that isn’t likely to happen, which means they all go through.

No cuts. No tax rises. No billionaire tax-loopholes closed. No need for Tea-baggers to propose second amendment solutions.

All proposals to increase the deficit would therefore be blamed on the President. The debt limit would be blamed entirely on the President and the Democratic Party. The Bronze Age Mutant Ninja Turtle could live with what he considers a conscience and happily blame the liberals.

This one man has been able to control the agenda of the political parties of the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia. He has been able to create and destroy politicians.

This one man has wiped out the differences between the political parties. His empire has dictated the response of politicians to the created issues of the day for at least the last 30 years.

The closure of the News of the World is not enough.

Now is the time for politicians to say no to this man

Rupert Murdoch is not a fit and proper man to take over BSkyB, not is he a fit and proper man for politicians to fawn over.

The disgrace of his paper hacking the telephone of a murdered child as well as war widows should be enough to end his stranglehold over politicians from both sides of the hemisphere and the pond.

There are elections and a referendum taking place across the UK today, as I type 3/4 of an hour remain before polls shut. The referendum is on whether the UK should switch from first past the post to Alternative vote, voters really do not care and as a result polling has been difficult at best.

I’m not for AV, but want it to win because I believe in electoral reform and proportional representation. I won’t lose sleep if the No campaign wins today.

Elections for the Scottish Parliament, the Welsh Assembly and the Northern Ireland Assembly are being held, as are polls in 279 English councils, there are however no elections in London, so it will be very interesting to see if turnout rises above 30%.

In the constituency of Leicester South, there is a by-election to replace the former MP, Peter Soulsby, who resigned to contest the newly created position of a directly elected Mayor for the City of Leicester. Mayoral contests are also taking place in Mansfield, Middlesbrough, Torbay and Bedford.

Peter Soulsby won the seat from Liberal Democrats. Leicester South and the City election will be worth watching. Soulsby has in the past competed with Lib Dems about who was more anti-Iraq War.

Some lunacy has already gone on.

In Stockport nearly 100 people cast votes now recorded as invalid because wrong ballot papers were delivered to the polling station and in Carmarthenshire (Wales), a polling station was closed for hours after two escaped dogs bit four voters. Stick to the roads, keep clear of the Moors.

Council and Mayoral elections do nothing to change national government, although nearer the end of a Parliament Prime Ministers often used them to judge whether to run a General Election, however a wipeout for the Liberal Democrats may make their “partnership” with Cameron’s Conservatives somewhat more bitter.

My updated predictions – the Conservatives won’t do too badly despite massive cuts to public services because 1) they have their own fall guy, the Liberal Democrats who take the blame and 2) Ed Milliband is not really a shining star. So therefore Milliband and Cameron will have something to crow about and Clegg will be licking some painful sores (especially if the Yes vote loses).

UPDATE Polls have now closed, expect no politician to say how bad it was for democracy as a whole that turnout was abysmal.

Last update before bed: Nick Clegg is going to have a nightmare in his own Constituency, his City, Sheffield, is Lib Dem Controlled with no overall majority, I expect to wake in the morning with at least 12 Lib Dem Councillors defeated. 

President Obama has proposed an Executive Order that will end the ability of Corporations to bribe their way to Government Contracts. The Chamber of Commerce is not happy and are suggesting their own second amendment solution

Lobbyist Fires Warning Shot Over Donation Disclosure Plan

WASHINGTON — So much for détente.After a brief truce of sorts between the White House and business leaders, the top lobbyist at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce took aim at President Obama on Tuesday over an as-yet unannounced plan to force government contractors to disclose their political giving.

The lobbyist, R. Bruce Josten, said in an interview that the powerful business bloc “is not going to tolerate” what it saw as a “backdoor attempt” by the White House to silence private-sector opponents by disclosing their political spending.

“We will fight it through all available means,” Mr. Josten said. In a reference to the White House’s battle to depose Libya’s leader, Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, he said, “To quote what they say every day on Libya, all options are on the table.”

Note, they do not say all legal actions, they make a very clear reference to our current actions in Libya.

Tea Party Terrorists.

I personally think the alternative vote system is as bad as the first past the post system. I also think that the referendum that the UK is having on Proportional Representation is about as interesting as a 5 year old repeat of Countryfile or Songs of Praise.

I have found it impossibly hard to get excited about this referendum.

The debates have not interested me. The advertising has not interested me. The polling has not interested me.

I am not alone. No one knows who is going to win, not because of the Don’t Knows but the Don’t Cares. The only people who will vote on this referendum are the people who bother to vote because they were handed an extra ballot paper when they go and vote for their local Councillor.

If as had been asked for by Labour this referendum been separate from the Local Government elections, the constituency of those voting would have been less than the Orange Bookers of the Lib Dems.

AV is a shitty little compromise. It was an awful proposal when proposed by Gordon Brown and it remains a bad proposal now.

Despite this, I am fully aware that voting no is more than a vote against the Alternative Vote. A no vote will close the door on electoral reform for years.

A no vote will produce headlines that the voters rejected electoral reform and that will become the accepted position. Politicians will for years refer to the referendum on electoral reform. If you do not believe me, look to Scotland, look across the pond to our American cousins.

In 1979, Scottish voters were asked do they want a devolved Parliament. The legislation was on the table and it would have been implemented if Scotland voted yes.

Purists who wanted full independence were against it. Unionists were also against it. Despite this the Yes campaign won the referendum. They did not however win with sufficient number. The Scotland Act 1978 would only be implemented if more than 40% of the population voted for it. Turnout was 63%. Very high for a non General Election vote. The Yes campaign secured 51.6% of the vote. It meant that the total voting yes fell far short of the required 40%.

