Shouldn't GOP draft Cheney as its candidate?

For the herd of Republican presidential candidates who are desperately looking for a way to throttle Donald Trump, we have a proposal:  oil up Dick Cheney's mechanical heart and draft him as a candidate. It would instantly draw the national media into a new Twilight Zone because, like Trump, Cheney has never been at a loss for dumb things to say. Besides, unlike Trump, who grabs your attention with  theatrical rants, Cheney is Mr. Cool  in projecting his wildest lies. The Republican herd badly needs coolness these days.

It probably wouldn't be a hard sell to recruit Cheney.  He and his daughter Liz have just written a book  titled "Exceptional"  that he could autograph like baseballs along the circuit.   (You'll be hearing more about it on the more exciting TV news talk shows, I'm sure.)

I've only read the excerpts and there's apparently nothing new in it that would cause me to spoil the ending.  For a man who enjoyed five draft deferments because he said he had "other priorities,"  Cheney remains on the top tier of hawks who drove us into the bloody failed invasion of Iraq.  At the time, he insisted that the enemy was in "the last throes" of the insurgency; that the conflict would go "relatively quickly, weeks rather than months";  and  in the end we will be "greeted as liberators". Don't know whether any of that is in the book.

Speaking of liberators, he writes about  the brave Americans who fought in our military battles,  and defends our use of atomic bombs as an example of this country's "fundamental decency."

But he saved his biggest fantasies  for his assaults on President Obama, literally accusing him for ushering in ISIS and everything else  that has gone wrong in the Middle East for centuries.  He frets that in books, tests and classroom instruction   "our children are too often being told that the legacy they have inherited is shameful".

That is partly true, if you consider that the shameful legacy of Iraq only refers to a draft dodger and worse, Dick Cheney.

Yep,  with Trump on the loose the  Republican also-runners could satisfy their own core values with a  freshly laundered   fantasy from Cheney, who is not a fundamentally decent man.

(Reposted from Plunderbund)

On the Renacci-Joyce wingers; Pete Crossland, Rob Portman, Steve King

Now that we won't have  Republican congressmen to kick America  around for at least five weeks, I want to fill in a few blanks from the past week's immigration vote debacle:

Your two GOP representatives from northern Ohio - Jim Renacci and David Joyce - joined the heavy seas'  Cruz revolt by voting for a nonsensical grandstanding substitute bill with zero chance of getting past the Senate.  Both congressmen  have occasionally  been called ''moderates" in the  mainstream  media.. But a glance at their records show they come down squarely on the hard-wrong nutsy side that so pleases the Cruz mob.

So let's not continue the phantom portrayal of them as anything but lockstep wingers.

Renacci is opposed in a Republican designer district by Democrat Pete Crossland.  And when you mention this long-time party  loyalist and officeholder to other Democrats, some just shrug.   Let me tell you about shrugging:  The Democratic Party owes him.  He assumed the party's face-saving role when no other Democrat - even at his urging - would agree to accept the challenge. He didn't think an area with so many Democrats should leave the ballot space blank.  That, alone should wave off the shrugs, unless you are referring to the County Democratic Party these days.

* * * * *

So how did Sen. Rob Portman view his party's collapse in the House to the Cruzers?

He flew out of Washington and eventually turned up Friday at the Ohio State Fair, which has always been a welcome managerie for politicians.  There, the Dispatch reported, he did what comes naturally for GOP pols these days: He blamed President Obama for the humanitarian crisis.    But as with so many of his cautious non-answers about other issues he  said he favored  a policy shift on immigration. Considering that he belongs to a political group on Capitol Hill  that's  frozen in place, that would take years.  Besides,   wasn't it  President Bush who signed the document in 2008 that gave migrants time to state their cases for remaining in the U.S?

(Portman, lest we forget, was Bush's budget advisor, and you know how that turned out.)

* * * * *

And now for some really heavy lifting:

Daily Kos reports that a  House bill to honor Pope Francis for "inspirational statements and action" in advance of  his 2015 visit to the U.S. has met with tepid response from Republican congressmen.

Of the 221 co-sponsors only 19 are Republicans.  According to a Republican supporter of the measure, some of his collegues believe the Pope sounds  too much like Obama,  particulalry when he wants to help people in ways that are "more humane, noble and fruitlful, and which bring dignity to their presence on the earth."

