Perry touts Texas jobs record, promises to make government “inconsequential”

Today, three-term Texas governor Rick Perry announced his bid for the Republican presidential nomination, promising to foster innovation and enterprise. The speech offered no specifics, but Perry called for simplifying the tax code and promoting private business interests. In what may be the most striking and unusual phrasing of the speech, Perry promised, with passion: “I’ll work every day to make Washington, DC, as inconsequential in your lives as I can.”

Perry offered no plan for balancing the widening federal budget deficits, calling instead for what appeared to be a new round of tax cuts for business and decrying the American government as an institution that “takes too much” from its people. While short on specifics, Perry’s speech was a startling departure from what many believe to be the economic reality of the times: taxes are at historically low rates, revenues are so low, economists fear budget shortfalls are stunting economic growth, and Perry, who has left Texas with a $27 billion budget deficit is calling for cuts and for a radical rolling back of government.

The speech was in many ways like the speeches given by George W. Bush during the 2000 campaign, referring wistfully to the ideology of Margaret Thatcher, decrying the American government as intrusive and corrosive of free enterprise, and promising tax cuts that could lead to serious long-term stagnation for average household wages and the wider consumer economy. Perry attacked Pres. Obama, suggesting that his economic agenda—which has favored entrepreneurship, small business and innovation—is somehow the opposite of what it has been.

And in what appears to be a foreshadowing of Perry’s coming campaign of free-market rhetoric, Perry vowed to repeal Pres. Obama’s “one-size-fits-all government healthcare plan”—which, incidentally, does not exist and was never part of the Affordable Care Act. Perry’s rhetoric is tough, aggressive and ideologically deep-seated, but he will have to be far more disciplined about facts and solutions. Beyond that, he will have to grapple with the realities of both the healthcare law—already paying dividends in lower cost growth and popular among many who have benefited—and the budget—where he will not have the liberty to run up massive deficit spending to pay for new tax cuts.

Perry’s record in Texas is decidedly mixed: while he and his supporters have talked up the so-called “Texas miracle”, the miracle is in many ways an illusion. While there have been more new jobs created in Texas than in other states, unemployment remains high, wages have declined, most of the new jobs are very low paying, and immigration, including illegal immigration, which Perry has opposed, is considered to be the main source of growth in the Texas economy.

On energy, Perry’s record also must be of interest to voters: while Texas has more developed energy infrastructure than any other state, it is presently in its fifth “energy emergency” of 2011, and has had to resort to importing electricity from Mexico. This is in part because, while talking up his interest in renewables, and benefitting from a ground-up boom in wind energy production in his state, Perry has helped to impede the building of new clean energy infrastructure, favoring huge subsidies for fossil fuels production, making his state more vulnerable to foreign oil powers, price fluctuations, cartels and high fuel costs.

According to TIME Magazine’s Swampland blog:

In a report written for Perry last spring, Porter found that Texas’ overall prosperity growth, as measured by the rate of change in per capita GDP, was the eighth slowest in the country from 1998 to 2008. Texas has the highest proportion of minimum-wage jobs and the lowest median wage in the country. Porter found that Texas’ labor-force productivity was growing more slowly than 37 other states, further suggesting that the job-creation machine may not be keeping pace with productivity improvements in the rest of the country.

Perry offered no plan for taxes, war, healthcare, education, debt and deficit reduction, or economic recovery. In fact, his speech sounded much like it was intended to convey the message that he would call for aggressive austerity measures of the type that pushed the UK into a recession, after the were pushed through by David Cameron’s government.

In Texas, Perry has developed a reputation for being tough politically, but never truly popular with the legislature or with the people. He has won three consecutive terms, which many attribute to a kind of aggressive and hyperbolic rhetoric that is designed to obscure the realities of the public policy landscape, where his performance has not been as winning as he would like voters to believe.

His chief political adviser says Perry’s jobs record will make him the strongest possible Republican candidate to take on Obama, especially in a slow recovery with sparse job creation. But there are concerns about whether Perry’s record really stands up to scrutiny and whether once some of his more extreme positions become known, he might not appeal to moderates and to swing-state independent voters needed to win the presidency.

According to Politico:

One veteran GOP strategist said that multiple members of Congress had “expressed concerns about Perry’s ability to compete in not only the traditional 10 to 12 swing states, but also some of the lean-Republican states.”

The same state party chair, who spoke on condition of anonymity, voiced a worry that Perry hasn’t been “thoroughly vetted” and predicted: “If he’s the nominee, the first thing the White House is going to do is make an issue of secession.”

Perry’s 2009 comment — he said he didn’t want to “dissolve” the Union, “but if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that?” — is already the most famous black mark on his political resume.

Republican operatives have reportedly expressed worry that he is a “bombastic regional politician” who is not equipped to appeal to the governing priorities the majority of the country want to see. They worry that his extremist rhetoric, threatening secession if he were to disagree with Washington policy, calling for war against Mexico, will persuade most voters that Perry might be dangerous distracted by ideology and by personal obsessions, and not focused on serving all of the people.

Perry’s campaign announcement speech did little to calm those worries, and in fact may have exacerbated them. There is analysis that suggests Perry’s early moves will determine primarily whether the “smart money” starts to flow in decisive amounts to frontrunner and reputed moderate Mitt Romney, or whether a competitive Perry will dilute funding and support among a wider number of candidates, undermining the party’s chances to defeat Obama—the most prolific fundraiser in US history.

Perry’s “rogue” status may also work against him. While some believe a tough, “truth-talking” cowboy image will appeal to voters who are tired of the nuance and maneuvering of so many Congressional factions, others say Sarah Palin’s struggle to draw interest for her film or for a potential candidacy is a general fatigue with the very idea of a “rogue” candidate.

After a great deal of media hype, during several weeks, Gov. Perry announced his candidacy from South Carolina, on the day of the Republican Straw Poll, in Ames, Iowa, and Perry supporters can write in his name in Ames, if they support him. If he fails to show in the top half of the list of candidates, at the very least, there will be questions about his appeal to voters outside of Texas and the south.

Unlike Huntsman and Romney, who have set themselves up as problem-solvers, Perry seems to be betting his campaign on Bush-era Republican ideology and his record in Texas. The Obama campaign is almost certain to set itself up not as the “big government” campaign, but as the “good government” campaign. Perry’s attacks on the very idea of government playing a constructive role in the economic landscape may unnerve voters in the vital center of the ideological spectrum.

Most of the Republican candidates for their party’s presidential nomination debated last night in Iowa, two days ahead of the crucial Ames Straw Poll, thought to be a leading indicator of which candidates are credible and which are less likely to win in January. Rick Perry, who has not yet announced his candidacy, was not in attendance, and Fred Karger—who met all the criteria for attendance—was not allowed to participate, some say because he is openly gay.

The questions were direct, tough and probing. Challenged on her claim that she could turn the US economy around in just three months, Michelle Bachmann fielded the first of many tough questions. She backtracked somewhat, claiming that she could not fix the economy in three months, but that she could enact policies that could eventually have a positive impact. She then trailed off into a “one term president” rant against Obama, which opened her to the critique that her policy plans lack substance.

Mitt Romney attempted to deliver an economic-policy stump speech. He launched into a Republican talking point, calling for a steep reduction in “corporate tax rates”, which are either the lowest in the industrialized world or the highest, depending how they are defined. He called for energy independence, suggesting new drilling, but not openly saying so, and vaguely said we need “the rule of law” to shore up our economy.

Romney’s reference to “rule of law” struck many as odd and off-topic, in part because the Obama record has been one of trying to force major corporate interests to follow existing law and end the regulatory non-action of the Bush years. But Romney’s meaning was far more likely to be about taxes: he has been facing criticism for having “raised taxes” while governor of Massachusetts, but has said he was able to bring in “new revenues” by “closing loopholes”, i.e. enforcing the law.

Former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty got off to a very rocky start, showing either plain ignorance of active government policy and recent political history or a willingness to tell very big fibs in order to make difficult rhetorical points—alleging that Barack Obama has never presented a plan to reform Medicare. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act—which Pawlenty likes to call “Obamneycare”—included Medicare reform specifically designed to cut $500 billion of “waste, fraud and abuse” from Medicare, without reducing benefits or access to care.

In fact, while it achieves those cost savings, it also establishes that no insurance managers, public or private sector, can interfere with doctor-patient decisions on appropriate course of treatment. So Pawlenty missed the mark dramatically, while saying little about his own plan, getting the facts wrong and leading research-minded voters to look up Obama’s already in place and very specific Medicare reform plan. The president has called for an expansion of that reform plan, again without cutting benefits.

Rick Santorum announced his plan to “cut the corporate tax rate to zero, for manufacturers”, and he did so with a smile, as if anticipating major new corporate financing for his campaign. Santorum seemed eager, throughout the night, to glisten with new ideas of this kind which he hoped would capture new support and new momentum, going into Saturday’s straw poll.

Chris Wallace—who consistently asked aggressive, difficult questions—asked Pawlenty if Bachmann was really unqualified, as he had claimed, and had no achievements, but he added the quip that Pawlenty might be attacking her simply because “she’s beating you in the polls”. Pawlenty repeated that her record is simply lacking, that she has no accomplishments at all as a legislator.

Referring to the Bachmann’s catch-line that she has a “titanium spine” and will never relent on her ideological demands, Pawlenty said “It’s not her spine we’re interested in; it’s her record of achievement.” He then addressed her directly, saying “If that’s your view of leadership with effective results, please stop, because you’re killing us,” implying that by sabotaging deals that get much of what Republicans seek, she is losing the wider policy war for the party.

Romney faced his toughest question when he was challenged on his record at Bain Capital, which acquired American Paper, closed two plants, and imposed 2,000 layoffs. Romney says not all of the companies Bain invested in while he was there worked, and so some had to fail. He sought to paint this record of experience as an education in what works to allow businesses to grow and create jobs, but he offered no specifics on how that education would play out in presidential policy.

Wallace asked Gingrich if his record on the campaign trail—top advisers resigning en masse—shows he is not fit for the presidency. Gingrich bristled and decried what he called “gotcha questions”. He criticized the press corps generally, for focusing on “campaign minutia” and ignoring the basic ideas that distinguish Republicans from Pres. Obama.

He made the most specific policy suggestion of the evening, saying the government should make “Lean Six Sigma”—a combination of Toyota’s Lean manufacturing model and Motorola’s Six Sigma production process—the national manufacturing standard.

He asked Huntsman if his record of service as Barack Obama’s representative to China means he is not a true Republican. He said he is proud to serve and that when your country calls, you step up and serve. Huntsman repeated throughout the night that he is proud of his record of public service and that he believes that experience is the best sign that he is prepared to be president.

Herman Cain was asked if his extreme statements—like calling on communities to ban mosques—and saying he knew little about the war in Afghanistan made him too ignorant to be president. Cain seemed to agree with Gingrich’s critique of unfair questions, and said he has learned, that as a businessman he knows the ability to learn and to develop more complex understanding of such complex issues makes a good leader.

On immigration, Cain said legal immigration is the already existing and appropriate “path to citizenship”. In what might be his most memorable remark of the campaign, he artfully threaded the needle of ethnic and ideological tensions relating to immigration, saying “America can be a nation with high fences and wide open doors.”

Gingrich took an extreme tack to the hard right, calling for moving millions of people to the southern states to police the borders, the establishment of English as “the official language of government”—a radical position that ignores the First Amendment and holds that we will not inform anyone who does not understand English of their rights, or what they may need to do in an emergency.

Gingrich also added that he would “distinguish between people who have been here a very long time and people who have come more recently”. This last comment seemed to some to mean he would allow for something like amnesty for those who have been here longer, while others were chilled by what seemed to be a nativist rejection of immigrants’ rights.

Romney was asked about how he used new revenues to fix the Massachusetts state budget, and whether he would raise taxes to balance the budget. By simple arithmetic, it looks nearly impossible to balance the federal budget any time soon without raising taxes, but Romney defended his record in Massachusetts, explaining that he balanced the budget every year, and that he only needed to close loopholes, not to raise taxes, while imposing sharp cuts.

Pawlenty was asked about his having increased the cigarette tax in his state, in order to balance the budget. He made reference to whether it was a “fee” or a “tax” and to court rulings on the subject, and said he would later regret having done it, but it seemed clear that this was instrumental to his budget policy and a sticking point that could be to his favor or to his disadvantage, depending on whether GOP primary voters include the majority of Republicans who favor raising revenues to balance the budget.

Bachmann said she had opposed the cigarette tax hike, when she was in the state legislature, and that she was determined not to support it. But she did in fact vote to increase the cigarette tax. She claimed Pawlenty forced her to do so, by attaching a rider that would “protect the rights of the unborn”, so that she was forced to choose between voting against rights for the unborn and voting to raise taxes.

Bachmann said her view was that you can get things wrong when it comes to money but not when it comes to life. The exchange, however, seemed to play into Pawlenty’s argument, that he is better at getting results than Bachmann, who is a hapless prisoner to her own ideological priorities, and who—despite this, and contrary to what she says—will vote against her principles.

Rick Santorum, former senator from Pennsylvania, appeared to agree with Pawlenty’s critique of Bachmann, saying that a leader needs to know how to get a good deal and get results. Santorum sought to tout his record of “leadership” at the state and federal level, and argued that he was better able to serve the conservative ideals than Bachmann, because he knows how to negotiate.

When the question was posed if the candidates felt so strongly about opposing any increase of any kind in tax rates, would they oppose even a deficit reduction deal that made $10 in cuts for every $1 in new revenues, every member of the debate panel raised their hands. After-debate analysis suggested this moment may become “iconic”, indicating that the Republican party is only interested in tax cuts, not in deficit reduction, fiscal responsibility or protecting Medicare and Social Security.

The image of the Republican candidates dutifully—some with reluctance—raising their hands to support Grover Norquist’s radical anti-tax pledge could become the signal moment of the primary campaign, when Republican candidates announced their intention to enforce the tea party radical position of obstructing deficit reduction in order to prioritize tax breaks, at a time of historically low tax rates, perilously low revenues and escalating debt.

Santorum took issue with Ron Paul and Michelle Bachmann’s reference to the 10th Amendment, and the question of states’ rights, saying their theories were “the 10th Amendment run amok”, and that “Our country is based on moral laws, ladies and gentlemen. Abraham Lincoln said the states don’t have the right to do wrong.” It was a moment of passion and principle that stood out, but which will require Santorum to make clear how he would deal with issues like same-sex marriage or abortion, where prevailing law conflicts with his views.

Asked about the entrance of Rick Perry into the race, Ron Paul said Perry “represents the status quo” and that he will make Paul’s own unique views stand out more. Herman Cain agreed, saying Perry would dilute the vote for “politicians” and make his business record stand out. Bachmann said there is room for another conservative in the race, though many strategists believe Perry will cut into her vote-getting ability.

Newt Gingrich was asked if he has a clear vision of what should be done in Libya, after taking two diametrically opposing views within a few days, at the start of the conflict. He said he recently spoke to Gen. Abizaid, who speaks Arabic, is one of the foremost security policy experts on the region, and who said we have a “strategic deficit” that needs to be closed through intelligent, persistent diplomatic engagement.

In what is perhaps an interesting angle, politically, Abizaid has been a supporter of the Obama administration’s diplomatic efforts in the region, which taken with Gingrich’s characterization of the state of affairs, suggests the Obama administration’s policies are potentially closing that deficit.

Gingrich did not offer a clear policy position on the current situation in Libya, but complained that the press were criticizing him for Pres. Obama’s having coordinated a humanitarian crisis response in Libya.

Huntsman was asked what it meant that China has been hacking into US corporations and US government servers. He said he has long experience with China, and believes the United States needs to have a robust, informed, collaborative and secure relationship with the rising world power. He also said it would be naïve to expect China not to behave like a rival, and that we nee a president who understands the relationship.

Ron Paul decried sanctions against Iran, saying that military threats and sanctions are precursors to real military conflict, costly policy mistakes and would only worsen the security situation worldwide. Paul believes that foreign wars that are not of absolute defensive necessity are contrary to democratic values, undermine the principles of liberty and create enmities that would continue to threaten US interests far into the future.

Cain was asked by Wallace about his comment that US energy independence would be the best way to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. The suggestion was that it might be irrational to claim that drilling for oil in North America would persuade Iran’s hardline regime not to develop nuclear weapons. Cain explained that he views economic policy as one element of a complex foreign policy, where economic pressures can be brought to bear to incentivize the behavior of even extreme governments.