That failure was reported as a loss for the Yes campaign. For 18 years it was “accepted wisdom” that the No campaign won and that Scotland neither wanted devolution or independence. The Scottish electors had spoken.

In the United States President Obama pushed through a health care plan for poor and middle America that is remarkably similar to the plan being pushed by Paul Ryan for Seniors. Subsidised health care insurance for poor and working Americans. Republicans were deeply opposed to helping poor people and want them to just die quickly.

Getting healthcare reform through Congress was a massive battle. It was nearly lost and it has become known as Obamacare. Bill Clinton lost his fight to get health care reform through in 1993. It was not until 2009/10 that the battle was fought again. Suposedly the American people just did not want health care reform. If “Oamacare” had failed it would have been another rejection of all healthcare reform, from single payer to “Tort Reform”.

It is often said pick your own battles. That is not always possible.

Someone else can involve you in a fight not of your own making and this is what the referendum for AV is. It is a de-facto referendum on PR whether you like it or not.

No AV is not going to get the BNP elected. First Past the Post already does that. If people vote for NAZIs more fool them.

No it is not going to cost billions upon billions. It will not be responsible for a single closed hospital bed or for equipment not being supplied to a soldier in Afghanistan.

No it is not a referendum on Nick Clegg.

No it will not produce a proportional Parliament and indeed the Party in front may get more seat than under first past the post.

It is however far better than voting for the status quo, especially if you are a supporter of PR because if you are a PR purist this will be your first and last opportunity to get voting reform for generations.

Nice eh.

Thank you GOP for being idiotic enough to keep the page up. Yeah, we understand you pretend not to know about computers, after all this teabagger managed to stop the built-in autosave function of MS Access.

Actual link: http://www.waukeshagop.org/rwwcapr.html

The Political wing of the Tea Party Terrorists have found 7,582 votes for their pet Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate.

The Clerk involved took her computer systems off the State network so vote tallies could not be verified. Some history

http://www.jsonline.com/news/waukesha/100595954.html

Nickolaus is a former staffer for the Assembly Republican Caucus who was granted immunity in the investigation into allegations of illegal campaign activities on state time.

The Republican now claims she failed to properly save a spreadsheet after inputting the Brookfield numbers Election Night.

Update: it gets worse.

“There is a history of secrecy and partisanship surrounding the Waukesha County Clerk and there remain unanswered questions,” Scot Ross, director of the liberal group One Wisconsin Now, said in a statement.

An audit of Nickolaus’ handling of the 2010 election found that she needed to take steps to improve security and backup procedures, like stop sharing passwords. The audit was requested after the county’s director of administration said Nickolaus had been uncooperative with attempts to have county experts review her systems and confirm backups were in place.

Nickolaus was given immunity from prosecution in a 2002 criminal investigation into illegal activity by members of the assembly Republican Caucus. She worked for 13 years as a data analyst and computer specialist for the caucus.

She resigned from her state job in 2002 just before launching her county clerk campaign.

• An estimated 250,000 people joined the TUC anti-cuts march through central London
• The police arrested [b]a total of 9 people[/b], the clashes between police and “activists” had nothing to do with the main demonstration.
• More than a dozen stores on Oxford Street were occupied by UKUncut, as part of a separate but linked demonstration against the cuts, they have nothing to do with the TUC. They targeted Fortnum & Mason who have dodged tens of millions in tax.

The Metropolitan Police press office stated that today’s march has been largely peaceful and well ordered, with a small number of violent disruptions and just nine arrests

The Guardian reported

Matthew Taylor says UKuncut feel misrepresented by media coverage, saying that its occupation was not violent.

I have just spoken to Ukuncut protesters inside Fortnum and Mason and contrary to an earlier report [5:06] there has been no violence and the atmosphere remains positive. They also say that reports that it was a “rogue group” that has occupied Fortnum and Mason are untrue – they are all Ukuncut activists.

Nine arrests, when hundreds of thousands marched.

An entirely separate mob targeted banks and even the Police are reporting that they had nothing to do with the hundreds of thousands who turned up to protest.
So why are American news agencies telling lies about London?

Martin Harty - soon to be one of the people he wants shipped off to Russia.

Okay, next time maybe you’ll actually go out and vote. Because this is what happens when Democrats get complacent and stay home for the midterms. “Let’s just cross our fingers and hope for the best. After all, we got Obama into office, now we can take a break for 4 years, right?”
A New Hampshire state house Republican freshman resigned Monday after he suggested to Sharon Omand, a manager of a community mental health program and a constituent, that the mentally disabled be shipped off to Russia.

“It was a girl that (sic)wanted money for the crazy people, the people … a good percentage of the homeless people are mentally disturbed.” ~ Republican Martin Harty

He claimed, afterward, that he was “joking”. And maybe he was, but in light of fact that the state’s GOP is proposing huge budget cuts that greatly defund programs for the disabled, one has to wonder.

Harty told Omand, that “the world is too populated” and that there are “too many defective people.” When asked what he meant, she said Harty clarified, “You know the mentally ill, the retarded, people with physical disabilities and drug addictions –the defective people society would be better off without.”

There’s a pattern here folks; pay attention. It is always the people with the smallest voice, who are most in need of our community support, that Republicans attack. And why? Because someone has to pay for the loss of revenue caused by the loss of tax cuts for those with strongest voice in government – corporations and the wealthy. And because they are not as smart as they think they are -are, in fact, unable to see a day passed their own self-interest – they don’t even realize that their policies, in the long run, slit their own economic wrists along with the rest of ours’. Taking spending power away from the consuming class topples their cherished free market system from within.