Daily Kos also reminded us that Rep. Steve King, one of Cruz's wacko dittos,  said the U.S. needs the strongest of immigration laws because the border was created by God and any attempt to violate it is  "disrespectful of God".  

King, by the way, lives in Kiron, Iowa (pop. 279) and belongs to the Odebolt Chamber of Commerce.  For God's  sake, if you want to know more, look it up!

Limbaugh playing for bigger stakes against 'Marxist Pope'

Some time ago we discovered that Rush Limbaugh was the GOP's  Great White Whale with a blowhole as big as Grand Canyon.  He once spouted insanely that Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown law student,  was a " slut"  after she was denied an appearance  before a Republican House committee hearing on contraception and religious liberty.

But he may have topped that reckless remark  by referring to Pope Francis as a Marxist.  Rush was not at all pleased that the Pope had called unregulated  capitalism a "new tyranny"  in raising concerns about the poor.

"Somebody has either written this for him or gotten to him. This is just pure Marxism coming out of the mouth of the pope," Rush declared.

Well, we've heard the same things said about Jesus, which is where the Papacy all began.

With Limbaugh, a multi-millionaire  and then some, it's all about money and his Munchkins called dittoheads. He says he's considered becoming a Catholic.  But that's no longer in his future. Now he is playing on a world stage with his assault on Francis. Maybe he is seeking a still bigger audience - not a pun - to fill in a few more listeners for his show.

But with his money, you'd think the time has come at least for hiring  a new writer.  After all, Pope Francis does have  far more listeners.

Sifting through the debris of political madness

Day One - No shutdown...

Dial down the hysteria.  For now. Hundreds of thousands of government workers back on the their  jobs.  Shutdown costs of $24 billion.   America's prestige as a can-do country damaged.  Rush Limbaugh, foaming at the brain, describing a bi-partisan  agreement as an insufferable GOP concession, calling it the worst political disaster in American history.

Closer to home, U.S. Rep. Jim Renacci, who didn't get the memo on the rising floodwaters sinking the GOP,  voted no with 144 other Republicans. The wealthy freshman congressman,  who leap-frogged to Capitol Hill from  a gerrymandered district custom-designed for him, thus confirmed his allegiance to the hard right that has caused mayhem in the Republican Party...

Insurrection among self-styled "freedom loving" anarchists was openly embraced  at the recent anti-Obama gathering at the D.C.war memorial.  Larry Klayman, a lawyer and ultra right-wing blogger who heads an outfit called Judicial Watch, is recruiting  a mob to  rise against the president on Nov. 19. Klayman accused Obama of "kneeling before Al-Qaida"  to the delight of the protesters,  whose speakers included Ted Cruz and Sarah Palin.  "Mr.President," he demanded, "get up off your knees and come out with hands up."  Klayman widened the goalposts  with multi-choice epithets aimed at Obama,to wit:  "Muslim, socialist,  anti-Semitic, anti-Christian, anti-white,  pro-illegal immigrant, pro-radical gay and lesbian agenda."  (You'd think that Presidents Cruz or Palin would quietly urge him to save some of the bile  for their campaigns against Hillary.)

One of the biggest GOP mistakes (as well as that of  some liberal Democrats) was assuming that Obama would cave at some point.  Instead, he tapped the mood in some quarters of solidly standing his ground.  It would have been a disaster for him to give up his health-care reforms in the face of a bunch of unruly Obama haters who ended up shattering the Republican Party. Obamacare was ruled constitutional by the highest court in the land and, regardless of what your dissenting neighbor might think, it's the law.  And as I recall, he was elected twice .  Do you think this theater of the absurd could have been played out with  a white Republican in the Oval Office?

Finally, I was reminded of Albert Einstein's observation as the Republican resistance movement to Obamacare drove the nation to despair until the last moment:  "Great ideas often receive violent opposition from mediocre minds."

Seems about right these days.

Note to Speaker Boehner: Steve King's YOUR problem.