When Ron Paul was asked why he disagreed with Michelle Bachmann’s view that accused terrorists should not have due process rights, he said “she turns our rule of law on its head.” Paul explained that for individuals accused of terrorist activity to be treated as terrorists, “They have to be ruled a terrorist. Who rules them a terrorist?” He said the Constitution requires due process and a court ruling based on evidence. Bachmann, he said, is rejecting the rule of law and the traditions of American democracy, instead proposing “mob rule”.

Santorum said that under the regime of the Shah, the Iranian people were “free”—disregarding the police state, disappearances and torture used by that regime. He then complained that the “mullocracy” in Tehran “tramples the rights of gays”—a remark that surprised many, given his relentless pursuit of a national ban on same-sex marriage.

Gingrich was asked why he proposed a “loyalty test” for any Muslim that might serve in his administration. He said he would impose a loyalty test on every person who would serve in government, but gave no specifics as to how that test would be carried out. He cited incidents of Cold War espionage, where people that seemed above suspicion turned out to be foreign spies, and one case where an alleged terrorist conspirator said he “lied” when asked how he could take an oath of loyalty and then behave as America’s enemy.

Herman Cain was asked what it was he believes southerners “find objectionable about Mormonism”? He said that he, personally, has no problem with it, but that he believes many southerners simply don’t understand how Mormonism fits into the culture of protestant Christianity that they are familiar with.

Asked about her having said she hated her husband’s idea that she should study tax law, “But the Lord said, be submissive. Wives, you are to be submissive to your husbands,” Rep. Bachmann seemed genuinely embarrassed and stunned. She paused for an uncomfortable length of time, then offered the explanation that she meant by this term “respect” and that her husband respects her as well.

Romney may have waded into waters that will hurt him in the general election, when he shed the moderate tone of his campaign, saying “our marriage status relationship should be consistent at the national level” and he supported a national law to define marriage as between a man and a woman. He justified this by expressing concern that some same sex couples might have a hard time divorcing if they are in states that have different marriage laws from those where they married.

Huntsman supports civil unions, and spoke of “reciprocal beneficiary rights”. He said “I believe in traditional marriage, but subordinate to that, I believe that we haven’t done a good enough job at equality.” This helped to define Huntsman’s position as the true moderate conservative in the field, and a pragmatist. Many critics have been wary of the conservative candidates’ unwillingness to admit that any injustice could be in need of correction that does not need conservative ideological solutions.

Paul took a position that many find hard to grasp, given his arch-libertarian tendencies. He said “just so long as they don’t impose their vision of marriage on you”, that his priority was to ensure that no one had their private life defined by the government. This was in line with his libertarian principles, but he also specified that he believes marriage should be between one man and one woman, a concession to the conservative ideology he is known for criticizing.

Bachmann offered the awkward statement that “I have an absolutely unblemished record when it comes to this issue of man-woman marriage”. She has not supported same-sex marriage, certainly, but there have been questions about “blemishes” to her record, including alleged support for the extreme and discredited “treatment” option of prayer to cure homosexuality. Questions have also been raised about whether she and her husband have been spokespeople for this policy.

Romney may have made his most significant slip-up of the night—in line with his statement the previous day that “corporations are people”—when he said that “We’ve got to find a way to reduce our spending on a lot of anti-poverty programs”. He said this in responding to a question about whether he would extend unemployment benefits.

Romney has sought to blame both general economic pathologies and the president’s policy response for prolonged unemployment, which would suggest those who are suffering the impact are not in any way responsible for their predicament, so his admonition that in times of economic hardship the government should roll back its anti-poverty efforts seemed more than a bit awkward.

He said he would “go to Congress with a new plan for unemployment benefits”, but that he would not extend the current program of unemployment benefits. He was not pressed on what he would do should Congress fail to give him the option he prefers.

Huntsman took issue with the regulatory system and made what might be his most immoderate policy assertion of the night, saying that “If you want to build a facility in this country, you can’t, because of the EPA’s regulatory reign of terror“. He was defending the Huntsman company’s chemical operations, and by implication was suggesting chemical plants need more leeway to release dangerous toxins into the environment.

The use of the phrase “reign of terror”—a reference to the French revolutionary period and a campaign of torture and mass execution of “enemies of the revolution”—echoed the much maligned rhetoric of bloodshed and exaggeration increasingly used by Republicans since the summer of 2008, and through the 2010 elections. Huntsman did not backtrack, but repeated his allegation of a “reign of terror”, without giving any specifics about how that “terror” was imposed.

Newt Gingrich was asked to explain why he does not favor Ron Paul’s demand that the Federal Reserve Bank be “abolished”. “Having some sort of central bank”, he said, is necessary for dealing with the money supply “in the modern world”. He added, “I think the fact that the Fed is secret is a scandal” and repeated his demand that the Federal Reserve Bank be audited, that its books be open to public scrutiny.

Ron Paul celebrated what he called an awakening of the mainstream to the need to audit the Fed, but said we need to phase out the Fed, and that it is important to “understand the business cycle” in order to prevent recessions.

On education, Huntsman was firm, saying “No Child Left Behind hasn’t worked for this country; it ought to be done away with.” He called for a greater emphasis on governance at the local level, and said there is no one so interested in schools succeeding as the communities they serve. Herman Cain seconded this response, saying he would abandon NCLB and focus on local control of schools.

Huntsman added that he stood against letting the nation default, because the United States is 25% of the world’s GDP and by far the largest financial services industry in the world. This was a critique of the radical factions in his party, including Bachmann, who have said that they believe default could be beneficial for long-term fiscal solvency, acting as a kind of spur to activate serious budget reform.

The debate showed new rifts between and among the candidates and allowed them to stake out certain clear positions: Gingrich emerged as the “ideas” candidate, demanding that everyone focus more on ideas and less on rhetoric, style and the “minutia” of what goes on along the campaign trail. Romney sought to remain largely above the fray, and managed to do so, but gave few specifics. Ron Paul staked out a position of radical reform, in language many voters support.

Herman Cain talked up his business record, but mostly offered what he considered common-sense ideas. Rick Santorum promised bold leadership, offered some radical positions on taxation, and confounded some of the most problematic critiques of his ideas. Huntsman stood as the principled moderate, and a conservative problem solver.

Bachmann was on the defensive, but was poised; she moderated some of her most hardline views, but gave few specifics. Pawlenty became something of an attacker, and began what could be the most effective argument for his campaign: getting things done. It was not clear if anyone “won” the debate, though Romney, Bachmann and Gingrich were all given praise for their demeanor, for different reasons. Pawlenty may have made a dent in Bachmann’s armor, however, and some now expect him to be a tougher campaigner.

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Report and analysis from Independents of Principle

Wisconsin is holding six recall elections tonight in response to popular petition to unseat Republican state senators who supported Gov. Walker’s plan to strip public servants of their collective bargaining rights. Each of the six Republican incumbents occupy senate seats representing districts drawn by Republicans to ensure Republican victories, so any victory represents a significant shift in party preference.

The Democrats need to win three seats in order to take control of the state Senate, and deal a serious blow to Gov. Walker and his allies in the state legislature.

As of 10:02 local time, the Republicans had saved three seats:

• In District 2, Sen. Robert Cowles defeated Nancy Nusbaum—59%-41% (94% reporting).
• In District 10, Sen. Sheila Harsdorf fought off the challenger Shelly Moore—58%-42%.
• In District 14, Sen. Luther Olson defeated Fred Clark—52%-48%.

In the other three races, the story was more favorable to the Democratic challengers:

• In the 32nd district, challenger Jennifer Shilling was leading incumbent Dan Kapanke by 8 percentage points.
• Incumbent Randy Hopper was leading Jessica King by 2, separated by just 500 votes, with King’s base of support in Osh Kosh yet to report.
• But most significantly, Walker ally Alberta Darling—for whom Republican supporters and outside groups spent at least $8 million—was trailing Sandy Pasch by 8%, though there were still some very favorable areas for Darling yet to report.

Just a few minutes later, with 87% reporting, Jessica King had pulled ahead of Randy Hopper by 137 votes.

At 10:08 pm, Democrat Jennifer Shilling became the first challenger to unseat one of the recalled Republicans. John Nichols noted that Dan Kapanke was elected during the Obama landslide election year, and has been removed for office after voting to strip public servants of their organizing rights.

The race between Pasch and Darling shifted quickly, as Pasch first widened her lead, then ceded ground, leaving the race too close to call:

• By 10:11 pm, Sandy Pasch was holding her lead over Alberta Darling by a margin of 55% to 45%, and King and Hopper remained too close to call.
• By 10:18 pm local time, with 57% of the votes counted, Pasch was leading Darling by a margin of 58% to 42%.
• But just two minutes later, with the latest reports showing 63% reporting, Darling had closed the gap to 51% to 49%.

At 10:20 pm, Jessica King was leading incumbent Randy Hopper by less than 200 votes, with 87% of the votes counted. There are concerns that irregularities that occurred during state Supreme Court elections earlier this year might be repeated in some pro-Republican areas. Observers have suggested a Pasch win would be a major defeat for the Republicans, while local Democratic organizers remained confident King would pull ahead of Hopper when the number from Osh Kosh came in.

At 10:30 pm local time, Pasch was holding her lead over Darling, 51% to 49%, leading by a margin of fewer than 1,000 votes.

At 10:38 pm, with 97% of precincts reporting, Jessica King was leading Randy Hopper by 27,123 votes to 25,951—51% to 49%. In District 8, with 67% of precincts reporting, Pasch was leading Darling 52% to 48%, by a reported margin of roughly 1,200 votes.

At 10:39 pm Wisconsin time, in District 18, Jessica King was named the projected winner, becoming the second Democrat to unseat a Republican state senator for supporting Gov. Walker’s anti-union agenda.

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Suspicion of irregularities: Shortly before 11:00 pm local time, with 68% reporting from District 8, Sandy Pasch was still leading Alberta Darling by a margin of 51% to 49%, but the vote counting reportedly stopped.

Think Progress is reporting that Waukesha County would be providing no further results for at least an hour. The announcement is reminiscent of what has occurred in multiple past elections, where similar stalls in the release of vote counts immediately preceded the “discovery” of new votes that swung a tight election toward the Republican candidate.

The county clerk, Kathy Nickolaus has become known for her involvement in these alleged irregularities, and tonight there has been fast and furious criticism of her handling of elections, her party’s tolerance of what is seen as a deeply flawed track record, and of what appear to be new irregularities.

At this hour, there are mounting concerns that a county official with a history of being involved in irregularities that shift the vote toward the Republican party might interfere with the integrity of the election. One Wisconsin member of the House of Representatives called on the United States Dept. of Justice to investigate the irregularities that took place earlier this year.

With the history of manipulations, allegations of criminal election fraud, and the balance of power in the Wisconsin state Senate at risk, it is suspected that irregularities may be in the works. Democratic State Sen. Jon Erpenbach said it was “ridiculous” that the local county officials stalled the count, because they are using the exact same machines used throughout the state.

At 11:12 pm local time, the news broke that with 79% of local precincts reporting, the incumbent Alberta Darling had taken the lead, by a margin of 52% to 48% over challenger Sandy Pasch. At 11:19, with 80% reporting, Darling widened her lead to 53% to 47%.

Sen. Erpenbach expressed concern about the integrity of the election process in Waukesha County. Mike Tate, chairman of the Wisconsin Democratic party, issued a statement shortly after the sudden swing to Darling, suggesting there is now evidence of election tampering and a serious need for a closer look at what has taken place at the county clerk’s office in Waukesha County.

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At 11:31 pm local time, with 82% of precincts reporting, Darling was leading 53% to 47%. After the back and forth swings throughout the evening, the consistent 53% to 47% reporting sparked still more suspicion of irregularities.

— Wednesday, August 10, 2011 —

At 12:36 am, local time, the AP called the election for Alberta Darling, with observers split over whether the recall election had been conducted legally. In Waukesha County, the county clerk has been accused of manipulating the release of ballots, and there are mounting calls for a federal criminal probe.

At 7:41 am, local time, with 100% of all precincts reporting in District 10, the vote count was 39,471 to 34,096, giving Darling a 54% to 46% victory over Pasch. Some Democratic party members have softened their criticism of Waukesha County clerk Kathy Nickolaus, while others are alleging election fraud.

Critics express concern Perry is supporting groups that promote hate, seek a totalitarian theocracy to replace Constitutional system

There is dispute as to whether attendance at Gov. Perry’s prayer rally was 30,000, as organizers claim, or 15,000, as other news sources have estimated. Observers have expressed concern that the event featured radicals whose views oppose the constitutional order of the American political system, and who have called for the establishment of an absolutist theocratic regime.

The following report from Suite101 is indicative of the concerns being expressed by people across the political spectrum:

Possible 2012 GOP candidate Rick Perry was a hit with the 15,000 gathered for August 6, 2011 prayer meeting held in Houston.
Rick Perry, who is eyeing a run for the Presidency in 2012, may eventually have to distance himself from his more extremist Christian supporters. The trouble is that Perry needs the support of the American Family Association, which sponsored Perry’s allegedly non-political prayer meeting called The Response. An even more troubling possibility is that Perry may be in full agreement with their Reconstructionist plan to take down the Federal government and create a U.S. theocracy, under Biblical law.

Christian Extremists

The idea that Christians should physically overcome their enemies and rule in righteousness is not new in the United States, and the current thread of theocratic Christian Reconstructionists goes back at least to 1948. The movement has operated under various names such as the Latter Rain movement, Joel’s Army, the Manifest Sons of God, and now the Seven Mountain Mandate.

Conquer and Occupy Public Institutions

According to Chip Berlet, writing in the Huffington Post, “Christian Reconstructionism is a form of theocratic dominion theology…The core theme of dominion theology is that the Bible mandates Christians to take over and “occupy” secular institutions.” Dominionists and followers of the Seven Mountain Mandate came to public attention in 2005 when a video of Kenyan Pastor, Thomas Muthee anointing Sara Palin for leadership, was uploaded on Youtube.

One group participating, in particular, has been cited as an extremist organization, founded on the missionary promotion of intolerance and prejudice. According to People for the American Way, the so-called American Family Association has:

• held gays responsible for the Holocaust and likened them to domestic terrorists and Nazis who are intent on committing “virtual genocide” against the military, and asserts that “homosexuals should be disqualified from public office”;
• said “we have feminized the Medal of Honor” by awarding it to a soldier who saved his fellow combatants rather than killing enemies;
• demanded all immigrants “convert to Christianity” and renounce their religions;
• asserted that Muslims have “no fundamental First Amendment claims” and should be banned from building mosques and deported from the US, adding that Muslims are inherently stupid as a result of inbreeding;
• claimed African American women “rut like rabbits” due to welfare and that Native Americans are “morally disqualified” from living in America because they didn’t convert to Christianity and were consequently cursed by God with alcoholism and poverty;
• said that the anti-Muslim manifesto of the right-wing Christian terrorist who killed dozens in Norway was “accurate.”

The Dallas Morning News has reported that Perry’s affiliation with extremist organizations, and his radical policies, which have undermined overall economic progress for the population of his state, are driving Democratic party views that he is a deeply flawed candidate, too far out of the mainstream to be electable nationally. From today’s DMN:

As Rick Perry gears up for a presidential bid, Democrats also are making preparations — dusting off years of opposition research, sharpening attack points, designing anti-Perry websites and, for the most part, awaiting his entry with more eagerness than anxiety.

They’re not trying to tip the GOP primary. But in seeking to tar Perry as a flawed extremist, they want to ensure that as voters beyond Texas get to know him, he won’t be able to shake that image later.

“He has a pretty poor record as governor of Texas on a lot of measures — on wage growth, on job growth, on health care,” said Bill Burton, head of a new pro-Obama political action committee, Priorities USA, and until recently the deputy White House press secretary.

He called it “fairly amazing” that a quarter of Texas are uninsured, and that Perry wanted to opt out of Medicaid and “suggested secession as a remedy to the health care bill.”

The secessionist narrative is particularly disturbing to many in both the Republican and Democratic parties. Perry is seen as a wild-card that would not be likely to take responsible positions on the direction of national policy, and who might bring fringe ideas into the heart of the American government.

At a time of severe economic difficulty, there is concern Perry’s often rosy-eyed commitment to market-distorting deregulatory policies could deepen and prolong the years-long economic slowdown. His state has one of the nation’s most massive budget deficits, and no substantive plan to address it, other than cutting back on needed public services, and economists are now starting to look at whether the extreme positions and under-thought policy approaches might pervade his economic policy strategy.

The news today seems to indicate that while Rick Perry may have shored up a radical segment of the evangelical vote, he has succeeded in casting himself as an ally to extremists with little regard to the perils of programmatic intolerance and discrimination.

Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX), who is reportedly contemplating a run for the presidency, will be attending an evangelical prayer service on Saturday, labeled “The Response”. Perry has been heavily criticized for his participation, both by critics who say the event violates his constitutional oath to treat all Texans equally and by groups like the Anti-Defamation League, which is concerned about the hate-based policies of some of the event’s backers.

According to CBS News:

A number of controversial groups and individuals are linked to the event, including the American Family Association, which is providing financial backing; AFA representatives have called for a ban on Muslim immigrants and for gay men and women to “be disqualified from public office.” Others tied to the event have called for the government to be placed under Christian control and suggested Oprah Winfrey is setting the stage for the antichrist.

Some have suggested the event could link Perry to the religious fringes in a way that could hurt him both in states like New Hampshire and with the full electorate if he wins the GOP nomination, and have speculated that Perry may thus play down his involvement in the event he initiated. But Bearse, the spokesman for The Response, said that is not the case.

One preacher expected to participate has said Hitler was “God’s hunter” and another has allegedly called for armed defense of the white race. Perry himself was the event’s originator, but during the past week, he and his spokespeople have been attempting to suggest he is not the lead supporter and may not even speak at the event.

There has been widespread criticism of Mr. Perry, suggesting he is both out of touch and perilously aligned with extremist organizations. There has been criticism that Perry, now seen as a viable Republican presidential primary candidate could stain the party with the taint of racial hate, ideological extremism, and fundamentalist zealotry.

UPDATE, Sun., August 7, 2011: There is dispute as to whether attendance at Gov. Perry’s prayer rally was 30,000, as organizers claim, or 15,000, as other news sources have estimated. Observers have expressed concern that the event featured radicals whose views oppose the constitutional order of the American political system, and who have called for the establishment of an absolutist theocratic regime.

The following report from Suite101 is particularly telling:

Possible 2012 GOP candidate Rick Perry was a hit with the 15,000 gathered for August 6, 2011 prayer meeting held in Houston.

Rick Perry, who is eyeing a run for the Presidency in 2012, may eventually have to distance himself from his more extremist Christian supporters. The trouble is that Perry needs the support of the American Family Association, which sponsored Perry’s allegedly non-political prayer meeting called The Response. An even more troubling possibility is that Perry may be in full agreement with their Reconstructionist plan to take down the Federal government and create a U.S. theocracy, under Biblical law.

Christian Extremists

The idea that Christians should physically overcome their enemies and rule in righteousness is not new in the United States, and the current thread of theocratic Christian Reconstructionists goes back at least to 1948. The movement has operated under various names such as the Latter Rain movement, Joel’s Army, the Manifest Sons of God, and now the Seven Mountain Mandate.

Conquer and Occupy Public Institutions

According to Chip Berlet, writing in the Huffington Post, “Christian Reconstructionism is a form of theocratic dominion theology…The core theme of dominion theology is that the Bible mandates Christians to take over and “occupy” secular institutions.” Dominionists and followers of the Seven Mountain Mandate came to public attention in 2005 when a video of Kenyan Pastor, Thomas Muthee anointing Sara Palin for leadership, was uploaded on Youtube.

One group participating, in particular, has been cited as an extremist organization, founded on the missionary promotion of intolerance and prejudice. According to People for the American Way, the so-called American Family Association has:

• held gays responsible for the Holocaust and likened them to domestic terrorists and Nazis who are intent on committing “virtual genocide” against the military, and asserts that “homosexuals should be disqualified from public office”;
• said “we have feminized the Medal of Honor” by awarding it to a soldier who saved his fellow combatants rather than killing enemies;
• demanded all immigrants “convert to Christianity” and renounce their religions;
• asserted that Muslims have “no fundamental First Amendment claims” and should be banned from building mosques and deported from the US, adding that Muslims are inherently stupid as a result of inbreeding;
• claimed African American women “rut like rabbits” due to welfare and that Native Americans are “morally disqualified” from living in America because they didn’t convert to Christianity and were consequently cursed by God with alcoholism and poverty;
• said that the anti-Muslim manifesto of the right-wing Christian terrorist who killed dozens in Norway was “accurate.”

The Dallas Morning News has reported that Perry’s affiliation with extremist organizations, and his radical policies, which have undermined overall economic progress for the population of his state, are driving Democratic party views that he is a deeply flawed candidate, too far out of the mainstream to be electable nationally. From today’s DMN:

As Rick Perry gears up for a presidential bid, Democrats also are making preparations — dusting off years of opposition research, sharpening attack points, designing anti-Perry websites and, for the most part, awaiting his entry with more eagerness than anxiety.

They’re not trying to tip the GOP primary. But in seeking to tar Perry as a flawed extremist, they want to ensure that as voters beyond Texas get to know him, he won’t be able to shake that image later.

“He has a pretty poor record as governor of Texas on a lot of measures — on wage growth, on job growth, on health care,” said Bill Burton, head of a new pro-Obama political action committee, Priorities USA, and until recently the deputy White House press secretary.

He called it “fairly amazing” that a quarter of Texas are uninsured, and that Perry wanted to opt out of Medicaid and “suggested secession as a remedy to the health care bill.”

The secessionist narrative is particularly disturbing to many in both the Republican and Democratic parties. Perry is seen as a wild-card that would not be likely to take responsible positions on the direction of national policy, and who might bring fringe ideas into the heart of the American government.

At a time of severe economic difficulty, there is concern Perry’s often rosy-eyed commitment to market-distorting deregulatory policies could deepen and prolong the years-long economic slowdown. His state has one of the nation’s most massive budget deficits, and no substantive plan to address it, other than cutting back on needed public services, and economists are now starting to look at whether the extreme positions and under-thought policy approaches might pervade his economic policy strategy.

The news today seems to indicate that while Rick Perry may have shored up a radical segment of the evangelical vote, he has succeeded in casting himself as an ally to extremists with little regard to the perils of programmatic intolerance and discrimination.

In order to win support from radical Tea Party freshmen, most of whom voted against the legislation anyway, Congressional leaders imposed stiff new tax penalties on radiate students across the country. Specifically, subsidized loans for grad students were cut—the government provides all student loans, so this effectively eliminates funding for post-graduate education—and a tax credit for borrowers who repay student loans on time for 12 consecutive months was eliminated.

The tax credit eliminated costs far less than the massive subsidies going to oil, natural gas, coal and nuclear power companies, yet the Tea Party freshmen, who have touted their opposition to any and every tax increase, did nothing to oppose the tax hikes on students. And while the tax credits may be much smaller than fossil fuel subsidies, or nuclear, eliminating them will cost far more.

Eliminating the on-time repayment credit will reduce the likelihood of on-time repayment significantly, potentially costing the government billions, over time, as well as subjecting more borrowers to fines and fees, depleting their personal economic footprint, and serving as a drag on growth.

The logic is simply astonishing: while the radical anti-tax Tea Partiers, backed by billionaire partisans, claim as an article of faith the absolute truth that any and all tax cuts incentivize the wealthy to create jobs—though we have ten years of evidence this is often not the case—, they reject the idea that a direct cash incentive for repayment will pay off—despite the evidence that it does.

In fact, the particular kind of tax increase the Tea Partiers have demanded and are supporting is more costly and will exacerbate not only budget shortfalls but also the negative economic trends whereby the American people are unnecessarily disadvantaged in the face of far more powerful economic forces.

Allegations that the so-called Tea Party caucus has degenerated into little more than a lobby for the wealthy interests that back them gain credibility when they support tax hikes on the vulnerable, and which will have a direct negative impact on the middle class. It should be well understood by all: the House Tea Party Republicans have pushed for and supported—the anti-student provisions in the failed Republican-only House bills were far worse—tax hikes that will make college more expensive and eat way at middle class wealth.

In a stunning move, the American Conservative Union (ACU), which runs the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), has barred one of its former sponsors, a conservative gay rights group called GOProud. The ban comes just as moderate Republicans are calling on the party to embrace same-sex marriage and gay rights, put the culture wars behind them, and focus on conservative principles more in line with Constitutional freedoms and market economics, as their platform.

The decision was announced in a letter from Gregg Keller, national executive director for the ACU, which read, in part:

The American Conservative Union is preparing to open registration and announce sponsorship opportunities for our Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) 2012. As a courtesy to your organization, a previous co-sponsor of CPAC, this letter serves to inform you GOProud will not be invited to participate in a formal role for CPAC events scheduled during the 2012 election cycle.

The decision is certain to draw a new rift in the conservative movement, as libertarian conservatives continue to pressure the Republican party to graduate into the present day, honor the personal liberties enshrined in the Constitution, and put an end to the culture wars. It may also split the Republican primary field, as many now believe it will not be possible to continue anti-gay politics as a platform issue, without forfeiting national elections.

The Democratic party may see an opportunity here, to intensify its pressure on the GOP, which is increasingly being seen by voters—according to recent polling—as a party unwilling to cooperate in constructive governing, riven by ideological radicalism, and determined to attack seniors, the underprivileged, immigrants and other minorities.

Former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani said, after his state legalized same-sex marriage, with Republican support, said it was time for the Republican party to support same-sex marriage and ev0lve. Pres. Obama, who has said his own views on the subject are “evolving”, has consistently supported gay rights and the move towards full equality in civil marriage. In July, the Pentagon ended its “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, ending centuries of discrimination against homosexual soldiers.

Fred Karger, the only openly gay Republican candidate for president, has reported being barred from conferences and debates, and has written a scathing indictment of the ACU, for the Guardian newspaper. In his piece, Karger writes:

Alberto “Al” Cardenas, the new head of the American Conservative Union (ACU), has taken bigotry and hypocrisy to new heights. I believe I was a victim of his organisation’s prejudice earlier this year when I wanted to purchase a booth at their annual CPAC gathering in Washington, DC. My credit card information was taken last December, and I was told that I was in. Then, mysteriously, three weeks later, I was told by phone that they had “sold out”. Funny, others were purchasing booths right up until the conference began in mid February.

As the first openly gay candidate to run for president of either party, I have hit some bumps in the road, but I have to say that my treatment by the American Conservative Union was the most hurtful and hateful to date.

Now they have taken it up a notch: they have just announced that the gay conservative Republican group GOProud is not allowed a booth at next winter’s CPAC conference (pdf). Cardenas is not saying to GOProud that CPAC has “sold out”; he is saying, simply, STAY OUT!

CPAC is holding an event in Florida, on September 23, and Karger says he was not invited to attend. He will be asking all of the other Republican presidential candidates to boycott the event, so long as the ACU maintains its ban on his participation or on GOProud participating in next year’s conference.

The Republican House leadership today again reiterated the false claim that Democratic leaders and the president have been pushing for “job-killing tax increases”. It is obviously a deliberate rhetorical exaggeration, designed to make a case for tax cuts, in a mode of campaigning and fundraising. But it is also a lie: not one politician in either party has ever called for “job-killing tax increases”.

But there is substantial evidence that radical revenue shortfalls, owing to the unfunded Bush tax cuts of 2001 and 2003 are responsible for the lag in job-creation. The recipients of those cuts are not “job creators” if they are not creating jobs. They were creating jobs before those tax cuts, and wages were higher. Overall economic growth was bigger and the economy itself was growing at a sustainable pace.

The Bush tax cuts interrupted a trend of spreading middle-class affluence. More people were entering the middle class, and more people in the middle class were building broad bases of financial and property assets. While some Republicans continue to push campaign distortions with no foundation in reality as the sole argument about the American economy, the facts paint a very different picture:

In fact, it appears that the unfunded, unaffordable Bush tax cuts have had a corrosive impact on government revenues, a corrosive impact on job creation, and a corrosive impact on the job-creation potential of private wealth holdings. The Bush tax cuts have been intensely regressive—funneling far more money to the wealthy, and depriving most other Americans of comparable wealth gains.

Now that Republicans and Democrats both are griping about the unsavory taste of the bipartisan debt compromise, there is a return to false claims about Pres. Obama—the only president in US history to repeatedly demand that Congress “find the funds” and send him “deficit neutral” bills—wanting “a blank check” and about the Democratic party being devoted to a perverse conspiracy to “kill jobs”, and erode the middle class.

The arithmetic is simple: it is the policies of Pres. Barack Obama that have been designed precisely to benefit the middle class and hardworking wage earners; it is the policies of the House Republican caucus that have been designed to cut spending, cut taxes and steer still more of the American people’s household wealth to the already wealthy.

It is Pres. Obama who has been pushing policies designed to ensure that the United States fulfills its obligations; it is the Republican House caucus that has been pushing the idea that “we overpromised” to those under 55, and that Medicare is fundamentally unaffordable and should be reformed into nonexistence—Medicare is an insurance plan; the Ryan plan proposes replacing it with a coupon book but requiring seniors to buy costly private health insurance.

One of the worst and most insidious tricks of the Bush administration’s fiscal and economic policies is hard at work in the current radicalism of the Republican House caucus, and that is the giving of special favors—in the form of unfunded tax credits, lower rates and wide-open loopholes, to make businesses that have ceased to serve the market look as if they still do.

Specifically, instead of requiring—as did the Affordable Care Act—that insurers meet new standards, turn no one away and provide quality care at affordable rates, in exchange for tens of millions of new private sector clients, the Ryan Medicare plan would simply force tens of millions of seniors to give huge sums to the insurance industry, without demanding performance. In other words, it would take seniors’ money without requiring even similar quality of care to what Medicare now makes possible.

It is the job-killing unfunded tax cuts and wealth displacement of the Bush era that Democratic leaders and Pres. Obama are working to overturn, so that the nation can be restored to fiscal sanity and the interests that control most of the nation’s wealth can return to job creation. It is simple common sense: free money already received does not provide an incentives; the need to be enterprising in order to earn new wealth, does.

The Tea Party movement was a grassroots rebellion of discontented, disenfranchised, fiscally conservative working people. It was wage earners and small-town conservatives who wanted reason and rationality in government. It ballooned into a pro-Republican juggernaut, financed by billionaire partisans, and managed to maneuver itself into a position of seemingly dictatorial control over the Republican majority in the House of Representatives.

Tea Party luminaries have professed adoration for many details of the radical reform budget put forward by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), but Republican party campaign coordinators continue to believe the self-professed Tea Party caucus leader Michelle Bachmann would not be viable as the party’s nominee for president. There are tensions, to be sure, but the chattering class in Washington seems to have missed a vitally important detail of the story:

The debt ceiling crisis has essentially sealed the demise of the true Tea Party movement within the Republican party, for one very simple reason. The Republican Tea Party radicals have demanded, above all other priorities, the absolute commitment to protecting tax breaks for the wealthiest of the wealthy, even where it would bring on default, force interest rates to soar, and put the nation in a still deeper fiscal mess.

The Tea Party cannot be a grassroots movement, emerging from no particular center of influence, spontaneously rising up to protest against unfair government tax policy, if it is co-opted wholesale by billionaire interests and committed entirely to protecting, maintaining and expanding, unfair government tax policy. This is not to say that most Tea Party backers are aware at how far from their demands the Tea Party caucus has veered; many may be confused about whether the radical pro-wealth tax policy of the current caucus will or will not benefit them.

But let’s look at a few key facts:

• The Bush tax cuts for the wealthy are costing trillions of dollars in added national debt;
• That debt is expected to be paid by all Americans, as the tax cuts for the wealthy are designed to reduce the burden on the wealthy, transferring it to the rest of the population;
• Added debt will drive the nation to default or a credit downgrade, if new revenues are not found;
• The Tea Party radicals in the House of Representatives have committed not to deficit or debt reduction, but to protecting tax breaks for the wealthy;
• The Tea Party radicals in the House of Representatives continue to push against a solution to raise the debt ceiling;
• Failure to raise the debt ceiling will impose massive across-the-board cost increases on most Americans, slowing economic growth, choking off capital to small businesses, accelerating joblessness, pricing many people out of their homes;
• Committed defense of unaffordably expensive tax credits to the ultrawealthy undermines the economic standing of the middle class and wage earners;

The Tea Party has been effectively eliminated by the billionaire-backed Club for Growth, and its quest to overrule American democracy and institute tax policies designed to deliver massive new unearned income to the ultra wealthy and to multinational corporations. The contradiction here cannot be overstated or overlooked.

Either the Tea Party is against unfair government tax policy that disadvantages most Americans, or it is not. At present, the real voice of the Tea Party in the Republican conference, in the House of Representatives has all but been erased by the interests that favor the permanent extension of the Bush tax cuts and a host of other regressive tax policies designed to establish funding streams that run from small businesses, families and working people, to the accounts of billionaires and multinationals.

Even as Democratic leaders secretly cheer what they view as the future electoral inviability of the radical Republican “hostage-takers” in the House of Representatives, the media and the political analysis of Washington, DC, seem to be missing the real ideological and strategic import of the moment: what is being touted as the apotheosis of the Tea Party is in many ways its demise.

Day after day, throughout the debt crisis, it has been possible to read or to witness interviews with Tea Party grassroots leaders and intellectual leaders, who insist that the movement is not about defending tax cuts for the rich. Yet their protests are falling on deaf ears, as the establishment in Washington continues to interpret the opposition to unfair tax policy as support for policies disadvantageous to most Americans, and observers conflate the Tea Party’s populism with the GOP’s committed defense of the theories of Milton Friedman.

Perhaps making the anomalous state of affairs in the House still more clear: facing the possibility of more than $4 trillion in long-term debt and deficit reduction, in a plan balanced between new cuts and new revenue, making it more viable, more sustainable, and more conducive to long-term fiscal health, Speaker of the House John Boehner rejected the plan, in favor of a much weaker plan that would do very little to solve the debt crisis and would likely saddle most Tea Party supporters with higher costs.

It now looks like the Tea Party’s goals for this Congress are unobtainable, as neither the Republican leadership nor the so-called Tea Party caucus support any follow through on policies that would make the tax code more fair. Indeed, at the present moment, the sole voice calling for comprehensive tax-code reform, to eliminate distortionary loopholes and special deals, is Pres. Obama, whom the Tea Party do not recognize as an ally.

So, what of the Tea Party’s great promise of pervasive influence? It always had to do with only one element of the Tea Party dynamic—the claim to represent the interests of ordinary Americans who work for a living and want common sense fiscal policy. The Tea Party caucus in the House has abandoned policies that would serve that base, to win the favor of big money backers.

A failure to do bigger, more sustainable debt and deficit reduction, to defend tax cuts for the wealthy and demand that cuts be paid for by seniors, students and the middle class, signals the demise of the Tea Party movement in this Congress.

List of Legislative Riders on H.R.2584, The Interior & Environment Approps bill for FY12
39 provisions in the bill specifically eliminate environmental protections in service of big polluters and GOP campaign donors

*In order as they appear in the bill, with section numbers cited.

Blocks Endangered Species Act Designations [Language on page 8]: Prohibits funding for Endangered Species Act listings or critical habitat designations.

Blocks NPS Boat Checks on Yukon River [Section 116]: Prohibits the National Park Service from carrying out boat inspection or safety checks on the Yukon River within the Yukon-Charley National Preserve in Alaska.

Blocks Agency Appeal of Grazing on Public Lands [Section 118]: Amends administrative appeal procedures for grazing on public lands to require parties to exhaust all administrative appeals before they may file suit in Federal Court.

Blocks Judicial Review of De-listing Wolves in Wyoming/Great Lakes [Section 119]: Protects from judicial review any decision of the Secretary of the Interior to de-list wolves in Wyoming or the Great Lakes region.

Blocks NEPA Review of Livestock Movement across Public Lands [Section 120]: Provides that for FY 2012 through FY 2014 the movement of livestock across public lands shall not be subject to NEPA review.

Requires BOEMRE Oil & Gas Permit Reporting [Section 121]: Requires Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation, and Enforcement to keep detailed records and provide quarterly reports on any oil and gas permit or plan that was not approved by the agency.

Blocks Wild Lands Secretarial Order [Section 124]: Prohibits funding for the Wild Lands Secretarial Order announced by Interior Secretary Salazar last December. Proponents of the Secretarial Order argue that the Order is a reiteration of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 requirements for BLM management of federal lands with wilderness characteristics.

Allows for Export of Alaskan Western Cedar [Section 414]: Allows Alaskan western red cedar and yellow cedar to be sold for export. Current law requires such cedar to be used domestically.

Blocks NEPA Review of Extended Grazing Permits [Section 415]: Allows grazing permits to be extended without the required NEPA review in FY 2012 through FY 2016. In prior year’s appropriations, the extension of grazing permits was only for one year.

Extension of Forest Service Stewardship Program [Section 427]: Allows the Forest Service stewardship contracting program which under current law does not expire until September 30, 2013 to be extended through September 30, 2023.

Blocks Livestock Emissions Regulation [Section 428]: Prohibits funds for the promulgation or implementation of any regulation requiring a permit for emissions resulting from the biological processes of livestock production.

Blocks Greenhouse Gas Rule on Manure Management [Section 429]: Prohibits EPA from implementing a rule requiring reporting of greenhouse gases from manure management systems.

Blocks Greenhouse Gas Rule on Stationary Sources [Section 431]: Severely limits EPA’s ability to regulate greenhouse gases. For a one-year period EPA is prohibited from proposing or promulgating regulations to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from stationary sources. The language also prevents civil tort or common law lawsuits during this one-year period. Furthermore the language states that any permit applied for during the one-year period shall not be federally enforceable.

Blocks Update to Mountaintop Removal Mining Rule [Section 432]: Prohibits the Office of Surface Mining (OSM) from updating the Stream Buffer Rule. This is for the benefit of companies engaged in Mountaintop Removal Mining.

Blocks Mountaintop Removal Mining Policy at Multiple Agencies [Sec. 433]: Prohibits EPA, the Corps of Engineers, and OSM from implementing or enforcing any policy or procedure contained in two specified documents on Mountaintop Removal Mining.

Blocks Coal Ash Regulation [Section 434]: Prohibits EPA from regulating Fossil Fuel Combustion Waste (coal ash) under the Solid Waste Disposal Act.

Blocks Modification of Clean Water Act [Sec. 435]: Prohibits EPA from changing or supplementing guidance or rules related to the scope of the Clean Water Act.

Blocks Clean Water Act Regulations on Cooling Water Intake Structures [Section 436]: Prohibits EPA from developing, finalizing, implementing, or enforcing rules for facilities with cooling water intake structures.

Limiting Public Appeals [Section 437]: Changes the general administrative appeal process for the Forest Service to the less rigorous one contained in the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003.

Blocks Storm Water Discharge Regulations [Section 439]: Prohibits regulations or guidance that would expand the storm water discharge program under the Clean Water Act to post-construction commercial or residential properties until after the EPA administrator submits a study to the Appropriations and authorizing Committees. The study must include overall cost as well as a cost-benefit analysis for various options.

Financial Break for Big Mining Companies [Section 440]: Amends the 1993 law establishing the Hardrock Mining Claim Maintenance Fee to provide a financial break for placer claims held by an association of two or more persons.

Allows for Texas’ Cap-and-Trade System [Section 441]: Provides that the EPA shall take no action to disapprove or prevent implementation of any flexible air permitting program. This provision was for the benefit of the State of Texas.

Blocks Grazing Management of Bighorn Sheep [Section 442]: Provides that through FY 2016 no action can be taken to manage Bighorn Sheep if such action would result in a reduction in the number of livestock allowed to graze upon a parcel.

Waives Clean Air Act Requirements for Big Oil Companies [Section 443]: Amends the Clean Air Act to (1) preclude EPA from requiring offshore sources to demonstrate compliance with health-based air quality standards anywhere but in a single onshore area; (2) reduce the length of time during which exploration platforms and drill ships are considered emission sources under the CAA, thereby limiting the time when emissions would be controlled; (3) make it impossible to use the permitting program to set emission control requirements for service vessels associated with offshore sources; and (4) replace a relatively fast, inexpensive process for citizens to challenge government action with a longer, more expensive review process in the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. This legislation passed the House on June 22, 2011 by a vote of 253-166.

Blocks Arsenic Cancer Study & Formaldehyde Risk Assessments [Section 444]: New authorization language requiring EPA to improve its Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS) seeking to draw doubt to the program that highlights health implications from environmental contaminants. The language stops the release of draft or final risk assessments that are not based on improvements in IRIS based on a National Research Council assessment of formaldehyde. Further requires the National Academy of Science to review EPA’s changes to IRIS and review risk assessments undertaken by EPA. The language goes on to limit funds for any action that would lower exposure levels below or within background concentration levels in ambient air, drinking water, soil, or sediment. Report language directs EPA to take no further action to post its draft cancer assessment of inorganic arsenic until the completion of the NAS study.

Removes Protection of Grand Canyon from Uranium Mining Claims [Section 445]: Prohibits the Secretary of the Interior from implementing a land withdrawal to protect the Grand Canyon from new uranium mining claims.

Blocks Forest Service Travel Management: [Section 446]: Prohibits the Forest Service from implementing Travel Management Plans in California until completion of an assessment of unauthorized routes. It further limits the classification of certain forest roads.

Blocks EPA Opinions on Pesticides [Section 447]: Prevents the EPA from using biological opinions related to pesticides and the Endangered Species Act, with a focus on ESA-listed salmon.

Blocks Clean Air Act Regulations of Cement Industry [Section 448]: Prohibits funding for the EPA to implement Clean Air Act regulations on the manufacture of Portland cement.

Blocks EPA Enforcement of Florida Water Quality Standards [Section 452]: Prohibits funding for the EPA to implement or enforce numeric Florida Water Quality Standards even though the state receives millions in federal funds for water projects.

Blocks EPA Greenhouse Gas Standard for Automobiles [Section 453]: Prohibits funding for the EPA to develop or finalize a new greenhouse gas standard for automobiles after model year 2016.

Blocks Clean Air Act Regulations of Fine Particles/Soot [Section 454]: Prohibits funding for the EPA to regulate certain levels of particulate matter in the air under the Clean Air Act.

Blocks EPA Regulation of Hard Rock Mining Operations [Section 455]: Prohibits funding for the EPA to develop additional financial assurance requirements for hard rock mining operations.

Requires BLM Notification of Land Exchanges [Section 458]: Amends the Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 to require BLM and the Forest Service to provide written notification of land exchanges to adjacent landowners.

Blocks EPA Funds to Great Lake States due to Ballast Water Requirements [Section 459]: Prohibits certain Great Lakes states from receiving any EPA funding if they have adopted ballast water requirements that are more stringent than Coast Guard requirements. The Coast Guard believes this will block at least four Great Lake States from receiving any EPA funds.

Blocks EPA Guidelines on Misleading Pesticide Labels [Section 460]: Prohibits funding for the EPA to finalize guidelines on misleading information provided on pesticide labels.

Blocks Fictitious EPA Action on Ammonia Emissions[Section 461]: Prohibits funding for the EPA to develop or implement regulations related to ammonia emissions under the secondary standard for NOx and SOx.   EPA has already stated that it has no intention of doing so.

Blocks Clean Air Rules for Power Plants and Requires a Study That Ignores Public Health Benefit of the Clean Air Act [Section 462]: Directs the EPA to do a cumulative assessment of the impacts of EPA regulations, and prohibits funding for the “Utility MACT” and “Transport” rules.

Blocks Permit Requirements for Pesticide Discharge in Waterways [Title V]: Amends the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act and the Clean Water Act to eliminate requirements for chemical companies and agriculture to obtain permits for pesticides entering waterways.

• From the Democratic minority of the House of Representatives’ Committee on Appropriations

Speaker of the House John Boehner has insisted on enforcing a strategy whereby his party dictates all federal budget policy, no matter the law, no matter the makeup of Congress, no matter the risks to the future of the United States of America. Now, after a wasted week of partisan isolationism and refusal to negotiate, he has passed a radical one-sided plan that will hurt most Americans, while doing little to solve the debt crisis or stave off a credit downgrade.

After the Bolshevik revolution swept away centuries of Russian imperial history, Vladimir Lenin’s regime adopted an attitude of benign demolition—the view that destruction was itself a creative force, allowing for positive change that could not otherwise happen. In today’s American political scene, a constitutional scholar, a moderate and a vocational negotiator now finds himself in pitched battle with a Republican House caucus that has adopted Lenin’s reckless approach to governing.

The new Tea Party freshmen in Congress have imposed on their party, on their speaker, on the American people, a politics of allegedly benign demolition. Claiming to be patriots who love austerity, they demand we burn the village—impoverish millions of Americans and slow down the economy for a generation—in order to save it. The argument seems to be that American democracy is wrong, negotiation is wrong, bipartisanship is wrong, and that the more severely the process of governing is obstructed, the better.

It is vitally important to note two key aspects of the bill that passed the House of Representatives on Friday:

1. It contained no constructive vision whatsoever for how to upgrade and sustain vital programs like Medicare and Social Security—only cuts;
2. It did not in fact meet the structural reform demands of most Republicans, but included steep cuts to programs that benefit citizens every day, including at least 39 different radical reversals to environmental protections…

In order to “motivate” the rogue element in the Republican caucus, Speaker of the House John Boehner played a clip from the Ben Affleck movie ‘The Town’, in which Affleck’s character says to a friend, in a somewhat desperate and ominous way: ”I need your help. I can’t tell you what it is. You can never ask me about it later. And we’re gonna hurt some people.”

The use of the clip was widely criticized as bizarre and reckless. The clip clearly suggested there could be value in doing harm to people. The use of the clip as a motivational tool clearly suggested there was a consensus view that hurting people could be a pleasurable bonding experience and a way to feel energized. In short, it seemed to many a shameless revelation of the leadership’s view that the radical first-years could only be brought on board with the promise that someone would be harmed.

Critics denounced the stunt as sadistic and out of bounds, a stain on the Congress. But the motif itself reflects a wider political strategy, by which deliberately harming and hampering the ability of the federal government to operate efficiently is seen as a constructive and patriotic act.

After three decades of one of the two parties committing its entire fiscal policy to the relentless and mounting reduction of taxes, revenues are now at an historic low, just over 14% of GDP—and that is with slow growth—budget policy has become about deprivation. Even in the face of extreme revenue shortfalls, at a time of grudging economic growth and facing a national default, the radicals who favor benign demolition remain convinced they are behaving in the interests of the same entity—the nation—they seek to save.

Under the pressure of pervasive consequence, however, the passion for forced austerity—coupled with a doctrine of oppose, obstruct and eliminate, at all costs—quickly degrades into uncontrolled heat and light, blinding those who argue that setting the building on fire will save it from collapse. In other words, the Republican House caucus has adopted Lenin’s reckless attitude of benign demolition, in which harming innocents is applauded as progress.

This is not news, at least not entirely. Mitch McConnell, who yesterday told Harry Reid on the floor of the Senate that he would not negotiate in any way with him, openly declared that he would dedicate his leadership of the Senate majority to the destruction of Barack Obama’s presidency. Since he made that declaration, it has become increasingly difficult to discern any substantive effort on his part to play a constructive role in economic stewardship.

It may seem extreme to suggest that the Republican party has committed itself to sabotaging the American economy in order to “destroy the Obama presidency” , but when there is little evidence to the contrary, the question has to be raised. And what is so dangerous, given that dynamic, is the train of thought that demands a brutal, painful rearrangement of priorities, and which favors the onset of calamity to make the pain seem like a sensible choice.

It is not in the tradition of American conservatism that the system should be driven to calamity in order to achieve narrow ideological goals that are harmful to the majority of people in material ways. It is not in the tradition of American democracy for one party to put the nation itself in jeopardy in order to get an edge over its opponents.

The House Republican caucus has an absolute moral obligation to abandon this slide into Leninist demolition tactics, and to propose constructive solutions that edify every vital program and protection the American people expect and deserve. Hurting people is not democracy; it is the absence of moral consideration.

Democracy requires service to, not sidelining of the people’s interest. The demolition of a century’s worth of progress toward fairness and personal security in the American economy is a departure from the ethical demands of legitimate government, and the people should be expected to judge such behavior harshly, at their next opportunity to express their will through the vote.

The Republican party’s demand that any deal to raise the debt ceiling—normally achieved by passage of a single line of legislative text—include a balanced budget amendment is a complex tangle of distractions, rooted in campaign rhetoric and a desire to frustrate the process of economic recovery. The last constitutional amendment to pass, the 27th, was ratified by the states fully 203 years after it was introduced.

The process of amending the Constitution is a complex tangle of maneuvering and retrenchment that invites into the fray nearly every ideological bias and grudge. That tangle is notoriously difficult to unravel, to win consensus, because an amendment to the Constitution takes on supreme overriding value as against any number of statutory laws, the ramifications of which can be hard to quantify, and which can lead to many vicious partisan fights in the future, or, where the budget is concerned, to policy changes and unforeseen consequences that not even the amendment’s supporters would like.

State-level balanced budget amendments, like European Union deficit constraints, are guidelines that often result in dysfunctional—underfunded—government or even more problematic deficit crises, stemming from unusual accounting methods and bills passed in overly pressurized political environments. Many political observers in California blame much of the state’s ongoing budget crisis on the relative ease with which referenda are used to amend the state’s constitution, building in policy requirements that are not always—at first glance—an obvious result of the amendment.