 Rep. Steve King, the Iowa  Republican, had no sooner likened the kids of undocumented immigrants to  "drug mules" with bulging calves the size of "cantaloupes," than some of his GOP colleagues shuddered  at his metaphor.  Doesn't the maniacal  Iowan realize that some Republicans are doing their damnedest to convince Latinos that they are all  brothers and sisters of wholesome Americans? Apparently not, which is why Speaker John Boehner, departing briefly from his sky-is-falling rants against President Obama,  promptly described the remarks as "hateful and ignorant".

Worse yet, Rep. Raul Labrador, Idaho Republican, blamed the media for reporting King's comments.  Ah, but there's a problem here.  The last time I looked, Steve King's House roll call vote on any issue counted as much as Boehner's or Labrador's.  I'd say King, who is among those who have jolted the party's derangement still farther to the Right, is the GOP's problem, not the media's, which doesn't have a vote.

Darrell Issa: Catching up with Louie Gohmert

We get a little spooked when we hear a congressman who is  the Republicans' leading investigator  engtangle himself in the the English language. We could have forgiven my immigrant grandmother for imprecise references to little things like verbs and nouns.  But when Darrell Issa, the Republican chairman and Inspector Clouseau of the House Oversight Committee does it, you have to wonder whether America has moved one step closer to Orwell's Newspeak.

Issa,  a forever showboating right-wing nuisance, has yet to produce anything of substance from his feral probes.  Back in February 2012 , you may remember,  he barred Sandra Fluke from appearing on his all-male panel on contraception, supposing she lacked "expertise". That raised the bar to declaring that condoms and such are only a guy thing.

Now, back in the fetid trenches of Benghazi, Issa insisted  that "an act of terror is different from terrorist actions".

Huh?  Right.   For this profound insight into international terrorism and American unpreparedness  (read: Obama/Clinton deriliction) we have  hauled out the cherished Grumpy Abe Linguistic Lunacy  (GALL)  Award for the congressman.

That will put him still a tad behind  on this day to the Louie Gohmert Award.  But with Issa, you can be certain there will  be more opportunities for him to even the score.

A Portman in the (gay- marriage) storm

Sen. Rob Portman, a dutifully faithful inhabitant of the Party of No, said "yes" this week and you would have thought that he had just endorsed universal medicaid even for the one percenters.  Instead,  he ended his long opposition to gay marriage, thus becoming the first Republican senator to do so.  Do we need further evidence that Republicans on Capitol Hill have all arrived from the same hatchery?

Portman, an Ohioan,  was clearly influenced to change his mind by the fact that his 21-year-old son Will is gay - a revelation that young Portman advanced to his family a couple of years ago.  But it wasn't until lately that Rob  finally decided that maybe gay marriage isn't such a ghoulish idea after all now that one's sexual preference is shown to be non-partisan and even all in the family.

The response, as you might expect,  has ranged from one end of the political spectrum to the other. Doug Preisse, the gay chairman of the Franklin County Republican Party, told the Columbus Dispatch that he is "pleased and proud" of Portman.  On the other hand,  Speaker John Boehner, who has been in a snit about a lot of things, disagreed with the senator's about-face.

One of the papers that arrives on my breakfast table every morning did see something positive in Portman, declaring in a front-age headline that his new position could mean that  he's a Republican "open to change".  The analysis by Henry Gomez, the Plain Dealer's politics writer, was largely friendly and even noted that Portman was once the reputed trusted economic advisor to George Bush the Second.

As we rummage through the ruins of Bush's economic catastrophy, I doubt that Portman is eager to be reminded of his role.

It is now fair to ask that if the senator's son weren't gay - as are  many sons and daughters  across the land - would he be so willing  to  change his mind?   Let me stretch  my neck way out and say that in this instance, his new form followed function for Portman as a caring father.

And I doubt he will be left  without scars by the social conservatives who control the party at its aorta.  Before his announcement, the senator tweeted back on March 8:  "Today is the last day of National Invasive Species Awareness Week.  It's a great way to focus attention on an important issue for Ohio."

He just did. All the way to his Republican colleagues on Capitol Hill.

GOP: Obama socialist, communist, Hitler,Stalin, or what?

There's nothing more effective in advancing the  Republicans toxic mental breakdown than a speech  by President Obama.  An occasion such as the annual  State of the Union address, first administered by Obama in 2009,  has been  the party's proven emetic ever since, although the response  seems to have gotten  even worse this week.  Struggling to find something imaginative to say, Fox News' iconic analysts even questioned the news value of a 102-year-old woman's efforts to vote in Florida.