Observers on Capitol Hill believe the balanced budget amendment demand is a non-starter in the Senate, and that it will only bring the United States closer to a catastrophic credit downgrade. Passage would require impossible two-thirds votes in both the House and the Senate, and then ratification by three-fifths of the states. It is impossible to pass such a plan by Tuesday, at which point the United States will go into default and see its credit downgraded.

Republicans are now being accused of electioneering, trying to use the debt crisis as a lever to inspire voter turn-out in the 2012 election. And some observers are complaining that Boehner did not propose this in any serious piece of legislation before this last-minute debt crisis was afoot. That analysis has led some to call the entire idea a stunt that is putting the nation in real fiscal jeopardy.

Around 10:52 am, the news emerged from Capitol Hill that Republicans were planning to change the controversial Boehner spending-cut bill, and call a floor vote some time today. There was speculation that House leaders were planning to cut funding for Pell Grants—needed financial aid for college students—in order to win the support of Tea Party radicals.

Pres. Obama gave a brief address, shortly before reports of a revamped Boehner bill came to light, calling on the American people to demand principled compromise from their representatives in both houses of Congress. He explained part of the dynamic that has been noticeably absent from the debt debate: that Boehner will need Democratic support in both houses.

The Speaker’s decision to continue his push for a one-party deal in the House of Representatives is being maligned by critics of both parties, and by financially minded observers who worry that allegiance to party ideology, or defense of his own leadership turf, may be putting the nation’s long-term economic solvency in jeopardy.

Washington Post columnist Ezra Klein observed today that “Boehner’s need to protect his speakership tends to come ahead of his need to cut a deal.” Democratic House whip Steny Hoyer said that after Boehner and Cantor have walked out on talks three separate times, the House Republicans have now “walked out on Boehner”.

There is speculation that Boehner, long reputed to be a moderate and a deal-maker, may be hoping to outwit the Tea Party radicals, by giving them “red meat” to vote on, then letting the Senate alter the bill as much as is needed, then seeking Democratic support to pass the final deal in the House. There is no word that such a strategy has been discussed with Democratic leadership in either house.

Speaker Boehner has yet to offer a plan that meets the requirements of the Gang of Six or the bipartisan deficit commission, both of which called for major new revenues to guard against the economically deleterious effects of unprecedented spending cuts that will erase significant shares of GDP from the nation’s economic output.

It is unclear how Mr. Boehner intends to move any legislation through the House, given the divisive nature of the bill he has spent a week defending and promoting, despite the nearly universal view that it cannot pass both Houses in one form and be signed into law. Pres. Obama is now calling for the Senate to lead, and asking the American people to buttress the Senate’s work with demands that the House sign on to a bipartisan deal.

Speaker of the House John Boehner appears to have made an astonishing miscalculation in his legislative strategy, designing proposed legislation to be viable only in a 100% party-line vote, even though as many as 120 of his own members have vowed not to support raising the debt ceiling.

Speaker Boehner would need to round up only 21 Republican votes to pass a Democratic or bipartisan plan emerging from the Senate, were he able to rely on all of the Democratic members of the House. It would seem a more reasonable political calculation to work with the party that wants to make a deal than to struggle against all odds to win support from those who have vowed not to give it.

Democratic whip Steny Hoyer put it succinctly, quipping tonight that “The party of no is saying no to their own policy.” He added that the Republican policy of making radical demands in order to avoid default “is an immoral policy”. Hoyer said tonight “I’ve been in Congress 30 years, and I don’t know that I’ve been as concerned about the welfare of my country as I am tonight.”

Independent Vermont senator Bernie Sanders said tonight that “what is going on in the House right now is a disgrace and an outrage”. He asked how it could be that “the Congress is so far removed from what the American people want”, citing surveys that show people don’t want the deep cuts to entitlement programs now under consideration and that they do want taxes to rise for those earning more than $250,000 a year.

Speaker Boehner has not only failed to bring a viable piece of legislation to a vote, putting the nation’s fiscal integrity at risk, but he has managed the debt negotiations in a manner that has left the American public with the distinct impression that his party is not serious about solving the debt crisis.

And yet, there is a subtler way in which Boehner’s miscalculation could also harm his party. As the pressure mounts to make a deal, it becomes clearer that everyone is waiting for Tea Party radicals in the Republican party to decide whether or not the nation should be plunged into economic calamity, in service of ideological policy preferences.

That will obviously reflect badly on the Tea Party members involved in the standoff, but it will also make it harder for Republicans more broadly to win in 2012. Boehner could have avoided this crisis for the nation, and for his party, by working across the aisle, by letting the radicals know, with the same firm language he has used this week to demand cooperation, that he will not be held hostage and they can choose to make themselves relevant or not.

Boehner could have shown himself to be a statesman by cobbling together a “coalition of the willing”, comprised of moderates in both parties. Such a move would have elevated him as leader of the entire House of Representatives, worthy of the third highest office in the Constitutional order.

Instead, Mr. Boehner’s astonishing miscalculation now appears to have the nation hurdling toward debt default, credit downgrade, forced recession, and massive job loss, and his party torn and divided, his speakership in question, and Republican electoral chances sliding, by the day.

There is no constructive outcome to be gained from this debacle, and no clear way to explain why Mr. Boehner and his caucus would push the issue so far as to lose on so many fronts at the same time.

White House spokesman Jay Carney, and Democrats in the House, increasingly aware that Mr. Boehner will likely need Democratic votes to raise the debt ceiling, are reminding Mr. Boehner that the “grand bargain”, which would include new revenues, is still available. It is believed some version of that deal, with between $800 billion and $2 trillion in new revenues, could pass both houses, if Boehner can wrangle enough Republicans to vote with Nancy Pelosi’s Democratic minority.

At 10:27 pm, Rep. McCarthy, the House Republican whip, announced there would be no vote on the “Boehner bill” this evening. That marks four consecutive days that Mr. Boehner has been unable to get a vote on a piece of legislation that no one believes can pass the Senate.

Speaker of the House John Boehner has an admittedly difficult task, trying to corral rogue Republicans who have vowed to oppose raising the debt ceiling, even with the threat their actions could plunge the nation into an economic depression. But today, his speakership inched closer to calamity, as his push to pass a limited package of cuts, thought unlikely to prevent a credit downgrade, ended without a floor vote.

In what has been described as a partisan “pep rally”, one Republican House member has reportedly said the Boehner plan is an opportunity to “knock the s#!% out of them”. The obscenity, verging on threats of violence, continued the atmosphere of partisan “trench warfare” many have derided over the last several weeks, and seemed tied to a narrative of opposition to any constructive solution that would allow Pres. Obama to rescue the nation from a credit downgrade.

Despite the aggressive talk and the attempt to rally support from his party, Boehner appears not to have support in his party for any kind of debt deal. The failure to vote again raises the question of whether the Speaker of the House will be obliged to work with moderate Republicans and Democrats in the House, to pass legislation that would win support from the Democratic majority in the Senate and Pres. Obama.

Nancy Pelosi, known as the most determined and precise vote-counter on Capitol Hill, showed herself to be more in tune than Mr. Boehner, announcing even as he moved to bring his $917 billion plan to a vote that “the Boehner plan will not pass”. Even if it had been able to pass the House, it had no chance of passing the Senate, as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid sent a personal letter to Speaker Boehner, singed by 51 Democratic senators and two independents.

Even right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh decried the lack of political strategy in the Republican approach, which seemed more focused on forcing Democrats to not make a deal than on achieving a workable compromise. “The Democrats”, he said, “are two steps ahead here.”

Chris Matthews, commenting on the lack of a viable Republican debt plan, said the Republican party line seems designed “to threaten the destruction of the nation’s finances”.

There are now accusations that one of the provisions of the Boehner plan that raised the ire of Republican radicals is that it continues funding for Pell Grants, which help middle and low-income students finance their college education. Moderate Republicans have expressed frustration at the extremism of the opposition, and Democrats are accusing the hardliners of deliberately trying to kill programs that most Americans need and favor.

Observers on Capitol Hill suggest Democrats now perceive serious weakness in the Republican House caucus, and are more unified than they have been throughout the debate. Democrats in the Senate are now described as being aligned with Pres. Obama and determined to refuse any bill from the House that implements a short-term fix.

Some are also now saying there may be time to call for a vote and pass, in both Houses, with bipartisan coalitions excluding the radicals, the one-line debt ceiling increase bill that has been passed dozens of times before.

Jared Bernstein, a former economic adviser to Vice President Joe Biden, said tonight that the cuts being contemplated amount to four times the “negative stimulus” of any economic stimulus there was in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. He warned that Congress needs to be aware that the cuts they are proposing will drain that amount of value from GDP, pushing the economy downward.

As of 10:00 pm, the Capitol Building and Congressional office buildings were still the focus of political reporters anxious to know whether the House would call a vote tonight or not. There were images of pizzas being brought through the security scanners, as plans appeared to be in motion for an all-night session focused on passage of a spending-cut package designed to secure House approval of an increase in the debt ceiling.

At 10:27 pm, Rep. McCarthy, the House Republican whip, announced there would be no vote on the “Boehner bill” this evening. That marks four consecutive days that Mr. Boehner has been unable to get a vote on a piece of legislation that no one believes can pass the Senate.

Bruce Bartlett, former deputy budget director for Pres. George H.W. Bush and aide to Pres. Reagan, says the Bush tax cuts have added at least $3 trillion to the debt, and other Bush policies led to an increase of $4 trillion in the debt.

When Bush took office, budget projections showed a $6 trillion surplus, enough to pay off the then pending $6 trillion national debt. Instead, by the time Bush left office, the national debt had ballooned to $13 trillion. Obama, he said, has only added about $1.4 trillion to the national debt, and all of that was either already projected or related to economic recovery.

Thus afternoon, he told Chris Matthews that the truth about Barack Obama’s budget policies to date is that “he is a moderate conservative”, not a liberal and certainly not a “socialist” as his critics allege. So much so, he added, that if he were a liberal Democrat, he would be very annoyed by Obama’s committed centrism.m

He expressed concern that nothing can get through the House of Representatives. He even went as far as to say that a good number of the Republicans in the House are “either stupid, ignorant or craven cowards”, and that he doubts they have the courage or the wisdom to act in service of their country.

Budget deficits have appeared to widen more than actual spending has, under Obama, because in order to impose fiscal discipline, and prevent wasteful spending on wars and unfunded programs, he move Bush’s off-the-books wars back onto the federal budget. The result has been the most substantive and far-ranging efforts the nation has seen to roll back the widening flood of long-term national debt.

Bartlett’s warning was concise, clear and deliberate: the Republicans are refusing to take responsibility for having driven the borrowing binge that put the nation in the hole it is now in. Had George W. Bush not slashed taxes, without any plan to pay for the revenue reductions, twice, the existing budget surplus would have paid down the debt.

He then added still more by entering into two multi-trillion-dollar wars, with zero funding, and a Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit, also with zero funding, then setting in motion the most extensive burst of new borrowing in US history, to fund the bank bailouts.

Republican House speaker John Boehner has a choice that amounts to deciding where the weight of history will fall: he can lead a non-partisan effort to stave off a credit downgrade, and the massive ensuing costs of higher interest rates, which will drain both the people and their government of future revenues, or he can side with the radicals in his party who openly celebrate their quest to violate the Constitution and drive the government into default.

He can choose to be a leader of courage and principle, or to follow the radical freshmen already calling for his ouster.

Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) today addressed the Senate, calling for reasoned cooperation between the two parties and the two chambers, to craft a serious budget deal that can avoid a credit downgrade. He admonished hardline Republicans in the House to recognize that the Constitution they have sworn allegiance to institutes checks and balances, that no one party or ideology gets to rule without a contest of ideas.

“The attitude of some of these members in the House that it’s my way or let’s drive our country over the cliff is as dramatically un-American as anything I’ve ever seen,” Warner said firmly. His message comes at a time when House Republicans appear to moving further away from a grand bargain that can win support from both parties and make substantial changes to bring the debt-to-GDP ratio back within reason.

Warner made two important observations that have been almost totally absent from the debt negotiations so far:

He pointed out that Republicans who say they want the federal government to be “run like a business” seem to overlook the fact that any business with sound leadership would look to increase its revenues to fix a budget gap, not just to slash spending and undermine its productive capacity.

He then noted that it seemed odd that anti-tax radicals have sworn they will never vote to increase revenues or raise the debt ceiling, yet not doing so will cause a credit downgrade, which will lead to higher interest rates for all Americans, possibly depriving Americans of more than they would lo to tax hikes.

What’s worse, and Sen. Warner did not mention, is that the interest rate hike would take money out of everyone’s pockets, slow down the economy and hinder job creation, it would give much of that money to foreign-owned banks, corporations and to foreign governments like China and Saudi Arabia.

There would be measurable productive value in giving that money to the American government, to deal with debt and deficits, to make our spending policy more rational and more balanced, but no productive value whatsoever in sending it overseas.

At present the Republican party has yet to present a single, viable debt and deficit reduction package that meets the standard for avoiding a credit downgrade and forcing hundreds of billions in American taxpayers’, consumers’ and households’ dollars to fund non-productive spending on higher interest rates.

Wisconsin’s governor Scott Walker has signed into a law a controversial requirement that voters present photo ID in order to exercise their right to vote. Now, he has announced plans to close as many as 16 motor vehicle offices, every one of them in districts that favor Democrats. What’s more, Walker’s plan includes expanding hours at facilities where Republicans are more likely to obtain their driver’s license or photo ID.

Democratic leaders say the move is clearly designed to deny photo ID to voters more likely to vote Democratic, and then deny them the right to vote. It is the latest in a series of policy changes, enacted by Gov. Walker and the brothers Fitzgerald, the Republicans who control the legislature, specifically designed to make it more difficult for Democrats to win elections, beginning with what many say was an illegal legislative maneuver to strip public servants of basic labor rights.

More than one top Wisconsin Republican openly stated in televised interviews that the collective bargaining ban was specifically designed to “break the unions” or to “crush the Democrats”. This latest move comes as Walker’s government is releasing a radical redistricting map, changing all of the borders of every district in the state, just before voters are scheduled to cast votes to recall six Republican state senators—an effort critics say is designed to confuse voters.

When asked by Current’s Keith Olbermann whether it was an exaggeration to classify Walker’s actions as “fixing an election”, John Nichols referred him to the history of the infamous Boss Tweed and 19th century New York City’s Tammany Hall, to this day viewed as possibly the most significant example of pervasive and outright public corruption in US history. Tweed’s methods were similar in many ways to Walker’s, nibbling around the edges to get the outcome he wanted.

Scott Walker’s term has been laced with one after another accusation of corruption and abuse of office. As protests mounted in Madison, against the bid to strip the state’s public servants of collective bargaining rights, Walker attempted to mobilize the National Guard against the demonstrators, attempted to have protesters arrested for free speech, illegally sealed the state Capitol building, and is accused of using state troopers to harass and intimidate the families of Democratic legislators who fled the state to deprive Walker’s Republicans of a legislative quorum in the Senate.

He named the father of the Fitzgerald brothers—who control both houses of the state legislature—to be head of the state police. And it was the father of the two men he was counting on to carry out illegal actions in the legislature to force through votes on a rights-stripping measure, designed to undermine unions and give Republicans and edge in elections, that he asked to send troopers to the homes of individuals he knew to be out of the state, to harass their families.

It was alleged in more than one report that Scott Walker was considering ordering the state police to attack demonstrators in order to disperse the crowds, with multiple top police commanders calling for restraint and saying they would not recognize such a scene as American democracy.

Some state police joined the protesters in denouncing Walker’s actions as corrupt and undemocratic. On February 25, 2011, FireDogLake published this report:

Rainforest Action Network’s Jenn Breckenridge posted around 8:00 p.m. EST that the Wisconsin State Police had arrived at the capitol building in Madison, Wisconsin, joining the protesters in solidarity against Gov. Scott Walker and his attack on state employees’ collective bargaining.

The move may have come in response to an apparent order by the state’s assembly to close the capitol building at 4:00 p.m. on Sunday. RAN’s Ryan Harvey said the state police are rejecting the order and are planning to sleep in the building along side the protesters.

The police officer says in this video, “Let me tell you Mr. Walker, this is not your house, this is all our house.”

When a critic staged a fake call from one of the Koch brothers, who were spending millions to help finance the Republican response to the massive Madison protests, Gov. Walker accepted a gift in kind, in the form of an expensive vacation, as a reward for his hard work. And allegations of corruption only mounted.

According to the watchdog site Scott Walker Watch:

Thanks to the great work by the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, it has become apparent that dozens of Walker supporters were illegally donating more that the $10,000 limit in campaign contributions during the 2010 election season.

There is now an official complaint against Gov. Walker and his campaign, for seeking and accepting illegal contributions.

With mounting evidence that a significant portion of the Walker governing agenda is going toward rigging the 2012 election to favor Republicans, critics and election watchdogs are now calling for an investigation into election tampering and voter suppression.

A recall petition is almost certain to emerge after the one-year-in-office requirement is met. Already, there are petitions circulating calling for a bid to recall him. One accuses him of “economic treason” for what many view as a war against the middle class. Over 11,000 people have already joined a Facebook page devoted to removing Gov. Walker from office.

The pro-business lobbying organization ALEC (the American Legislative Exchange Council) has actually gone as far as to pair corporate interests with Republican legislators interested in working with them, to essentially push legislation written by industry. John Nichols, reporting for the Nation, writes:

“Never has the time been so right,” Louisiana State Representative Noble Ellington told conservative legislators gathered in Washington to plan the radical remaking of policies in the states. It was one month after the 2010 midterm elections. Republicans had grabbed 680 legislative seats and secured a power trifecta—control of both legislative chambers and the governorship—in twenty-one states. Ellington was speaking for hundreds of attendees at a “States and Nation Policy Summit,” featuring GOP stars like Texas Governor Rick Perry, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. Convened by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)—“the nation’s largest, non-partisan, individual public-private membership association of state legislators,” as the spin-savvy group describes itself—the meeting did not intend to draw up an agenda for the upcoming legislative session. That had already been done by ALEC’s elite task forces of lawmakers and corporate representatives. The new legislators were there to grab their weapons: carefully crafted model bills seeking to impose a one-size-fits-all agenda on the states.

The radical Walker agenda has many of the hallmarks of such model bills, and his Republican majority has been accused of selling its role as legislative majority, in exchange for financial support from industry. There are calls for a comprehensive corruption investigation into the dealings of the Wisconsin Republican party, to look into illegal campaign fundraising activity, illegal legislative process, potential quid-pro-quo, abusive of power and extortion.

There is even an allegation that Mr. Walker had been illegally funneling low-interest government bonds to his employer—BP Rifinery, in Whatcom County—for as long as 10 years. While he was able to deliver $180 million in low-interest bonds to that one entity, all other businesses in the county received only $13 million of the same bonds.

It is alleged Walker routinely manipulated the process for debate and for public hearings, to obscure a decision-making process that was flagrantly corrupt and which would have raised opposition from the community, from businesses and from the federal government.

If the leadership of the House of Representatives does not craft a bill that can work as a bipartisan compromise that will pass both houses, and be signed into law, they will be knowingly imposing on the entire American economy a steep “tax”, in the form of rapidly escalating interest rates. Those interest rate increases will impose a real and measurable cost inflation on all interactions with the economy.

Once the nation’s credit rating is downgraded, Treasury bond interest rates will have to go up, and those interest rates will push all other interest rates higher, choking off credit to consumers, families and businesses. And the negative impact will multiply, by very simple logic: will for-profit entities—i.e. banks—who make their profit from interest not only increase interest rates, but increase them enough to pad their profits, if basis rates go up?

The Republican party’s tempting of markets to react to imminent default is not only a “dangerous game”; it is a reckless experiment in the deliberate, long-term degradation of the American economy. It will pose an “across the board” threat to American enterprise, and literally undermine—take the legs out from under—the still slow and tenuous recovery. It will also make permanent some of the driving dynamics of the slow jobs economy.

How? By building into our economic fabric a degraded credit rating, the Boehner-Cantor default will make all government borrowing, indeed all borrowing of any kind, more expensive. This cost increase will not be temporary, as it will propagate the fiscal dysfunction currently at work in the budget process to the entire economy, forcing every man, woman and child in the United States to fund unnecessarily high interest payments.

The burden Republican radicals say they want to put a stop to—the ever-increasing share of the federal budget going to interest payments—will be expanded to all American businesses, households and individuals. Banks will find it harder to make money, as fewer and fewer people are able to meet the threshold for borrowing, and so will push for still higher ROI on ever riskier, and/or less frequent lending.

Republican leaders might object to calling their singularly engineered default, and resulting interest rate hikes, as a tax, but in the sense of imposing a heavy added cost burden on the American people—not to mention the Republican rhetorical flourish wherein everything other than free cash for business is a tax hike—it is.

The cost of living will go up, even as employment opportunity narrows, and wages continue to fall, when adjusting for inflation. Credit will become more scarce, threatening to halt an extremely feeble housing recovery, and to put still more home buyers “underwater”. States will see more pressure to lower property taxes, to mark to market, even as banks fight to avoid the same fate.

There will be more layoffs at the federal and state level, and vital incentives for businesses will begin to dry up, as federal and state budget hawks take note of how difficult it is to finance such incentives through new borrowing. Today, the IMF chief warned that a US credit downgrade could do severe harm to the entire global economy—blocking yet another source of potential income for American businesses and investors.

While anti-tax radicals in the GOP are convinced that a default will be the jolt to the system they need to remake American fiscal policy in a way that spurs economic growth, it will in fact be the single most effective way to insure the contagion of fiscal dysfunction and escalating long-term economic burden to entities large and small that—unlike the US government—cannot afford to bear that burden for even a little while.

The Boehner-Cantor default tax will, in fairness, also be in large part attributable to Rep. Paul Ryan’s radical budget proposal, which itself was rooted in a number of fiscal policy fantasies, chief among them that cutting spending automatically creates jobs, spurs growth and increases revenues, even if tax rates are slashed at the outset.

Ryan’s plan took all of the wrong lessons from the fiscal policy of the Reagan years, amounting to—according to some critics—an irrationally rosy rewriting of history, in the hopes that money and economics will just be different in this next go-round. More specifically: Ryan confused tax cutting with economic growth. He made the assumption that a government small enough so as to be unable to aid in fostering economic health and wellbeing would somehow do so magically.

He forgot to take note of the many tax increases Reagan was forced to sign, in order to make sure the nation did not fall into depression and loses its competitive edge against the Soviet Union, as a result of his radical tax cuts. He forgot to take note of how necessary Reagan made “deficit spending” to the shape and function of our national government and our economy more broadly.

Ryan proposed, essentially, a more radical version of Reagan’s failed policy, ignoring the fact that his plan would ultimately drive the government into far more long-term borrowing, or necessitate a dramatic decline in GDP and key areas of medium to long-term investment. So, it could be a Boehner-Cantor-Ryan tax, but it is Boehner and Cantor who made Mr. Ryan’s radicalism seem mainstream, sparking a misguided intransigence among their own caucus.

The default, if it comes, will be owned by Messrs. Boehner and Cantor, who have, between them, walked out of talks at least three times, simply because they refused to even listen to alternative ideas. And they did so in service of a radical minority of one party, who have already vowed not to assist in avoiding economic chaos.

Polling now shows clearly that while Pres. Obama suffers from an economic approval rating below 50%, that number might be more about incentivizing action than about policy preferences. Recent polls also show a majority of the American people have more faith in Mr. Obama than in either party’s Congressional leadership, to deal with debt and deficits.

Polling also reveals that while nearly 60% of the public believe George W. Bush’s economic policies inflicted lasting harm on the economy, only 37% believe Barack Obama’s policies have caused harm. The suggestion is that the public is more aware of who is offering viable solutions, and who is acting in good faith, than partisan dividing lines would ordinarily allow.

Meanwhile, the new Republican majority has succeeded in driving anti-incumbency sentiment to its highest rate on record, after just six months in control of the House of Representatives. They have lost two important House elections this year already, as the message that they are pushing a radical agenda to eliminate Medicare, while introducing zero pieces of legislation to create or incentivize the creation of even one new job, is sticking.

But all of that is politics. The economic reality is that a Boehner-Cantor-driven default will add measurable, possibly prohibitive new costs to everyday activities, personal and commercial investments and leave the nation with unmanageable new operating costs, slowing economic growth and threatening our standing in the global economy.

IndependentsOfPrinciple :: House Speaker John Boehner appears to be under attack from an intransigent House Republican caucus that will not allow him to retain any credible leadership if he agrees to a debt and deficit reduction plan that includes any tax increases of any kind. While select Republicans in the Senate agree with the deficit commission recommendations and the Gang of Six proposal—which recognizes the need to increase revenues to deal with escalating deficits—, radicals refuse to agree to any compromise.

It seems Speaker Boehner is being held hostage by a radical Tea Party revolt in his party, whom he is not prepared to anger. Part of the problem is rhetorical. On issues of debt, deficit, entitlements and security, routine use of hyperbole has so distorted debate, that much political discourse now distorts what is actually happening in policy. Republican Sen. Tom Coburn (OK) told Meet the Press, falsely, that “the government is twice as big as it was ten years ago; it’s thirty percent bigger than it was when Pres. Obama took office.”

What Coburn is speaking about is the federal budget, and nearly the entire amount of the increases he cites are security related—specifically the costs of funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with increases in Pentagon spending. Pres. Obama added massive new numbers to the federal budget, without adding any new spending, simply by reporting, for the first time, the spending for Iraq and Afghanistan as part of the budget.

Such distorted rhetoric, treating cost as “the size of government”, leads many conservatives to the mistaken view that tax dollars are being foolishly wasted on unnecessary programs, new hires, and intrusions into personal freedom. In fact, there are fewer government employees now than when Pres. Obama took office; in fact, Democrats are proposing sweeping reforms designed to reduce long-term debt and deficits; in fact, it is failure to fund the government that is causing the deficit to expand.

Sen. Coburn also repeated on Meet the Press the right-wing myth that Pres. Obama has been “unwilling to deal with entitlements”. When Pres. Obama’s healthcare reform process called for saving $500 billion in Medicare fraud, waste and abuse,  over 10 years, Republicans ran vicious and false ads against him, claiming he was trying to “gut Medicare” and “cut benefits” for the elderly. In fact, it has been Pres. Obama who has repeatedly proposed targeted Medicare reform, designed to roll back costs without cutting benefits.

“Entitlements” is another keyword in the rhetorical distortion of Washington politics: entitlements are programs which some citizens are “entitled to” because they have funded them. By paying into Social Security and Medicare, or by virtue of one’s military service, one accumulates benefits that come later in life. There are many benefits to society of such a system, and the “entitlement” factor in the equation is really, and should be thought of as earned benefits.

Medicaid, unemployment benefits, food stamps, and SCHIP—which provides health insurance to underprivileged children—operate on a different logic. But, there is no way to eliminate spending on these without causing real and measurable harm to the overall economy. Even these “entitlement” programs are really designed to optimize the public cost of certain failures of the marketplace to optimize costs. Our public discourse on “entitlements” is almost entirely driven by a narrow ideological view that anyone receiving entitlements is a parasite.

In this climate, Speaker Boehner is trapped between the reason of the vast majority of people, who believe we cannot solve the mounting deficit crisis without addressing revenue shortfalls and the unreason of a radical Tea Party faction, a minority even of his own party, that will not support any increase in taxes, no matter the potentially virtuous impact on the nation’s economic fabric.

Last week, Boehner tried to move his position closer to a “grand bargain”, with Pres. Obama, who has sought to meet the demand of that reasoned majority; since Friday, he appears trapped behind a wall of intransigence, not of his own construction. Much of this may stem from the hardcore ideologically wishful mythologies that prevail in the use of rhetoric to deal with debt and deficit issues.

Doris Kearns Goodwin said, today, that people in the political center are often neglected by the heated political rhetoric that prevails in ideological debate. She noted that some have called for “raging centrists” who can represent the true voice of independents. Boehner has sought to be the skilled negotiator and the leader wise enough to recognize a good deal when he sees one, but it now appears his party will not allow him to lead in that way.

There are questions about whether the Boehner speakership is in jeopardy, whether his party will challenge his leadership, if he strays from their 2012 election strategy, which involves a programmatic refusal to cooperate with Pres. Obama. More radical Tea Partyists have adopted the irresponsible “blow it up” view, which holds that forcing default will ruin the government and allow them to rebuild it, according to their ideological preferences.

For the record, Tim Pawlenty proudly says he “did blow it up” when he was governor of Minnesota, leading to a debilitating government shutdown, the furlough of thousands of workers, negative impact to his state’s economy, and higher borrowing costs that could weigh on the state’s budget for years. Economists agree that default would be catastrophic, and would lead to higher borrowing costs, exacerbating the problem and doing serious long-term harm to the wider economy.

Andrea Mitchell said it is hard for her to understand how over 200 members of the House of Representatives swear an oath to refuse to raise taxes, before even evaluating the wisdom of specific policies on which negotiation will be necessary. Historically, being a good legislator means being able to make the deal that moves official policy in the direction of your agenda. Many, including Republicans, are now urging Speaker Boehner to abandon the Tea Party radicals and work with moderate Republicans and Democrats to stave off catastrophic default.

Meet the Press moderator David Gregory quoted Winston Churchill, who said “You can always count on Americans to do the right thing, after they’ve tried everything else.” Many political analysts believe we could do better, if there were more consideration given to non-ideological positions, which may actually represent the views of most Americans, regardless of their partisan voting habits.

Independent voters are often credited with leading the debate from the political center, but have been boxed out of all talk on debt and deficit, with ideological distortions applied to polling numbers to obscure their views. The debt-ceiling negotiations have thrown into high contrast the implied obligation that House Speaker Boeher join Pres. Obama and Senate Leader Reid as three principled centrists negotiating, as Boehner today told Chris Wallace, to do “what’s right for the country,” regardless of party preferences.

ABC News political correspondent Jonathan Karl today tweeted: “Boehner will face a revolt of his own leadership for grand bargain that increases revenue by 800B. Am told Cantor&McCarthy are opposed.” Mr. Boehner finds himself pressed by history to be a principled centrist, but standing alone between reason and unreason, and under attack from his own party. He may even be facing the threat of a challenge from Eric Cantor (R-VA), who has used the debt debate to reposition himself as an ally of the Tea Party.

Speaker Boehner did, however, say today that he did not come to Washington to “be a Congressman”, but to “do what is right for the country.” And he may now have to choose between the two. The question is, ultimately, whether the American people can find a way to expand the space for the voice of reason, and reward principled moderates who make political sacrifices in service to “what is good for the country”.

Ron Paul gave Fox News’ Neil Cavuto the latest in a series of Republican presidential campaign advertisements, posing as interview, today as the nation waited to see Congressional leaders gather with Pres. Obama in the White House Cabinet Room. While Cavuto labored to spin the issue toward a Tea Party interpretation of reality, Mr. Paul made the astonishing claim that the least damaging outcome of the debt ceiling negotiations would be a national default.

He then went on to claim that his view represents “American tradition”. While Paul is often a credible and passionate voice in the wilderness, defending individual liberties against the encroachment of modern government and corporate tendencies, his claim that great nations “always default” when they get to a place where default is possible, or that it is American tradition to let entire government agencies collapse, for failure to negotiate a responsible solution, is unfounded and reckless.

When Ron Paul attempted to explain that part of his appeal to independent voters is related to his revulsion to departures from American civil liberties traditions, such as the so-called USA PATRIOT Act, which enabled domestic spying and other constitutionally dubious security powers, Cavuto cut him off and said bluntly he didn’t want to discuss “those issues”.

Even as Fox News ran its “Fox Facts” at the lower right of the screen, revealing its people know and understan that 44% of all government bills will go unpaid, if the debt ceiling is not raised by August 2, Cavuto made the incredible statement that the wealthy “are already paying a lot”—they are paying historically low levels of taxes—and that they have no reason “to pay more for a lousy product”. The network that wrapped itself in the flag to promote war in Iraq, and the USA PATRIOT Act, now says the United States of America is “a lousy product”.

There is an undercurrent of reveling in what some perceive as the demise of a form of government, so-called “big government”, which they believe is a threat to American democracy. There is a trend among far-right conservative ideologues that favors advocating for and trying to bring about the sabotage of the American system of electoral government, on the grounds that it is dangerously “liberal” and that it somehow disregards “traditional” values.

Mr. Cavuto and Mr. Paul today showed themselves both to be guilty of the unfortunate—and one hopes unintentional—failure to recognize when extremist far-right euphemisms penetrate into their more moderate conservative rhetoric. This crossover has been happening for too long, and is an irresponsible attack on informed discourse. It mirrors the false claim that all issues of public controversy are just “opinion”, and radical, factually unfounded smears as legitimate as sincere dealing with circumstance.

In a subsequent interview, Cavuto immediately interrupted his interlocutor, when the consensus position that responsible debt and deficit reduction requires an upward adjustment of tax rates on the wealthiest Americans. Cavuto interrupted in order to shout that the wealthy are “already paying a lot”, then to state his “lousy product” blanket smear against the American government.

That there is intense logical incoherence in this method of reporting—where facts are brushed aside in favor of metaphor, hyperbole and counter-to-fact claims, designed to further a world view, not a solution—is obvious. That this logical incoherence matters to viewers or to editors is not so obvious. Mr. Cavuto’s deliberate manipulation of his interviews, to convey a biased, counter-to-fact line of argument, is indicative of the morally bankrupt tabloid culture promoted by Rupert Murdoch’s tabloids in the United Kingdom.

That is not to say Mr. Cavuto is himself so unworthy of respect, but he, like any other journalist or news analyst, must earn what respect is given, by dealing intelligently with the reality of the world before him. To refute the very facts everyone at the table agrees to, to argue that the failure of the US government to pay 44% of its bills would be of negligible importance, to invite collapse as somehow courageously patriotic, is irresponsible and suggests a lack of seriousness about the responsibility of the press to foster actual understanding of events.

Whether he has been directed, by Bill Sammon—whose emails instructing reporters to slant their reporting for ideological and partisan reasons have shocked and concerned media analysts, citizens and journalists—to slant his reporting, or whether he is voluntarily doing so in order to further the culture that prevails at his network is impossible to know, unless Mr. Cavuto chooses to express his genuine thinking.

Mr. Paul, for his part, must improve the way he manages the unwieldy set of passions that inform his rhetoric. If we were to give him the benefit of the doubt, that he believes honestly that the United States of America does not need its government, or most or much of it, then he would do better to learn specifics, and to explain what, precisely, he would eliminate and how, precisely, he would secure the same services and from whom.

The right-wing doctrine, for instance, that the EPA is some sort of hostile force with no productive value does not contemplate any means of any kind to protect the air and water the American people need to survive. No one argues that function should be militarized, and the very idea that there should be an actual police component to environmental regulation is anathema to the anti-EPA hardliners.

Yet those people need clean water and clean air, in order to avoid the literally thousands of carcinogenic chemicals and compounds that are released into the environment by American industry, all the time. Their children and grandchildren will be less able to live in a nation that has the health security to function as an advanced nation, if clean air and water services are not performed by any entity, with enforcement powers. Yet they profess it is patriotic to throw caution to the wind and allow industries whose entire methodology requires them to release these chemicals into the environment, unless otherwise constrained, to “regulate themselves”.

It is this kind of gap between Mr. Paul’s words and the real world that make him a less serious candidate than he might otherwise be. It is this kind of flippant, sometimes irrational, politicking that wins him the affection of passionate supporters, but not necessarily the respect of the wider electorate or the press and the parties.

In short, Mr. Paul again revealed himself to be more of a rhetorician than a leader, more a critic than a president. After so many years of presenting himself as eligible for the nation’s highest office, he has yet to communicate a credible vision for what he wants the United States of America to be. To get a grip on administrative specifics and how they affect real people’s lives, would go a long way to making his rhetoric more credible.

Saying that default is acceptable, or that it somehow represents “American tradition” is just an astonishing failure to reason with clarity.

Anyone who wants to drive the nation to default, in order to “hurt Obama” or promote some narrow ideological interest, hates this country. There is no other way to see it. People who lust after, and joke about, and court and urge and instigate, the failure of their nation, with the idea that doing so might elevate their faction in the resulting chaos, harbors a deep and pervasive resentment against the majority of the people who will suffer as a result.

They must… because there must be reason in this universe, to help us make sense of the mess and hold back chaos.

A default of any kind is against our founders’ revolutionary principles, let alone a deliberate one. Default violates the founding principles of American democracy, because the founders put the honor and integrity of the United States Congress, of our executive branch, and our electoral system of government, our revolutionary experiment in democracy, ahead of the interests of party and faction.

George Washington famously warned, in his farewell address:

“The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries, which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of Public Liberty.”

At this moment in time, we have a credible opportunity to come together around a common need, the need to defend our system of electoral government, the integrity of its officers and the full faith and credit of the nation, against the slings and arrows of misbegotten disharmony. In other words, we can join together, demand statesmanship from everyone at the negotiating table, and save our nation from our own worst habits.

A Congressional refusal to honor our debt, already incurred by so many majority votes in the Congress, is a violation of our Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States explicitly requires that all debt incurred through normal operation of our system of government be honored. There is no provision that grants the United States Congress the right to invite, make necessary, or cause default.

It would be a gross and perhaps criminal abdication of responsibility, on the part of those members of Congress who would do so, to bring about an end to over two centuries of responsibly honoring the debts we have already incurred.

Is it even within the realm of most citizens’ comprehension that the United States would borrow money, from its own people, from pensioners, from foreign nations, and major investors, all of whom put their faith in the full faith and credit of the United States government, and then refuse to pay those debts?

Make no mistake: those who would invite default in order to score political points, “hurt Obama” or force massive spending cuts, are not only engaged in a kind of hostage-taking; they are proposing that the United States should be a deadbeat country, with all the connotations you might attach to that description.

Default means the US bond rating —which during Barack Obama’s presidency is at such unprecedentedly beneficial status we can actually sell bonds with negative interest, bonds investors pay us to sell to them, solely because they want the security of the full faith and credit of the United States government— will be downgraded. Downgrading the credit-worthiness of the most stable investment product in the world will likely push the rating of every other investment product in the world down as well.

This would destabilize not only bond markets, but other investment products as well. It would destabilize the entire world economy, the banking system, the ability of ordinary Americans and small businesses to borrow, or to fund their existing debt.

The stability of our bond system underpins the entire global economy, helps us to leverage our power in the world, and to hold back forces hostile to democracy and trade, like fundamentalist Islamofascism and totalitarian communism. The stability of our bond system infuses tense seams of global trade and politics with reason and collaborative problem-solving. In other words, peace and democracy are byproducts of a stable, reliable system of American bond investments.

If you are telling people this is a game, or that we can weasel out of our debt, because somehow Obama doesn’t belong where he is, then you are threatening to destroy America’s influence in the world, undermine our alliances, and urge the nations we do business with to treat us like good-for-nothing cheapskates who can’t be trusted and shouldn’t be. That is against our cultural values, an affront to our revolutionary democratic principles, and shows a lack of seriousness, on every level, about anything one might call “conservative” or “patriotic”.

There is something called statesmanship: if you want to serve your nation, you do the thing that serves your nation, not your tribe. You do the thing that benefits everyone, even if your narrow ideology does not comprehend the problem or the solution. When you sit down to negotiate, with a president who says he will give you something from e every one of his party’s sacred cows, so you can do the same, and there can be a middle ground, and you can come together to solve a problem we have spent 50 years creating, as a nation, you negotiate in good faith; you don’t act like a spoiled child, shout out of turn, and make false accusations and false claims and hold symbolic votes that make the entire institution of the US Congress look like a clique of high-school trend-chasers.

If you love this country, demand statesmanship from the leaders on your side of the ideological divide. If you love your families, and your communities, and the democratic principles of this republic, make sure you have the conscience and the integrity to ask of your leaders that they be willing to sacrifice their ideological determination as much as they are asking the other side to sacrifice theirs. That is how we find common ground; that is how we honor the sacrifice and service of those who have come before; that is how we start down the path of fixing something that was broken by several decades of irresponsible and unfunded manipulations.

Gov. Scott Walker has divided Wisconsin like no politician since the 1880s. His government engaged in what critics called a campaign of naked corruption almost from the day he took office. He was accused of illegally using the police to threaten, harass and intimidate the families of his opponents in the state legislature. He was accused of attempting to deploy the National Guard against peaceful demonstrators.

He committed his administration to an extreme proposal to strip public servants of collective bargaining rights, despite having campaigned not on that proposal, but on job-creation. He was recorded on a phone call sting telling an individual he thought was one of the billionaire Koch brothers he would accept a gift vacation in exchange for stripping the state’s public servants of their rights.

Now, in a shocking revelation of election fraud, the Wisconsin Republican party has admitted to entering fake Democratic candidates into the recall election process, in an effort to derail the recall of Republican state senators. The coordinated campaign of election fraud should be grounds for a federal criminal prosecution of those involved in the conspiracy, though tonight’s news is that in early returns, one true Democrat has already won the primary and the other five are leading the fraudulent candidates.

The fake candidate fraud is just one element of what now appears to be a state-wide Wisconsin Republican effort to disrupt the election. There are reports of an out-of-state phone campaign to mislead Wisconsin voters into believing they should not vote and instead wait for an absentee ballot. There are also reports that some poll workers were told to attempt to block any voter not showing photo ID, though photo IDs are not yet required in Wisconsin.

Poll workers were also a target of the campaign to create confusion, as conflicting information was put out, regarding whether existing voter registration rolls were the correct place for a legitimate signature, or whether a signature was required to be entered in a new list of registered voters.

The election fraud, voter-distraction phone calls and alleged attempts to disrupt voter activity at polling locations, come after Walker’s Republican majority in the state Senate held an illegally closed meeting in order to force through legislation that was not prepared or voted according to the established legislative process.

As the recall effort moves forward, it is expected the six Democratic candidates will have a strong chance of winning at least three more seats, enough to retake control of the state Senate. It is expected a recall effort against the governor will get underway as soon as he is eligible for recall, after one full year in office, and that there will now be a coordinated statewide effort to undo the radical reforms imposed in such authoritarian fashion on Wisconsinites.

Now is the time for Republicans to lay down their arms and help Pres. Obama build a better, safer, more cooperative American future. In just a few short days, they have lost the birther issue, the budget issue, and, more importantly, the national security issue. They have no candidates with any military or command experience, and Barack Obama has just accomplished what George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, with all they did to alter US and world politics to empower their administration, could not do in seven: he killed Osama bin Laden.

The Republican party has to take note of the importance of this moment, and cede ground on Capitol Hill, where they still have some chance of influence, if they can be part of the solution. Of course, there are firebrand radicals in the party who have little to offer other than their relentless firebrand radicalism, but the smart Republicans have to take note of just how much the landscape has changed since November 2010.

Gov. Scott Walker tried the GOP’s most extreme angle, a virtual government takeover of contract negotiations, pension plans and workers rights, with the now explicitly stated purpose of making it easier for Republicans to get elected, by gaming the system. His corrosive overreach has unleashed a nationwide backlash against the kleptocratic and corporatist bent of the party. The middle class is beginning to see the value of working-class activism, across party lines.

There have even been rumors that run as far as suggesting moderate (less partisan) Tea Party groups siding with local labor groups to challenge such power grabs. The extremist budget put forward by Rep. Paul Ryan has sparked such outrage among Medicare recipients and people who value their children’s educational futures, the resulting backlash has left that document seeming like the emblematic example of irrationally inhumane public policy.

What’s more, Pres. Obama has proposed a deficit-reducing budget that seems to have a more credible, more workable, more tangible, and less inhumane approach, to reducing deficits by over $4 trillion over ten years. Republicans are reeling from the policy losses, and the president has gained ground on which to run his 2012 campaign with each step.

The situation is so dire that the GOP now appears to be splitting between the desperadoes and fundamentalists, who demand some thinly veiled racist commentary or some perversely wishful push for prolonged economic hardship, to undermine the president, and those who, like Speaker Boehner himself, now say oil subsidies, might need to go, and the Ryan budget was little more than “a blueprint” or a valiant if misguided way of “provoking debate”.

Maybe the biggest problem the GOP faces is in the intellectual composition of their own vanguard: the party’s leading lights are having a very hard time letting go of the laissez-faire deregulatory fascination of the last half century, despite the nation’s cultural return to a depression-era mindset, where government need not be big or small, left or right, but honest and good at solving problems real people face.

That doesn’t line up well with a party platform that continues to favor the economic dogma of a decade of declining wages, the security-blanched fantasy of a cadre of leaders who started and could not finish not one, but two, of the nation’s longest and least effective wars. The GOP is facing a self-fashioned reality crisis, in which the party’s image is rooted in the same under-thought ideas that serve as backdrop to the very crises Obama is hard at work solving.

President Obama is talking up bipartisanship, and the GOP has to pay heed: this is the president offering them a place in the collaborative work of solving epic problems; they are the ones who need that offer more. Without a hard tack to the center, the Republican party of 2011 faces a very serious limitation: an effective president is making it clear whose ideological dilly-dallying has left the nation with so much to struggle against.

The GOP will have to argue, as Wall Street’s most discredited bankers did, that since they screwed everything up so royally, they are the only ones equipped to undo what was done. They are, however, hampering even that desperate strategy by proposing nothing that would in any way undo what they did to create the mess.

Their argument is that after a couple of years of honest hard work from someone unlike them, to undo the mess they created over several decades, it’s time to let them do more of the same. Wisconsin, the Ryan budget, the silly adoration for Donald Trump’s racist innuendoes, and now the killing of bin Laden, have thrown the whole political landscape into high contrast: it is now clear who is the adult in the room, and who is still dilly-dallying on partisan and ideological obsessions.

The GOP has a window of opportunity, before its most visible figures dive headlong into the mudslinging they are sure to bring to the 2012 race, to moderate its rhetoric, steer to the center and become part of the Obama problem-solving agenda. To do otherwise would be, more than foolish and short-sighted, a sign that their leaders are not so much leaders as devotees of political sabotage.

That will not give anyone the impression they are worthy of the nation’s highest office, or of holding the pursestrings, for that matter.

GOOD.is has released this infographic illustrating the significant disparity between the current demographic makeup of the United States Congress (both houses combined) and the actual population of the United States. There is a clear drag on progress in most Americans’ access to Congressional office, and it appears the composition of Congress would shift to the Democratic party, given the current policy platforms and voting tendencies of distinct (and overlapping) demographic groups.

The Republican party’s national political operation has, for this reason, been pushing to reduce access to polling locations for groups that tend not to favor the election of Republican candidates. A more democratic response (lower-case d) would be to find more appealing candidates and policy positions more relevant to a major of today’s American voters.

Independent voters often account for much of this disparity, as the composition of the independent (or non-aligned) electorate shifts significantly from one election to the next, and that shift often coincides with higher or lower turnout within the base of electoral support for one of the two parties.

That connection, and the disparity between actual population breakdown and Congressional representation, suggests independent voters are not exercising full agency or truly independent judgment in terms of their electoral choices. This accounts for the vast disparity between what voters say they think of complicated policies like the Recovery Act or the Affordable Care Act, where most of the specifics are in line with what they want.

It also explains how the people of Wisconsin elected an extremist regime that would defy the law, deliberately violate multiple court orders, threaten the use of force to prevent protest and to deny opposition legislators access to the legislative process, and strip Wisconsinites of basic rights.

Every citizen has a responsibility to ensure that we move toward being a nation where democracy is so pervasive that no one is disadvantaged by ethnicity or gender in the project of winning elective office. Independent voters have an important role to play, and can help drive the two major parties toward a more people-centered politics, more reflective of contemporary demographics and contemporary values.

The United States Supreme Court is preparing to hear oral arguments in a landmark campaign finance case, in which a wealthy candidate who chose not to use public matching funds alleges those funds amounted to an illegal enhancement of his opponent’s speech. That assisted speech, the argument goes, was an unconstitutional government intrusion into the territory of his own free speech rights.

Observers say the right-leaning now convincingly corporatist Roberts Court appears likely to side with the wealthy candidate, and effectively outlaw any and all public assistance that would give the non-wealthy a hope of competing. If this is their verdict, the Court should add to its finding that no candidate can spend more than a nominal amount of personal wealth to expand his or her own speech beyond that of a less affluent opponent.

At present, campaign finance laws bar any individual from contributing more than a certain amount to an individual campaign for elective office, but they do not bar any individual from collectively fundraising massive amounts from wealthy friends and business associates, and now, thanks to the Roberts Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, there is no limit on the wealth outside groups can devote to campaigning on “issues” related to a political campaign.

There is, consequently, no way around the following problem: these ruling are privileging the right of wealthy individuals to vastly amplify their own speech, while directly and aggressively imposing limits on the ability of the non-affluent to campaign effectively. There arises, then, a Constitutional imperative: the reversal of the anomalous legal scenario in which the wealthy can simply spend unlimited sums to campaign without building a movement.

If the logic of Citizens United and of what appears to be an impending ban on public matching funds for less wealthy campaigns is that speech rights should not be unnecessarily constrained, including by the expansion of any party’s speech by rights another party does not enjoy, then the spending of personal wealth on political campaigns should also be banned.

At the very least, an incremental step could be taken: Congress could require that no candidate for public office use any funds that are in any way connected to government revenues. Any money emerging directly or indirectly from present or past tax credits or non-taxation would be barred.

This would mean that no enterprise whose revenues over a ten year period are linked to a specific tax credit of some kind could donate any of that money to political spending, whether on issues or on candidates. Billionaires who have benefitted from capital gains tax reductions, bankruptcy protection or other public assistance, or who have outstanding business with the federal government —defense contractors, for instance— could not spend to influence elections.

But most importantly, individuals who fit into these categories could not use personal or corporate wealth to seek office. Gone would be the days of public servants starting out with a personal “war chest” of $5,000, while their opponents start with $100 million. Billionaire candidates would have to campaign, would have to win genuine grassroots support, before they could become credible candidates.

Is there any reason anyone in this country could give that would justify the status quo, where the über-rich are automatically viewed as credible, because they can buy their way into the public consciousness?

National Public Radio is a resource that belongs to the American people. It is not government controlled, has no editorial bias in terms of ideology or party, and is the nation’s most extensive network of committed professional journalists delivering reliable information to American citizens, via the radio. Federal funding is a commitment to enabling the American people to benefit from the founding principle that a free and independent press makes us freer and more resilient to the challenges a democracy faces.

Far from wasteful spending, federal NPR funding is necessary to guarantee that the American people have an affordable way to counter for-profit corporate media, much of which filters information through editorial offices with political or corporate biases. The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States specifies that “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press”. The legislation proposed by the Republican leadership in the House of Representatives abridges the freedom of the American people to have their voice heard, and directly limits the freedom of journalists to deliver reliable information to the American people.

NPR is offensive to extremist conservatives and radical partisans with a corporate or right-wing ideological bias, because it tells the truth. When politicians lie, they are found out. When corporations cheat the government or the people, they are investigated. When mainstream for-profit media get even simple stories factually wrong, NPR gives the people depth of coverage and fact-based reporting.

In a political climate where the Republican party, in apparent absence of any constructive idea for how to govern —no useful ideas for climate destabilization, no useful ideas for energy innovation, no useful ideas for job creation, no useful ideas for ending the foreclosure binge, no useful ideas for safeguarding or expanding the middle class—, seeks to establish and to capitalize from flagrantly biased media —like Fox News—, which help the party organize and advertise and which report flat-out falsehoods to further the party interest… an attack on NPR is clearly an attack on the people’s right to know the truth.

Because ordinary people can access public radio, build community centered programming, and use federal funds to make sure the information in their community is not biased, NPR looks to wealthy corporate interests —and to those unfortunate partisans who rely on wealthy corporate interests to help them persuade the people their service might be worth something— like a threat to their campaign of biased, interested information.

The people of the United States actually do need NPR, because there is no other national network of truly independent journalists committed to doing straightforward professional reporting of fact and context. NPR receives donations from listeners, but, like PBS, requires federal funding to allow radio stations in less affluent, less media-rich corners of the country to fund the production of professional quality content and/or licensing of NPR national content.

A radio network does not maintain itself, and a public radio network not funded by corporate commercial advertising does not aim to turn a profit, clearly. The mission of NPR is to make sure the fabric of American news media includes at least one standard of top-quality professional news reporting and radio broadcasting. We have a right to keep that best manifestation of a free and independent press, and no politician serious about the quality of our media or our democracy, could argue otherwise.

As a measure of how serious the individuals pushing this legislation are about —well, about pretty much anything—, when the United States is involved in two wars in Asia, with pressure to intervene militarily in Libya, with communities across the country experiencing a rash of foreclosures and the gutting of funds for their educational systems, food and fuel prices soaring, unstable countries being further destabilized, and an allied monarchy in Bahrain using extreme violence against pro-democracy demontrators… with the 3rd largest economy on Earth having suffered simultaneously the 5th worst earthquake in history, a catastrophic tsunami that has taken thousands of lives and destroyed and entire region and what is already the 2nd worst nuclear disaster in world history, they called an “emergency meeting” to force through legislation barring federal funding to NPR.

The callous and shamefully partisan nature of this proposal is glaringly obvious and should be deeply offensive to any American who cares about democracy as such. If we want to have a real and functioning democracy, we need to have media that tell us the truth, without seeking profit or party gain. NPR is that medium, and what NPR does, its journalists do to make sure we have the truth at our disposal and so can be fully free citizens of a truly open society.

Republican governors have unabashedly joined in their party’s national campaign to undermine the economic recovery and marginalize their people in a concerted effort to harm Pres. Obama and derail his re-election bid. In Florida, the new Tea Partyist governor has refused to accept any federal funding for a high-speed rail project that would have stimulated economic growth and job creation in his state, despite Florida being granted $2.4 billion out of the $2.6 billion needed, and the previous governor having explicitly requested the funds.

Florida may still get a chance to use that $2.4 billion in funding, and to build its high-speed rail system, without the governor having any say in the matter, but the cities who have agreed to back the project will have to join together to bid for the $2.4 billion, which is now open to any state that is planning high-speed rail construction. Ultimately, it will cost more to build the rail project, because of Gov. Scott’s actions, than it would have under Pres. Obama’s recovery plan.

This is just the latest in a long string of such episodes, where idea-starved extremist Republicans try to impress a rudderless Tea Party fringe by defiantly refusing to be part of anything at all, no matter how beneficial, no matter how trivial, that might make Pres. Obama look good. High speed rail is part of the president’s recovery legislation, and would stimulate economic growth, outside investment and job creation, along 10 different corridors across the country, but Republican governors have sworn to one another an oath of allegiance that now bars their constituents from having access to that better, freer, more prosperous future.

Instead, Republican governors and Republicans in Congress have consistently sought to promote policies that will undermine job creation, stimulate waves of layoffs, deprive working people of basic rights and already paid-for benefits, and force people out of their homes. The Republicans in the House of Representatives are now seeking to eliminate all funding for the four key programs Pres. Obama is using to help deliver relieve to homeowners facing foreclosure.

FOX News gleefully celebrated the move with the headline “Republican Seek to Kill Obama’s Housing Relief Programs“. The proposal specifically aims at using the money they would take away from families about to have their homes seized to “pay down the debt”. This is another way of saying the Republicans plan to fund their never-ending mega-taxcuts for the wealthy, by taking money away from taxpayers and the families in need of relief.

In Wisconsin, Michigan, New Jersey, Indiana, Ohio and elsewhere, Republican governors with a venomous view of public service are engaged in a political strategy designed to strip power away from ordinary people, working families and the middle class, and hand it to corporate backers, out of state front groups and the Republican party itself. In Wisconsin, ads run by Karl Rove’s Crossroads GPS (a.k.a. “the secret billionaires club”) and the words of the Republican leader of the state Senate himself have revealed the plot to deny public servants their collective bargaining rights is a political attack on Pres. Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign.

The governor of Michigan, in a move deeply shocking to many, is trying to force through the legislature a bill that would establish emergency rule, literally. Gov. Snyder is seeking emergency powers that would enable him to 1) unilaterally declare a “financial emergency”, 2) disincorporate entire municipal governments, 3) dismiss elected officials with no replacement election to follow, 4) seize control of local civil services, 5) hand taxpayer money, services and POWERS to private, for-profit firms.

Bobby Jindal, in Louisiana, not only has refused funding for housing relief and urban development, and for high-speed rail, he repeatedly sought to undermine the federal government’s access to information about what was taking place locally with regard to the BP spill, sued to stop what would have been an effective measure of oil containment, and imposed on his state a quixotic, scientifically unfounded and now failed “sand berm” barrier against oil infiltration.

The result: the Louisiana coastline has seen oil infiltration (crude oil seeps easily through sand) on a massive scale, and fragile coastal ecosystems have been devastated, both by the failure of the berm project and by the berms themselves, which have impeded marshland ecosystems’ ability to derive needed nutrients from contact with the Gulf of Mexico.

No serious observer can come to any other view than that Bobby Jindal has deliberately engaged in a systematic, political assault on the welfare of the people of his state, in order to hurt the Democratic president, undermine Democratic moderates who are popular in his state, and promote the Republican agenda of shrinking the public sector until it is more or less owned by the wealth backers pushing these ideas on people of mind and character weak enough to be part of this, like Gov. Jindal appears to be.

But that’s almost beside the point. The real problem facing the people of Louisiana, or Wisconsin, or Michigan or Florida, or anywhere these deranged policies are being implemented —deranged because killing job-creation in the middle of a catastrophic nationwide job collapse, specifically resulting from the policies one’s own party has promoted for decades, is not the work of right minds— is whether they will be given an opportunity to debate any of this in the public space.

In Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio and New Jersey, to name a few of the affected states, citizens not enamored of this particular fringe ideology, which is overtaking the whole of the national Republican party, are facing a very serious and very direct erosion of their ability to get their point of view into the public space. While corporate front groups have been granted the right to use unlimited, secret funds from donors with a specific for-profit interest in the outcome of elections, citizens groups, public media, labor unions and other non-GOP groups are literally under legal and legislative attack.

One after another state is now plotting to make poor people pay to vote, imposing a de facto poll tax by requiring all voters to carry a specific form of ID, which for many Democratic-leaning demographics will mean an additional expenditure and a hurdle to casting their vote. In Texas, Gov. Perry’s use of this tactic to manipulate the outcome of elections is so flagrant and egregious, the Republicans there included two waivers: senior citizens and people who hold concealed-carry gun permits. (For those of you not in the know, these are the two demographics with the most consistent and extreme pro-Republican voting record.)e

The Republican attack on ACORN was not an attack on “wasteful spending” or on a “political slush fund”; it was a coordinated, national, partisan assault on a non-profit umbrella organization that helped community groups doing charitable work get the visibility and the funding they needed to operate. And the logic of the attack was clear: ACORN was very good at registering poor, minority, young and first-time voters, all groups that tend to prefer Democratic candidates.

Republicans are unashamed of this campaign to harm groups, individuals and communities that stand up for ordinary people. Their assault on ACORN resulted in comprehensive “defunding” of the national organization, and has emboldened them to speak openly about their plans to drain funding from any organization, including ordinary citizens, that might not favor Republican party rule.

In New Hampshire, the Republican speaker of the state House actually explained on camera that their new voter ID plan was needed in order to counter the tendency of young voters to vote for liberal candidates.

In 2001, the House Republican majority, in connection with White House political director Karl Rove, declared its explicit intent to alter the landscape of American politics, through law, and through electoral engineering, to establish a “permanent Republican majority”, literally planning to establish permanent one-party rule in the United States, with all dissent forbidden either by diktat or by common practice.

In Texas, then national House majority leader Tom DeLay used his political fundraising and national influence to force the Republican-controlled legislature into an illegal redistricting of Congressional districts, to make it easier for Republicans to keep control of the House of Representatives. The move was illegal because redistricting occurs once every decade, based on new census figures, and it had already happened.

DeLay has now been convicted of money laundering and other corrupt activities relating to his misuse of funds. He infamously placed a call to Homeland Security, asking that fighter jets be scrambled to chase down Democratic legislators fleeing the state to deprive Republicans of a quorum needed to pass their redistricting plan.

What is now taking place is the flagrant politicization of all aspects of public service and public policy. In other words, one of the two major parties has adopted, as a national organization, in apparent coordination with extremely wealthy offshoots and non-party groups, the policy that every single act of any one of its members in public office should be directed toward manipulating the landscape of policy, economics, and elections, to benefit the party.

This is a nakedly transparent policy, and has been openly discussed by leading Republicans, from Sen. Mitch McConnell —who declared his intent to devote every aspect of his party’s action in the Senate to destroying Pres. Obama— to Rep. Michelle Bachmann, one of the most incendiary and ill-informed public servants in the country, who spoke of the need to “repeal Obama”, to even more radical figures who have spoken about “Second Amendment remedies” to the tragedy of any election not going to Republicans.

The American people need to stand up for common sense, stand up for common decency, stand up for the universal demand that NO PUBLIC SERVANT EVER USE THEIR OFFICE FOR PERSONAL OR PARTISAN GAIN, stand up for clarity and unity of purpose as a precondition of service in elective office. The American people need to demand that the Republican party correct its course, abandon this campaign to distort our political map to serve the interest of its wealthy backers, and demand an enforceable ethics pledge of every Republican candidate for office that he or she will never use any public office to manipulate the landscape for partisan or personal gain.

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Rachel Maddow reports on the Michigan governor’s legislation giving himself emergency powers, including the power to dissolve local governments, take over cities, unincorporate entire municipalities —the equivalent of erasing them from the political map— and remove elected officials, replacing them with his own unilaterally appointed substitutes.

Last night, the Republican party is Wisconsin decided to shirk the law, ignore a direct warning from the Assembly minority leader that their actions were a flagrant violation of the law, ignore established process and pass a fiscal proposal as if it were not a fiscal provision. The Senate majority leader, responsible for staging and carrying out this maneuver, said openly that the ban on collective bargaining was intended to make it more difficult for Pres. Obama to win re-election.

Last night, when Madison police refused an order from the governor to forcibly remove peaceful protesters from the state capitol building, Gov. Walker allegedly ordered the state police to intervene. Today, upwards of 200 individuals were in fact —and on camera— removed by force from the capitol building, as the Republican-controlled Assembly —run by the brother of the Senate leader, son of the state police director— voted to approve the measure Democrats say was a deliberate violation of the law.

There are serious ethical questions about the specifics of the bill passed today:

1. The same politicians, sworn to serve the people of Wisconsin, previously testified in the legislature that the collective bargaining ban was a fiscal measure, then later voted to pass it as a non-fiscal measure;
2. The procedure used appears to directly violate the state’s open meetings law;
3. There appear to have been inappropriate contacts between top Republicans in the state and wealthy backers, who may have illegally coordinated a propaganda campaign to support the radical legislative action;
4. Gov. Walker appears intent on finding ways to use police action to crack down on dissent, possibly in violation of his oath of office;
5. It appears the text of the bill voted on last night by the state Senate was never made public before the vote;
6. Statements made by politicians involved in the vote appear to suggest their motivation was purely political, an attempt to hijack the legislative process to manipulate the electoral landscape in 2012…

The flagrant ethical and legal violations inherent in the process used to pass this bill into law, with the explicit intent of stripping citizens of Wisconsin of basic rights in order to undermine their organizational influence in elections, is a clear and deliberate assault on the democratic process.

Gov. Walker wants to run Wisconsin without fear of legislative oversight, judicial oversight, or the risk of his party losing ground at the polls. The legislative action taken by the Republican majority in both houses of the state legislature, has been coordinated with Gov. Walker’s push to strip Wisconsinites of their rights and give their party —and wealthy, corporate, out-of-state backers— nearly unchallenged influence in election campaigns.

Gov. Walker is on tape agreeing to take a travel gift from one of the Koch brothers —actually someone posing as one of the Koch brothers—, who have reportedly been pouring millions of dollars into Wisconsin to advertise in favor of Gov. Walker and his radical agenda. The quid-pro-quo connection appears clear, and the crisis of confidence in Wisconsin is exacerbated greatly by Gov. Walker’s repeated use of threats, extortion and intimidation to force his will on the people of his state.

So far, Gov. Walker has threatened, publicly:

• To order the national guard to disperse demonstrators;
• To round up state legislators boycotting the budget plan, by coercive means;
• To surveil and interrogate families of boycotting lawmakers;
• To box Democrats out of other legislative business;
• To fire 12,000 public servants…

He reportedly ordered the Madison police department to forcibly remove protesters from the capitol building last night, an abuse of his office. When refused, he reportedly ordered the director of the state police —whose sons are leading the governor’s effort in the legislature— to intervene. Today, when citizens peacefully demonstrating against Gov. Walker’s plans refused to leave, they were in fact forcibly removed by police acting in Gov. Walker’s name.

Democratic lawmakers said the crackdown was so severe, some of their own elected members of the legislature were being denied access to the building, despite the Republican majority having called them to a vote on the controversial, possibly illegal, proposal to strip public servants of their rights.

The unprecedented action taken last night violated at least one law on the books in the state of Wisconsin. That violation was caught on camera, on live television. There should be an immediate investigation into the closed-door conversations between elected officials and wealthy backers, related to planning this attack on the rights of Wisconsinites.

The Ash Wednesday Ambush, as it’s being called by critics, was absolutely an attack on the virtues and the values that give foundation and meaning to our democratic process. Those who hold public office hold only borrowed authority, granted them for a limited time and within tight constraints, by and only by the consent of the governed.

Gov. Walker, Rep. Fitzgerald and Sen. Fitzgerald, have sought to silence the people’s representatives in the legislature; they have sought to deny access to the press; they have sought to stamp out dissent and to force citizens protesting their actions out of public buildings and off of public land. They have sought to bury any challenge to their attempt to seize power from the people who elected them. They have declared their specific intent to undermine the electoral process and bias the political environment in 2012.

Their actions are an unconscionable betrayal of our nation’s founding principles, a flagrant rejection of their oaths of office, and a shameful assault on the democracy they are sworn to serve. Their actions are extremist and corrosive, and we stand, as a publication, with the people of Wisconsin, in support of their fundamental rights.