You sense a pall of desperation over the GOP brood as they resort to their familiar assault weapons as a means of replacing serious policy with quackery.  Even before the speech, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina referred to Hillary Clinton as a murderer and threatened more nastiness on the Benghazi issue.  We should probably excuse this sorrowfully whining  guy because it is being widely reported that he could face a stiff challenge in the Republican primary  from a Ron Paul libertarian loyalist.

Some other expletives  from the Right:

"Dictators such as Hitler, Stalin and Obama" (Limbaugh).

"A Castro-like-speech" (Conservative author Mark Levin on Fox)

Obama's gun-control efforts a "disaster":  (Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe)

Obama nominee Chuck Hagel may be on  the payroll of overseas radicals (Texas Sen. Ted Cruz)

Obama is against free enterprise (read: dictator) obsessed with raising taxes (Florida Sen. Marco Rubio)

But none of this rises to a higher intellectual level than Fox News Psychiatrist (honest!) Dr. Keith Ablow,  who unpleasantly accused Obama of being "psychologically predictable".

"He does not surprise." Ablow   opined.  "Having been abandoned as a boy by his father and then his mother, only to then learn that his grandmother feared people of his race, he seems inherently to distrust initiative and intention and to place his trust only in the collective."

Sounds a lot like a reference to a socialist or communist to me.   I wonder how much they pay Ablow to give Fox News such a much-needed soaring sense of panache.  I also wonder whether they'll get around to having him do the 50-minute hour on the  couch for Limbaugh.

Life on Capitol Hill: Fibber McGee's closet

Considering  the great number of people in Washington who are unhappy these days, you have to wonder if somebody didn't open up Fibber McGee's bulging closet to let them all pour out in a messy heap.

When was the last time that you heard a Republican congressman from New York (Peter King) denounce his GOP colleagues for delaying a vote on Federal funds for his Sandy-stricken constituents?  He even wants to deny them campaign money when they come to New York  to pass the hat.

When was the last time a New Jersey Republican governor (Chris Christie) described the Republican House delay as "inexcusable"?

On the other side of the aisle, President Obama has been loudly assailed from both reaches of the political spectrum - liberal and conservative - for the deal that drew the nation back from the fiscal cliff. (I used to hear politicians say that when you have become the  target of both sides, you must be doing something right.)

President Truman had the clearest insight into Capitol Hill free-for-alls:

"If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog."   

* * * * *
Note: My column about the forlorn news publishing industry has been posted on Plunderbund 

The sad public meltdown of John McCain

From CNN comes this sign-of-the-times testy response by John McCain to a CNN reporter who asked him why he missed a briefing on Benghazi:

"I have no comment about my schedule and I'm not going to comment on how I spend my time to the media," McCain said.
Asked why he wouldn't  comment, McCain grew agitated:  "Because I have the right as a senator to have no comment and who the hell are you to tell me I can or not?"

Sadly for the old soldier who insists on making a fool of himself with his bitter post-election rants  against the President, his meltdown continues in full view of the public.  Maybe it would help if his friends removed the mood ring from around his brain.  After all, no one has appeared more on TV as a guest than...McCain.

                                                                     * * * * *

Why do we need   to know that Paula Broadwell, Gen. Petraeus' paramour, has only 13 pct. body fat?

                                                                       * * * * *

Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, a Republican known for his colorful exercise of the English  language, insists the GOP ought to search seriously for answers to its defeat by beginning with a proctologist.  The party can use a few laughs these days in its darkest hour.

Another Summit elections board deadlock?

The Summit County  Board of Elections meeting on Tuesday could  provide one more chapter in the ongoing Theater of the Absurd for the early voting issue.  The 6th Circuit  Court of Appeals in Cincinnati set the stage for more pratfalls by the GOP contingent on the board when it  said that although early voting was OK, it was up to the local boards to decide whether they wanted to open their doors the week end before the election.

Given the state-leading deadlocks on the Summit Board, the appellate ruling  could very well provide the two  Republican members with just the excuse it wanted to block minorities from casting early ballots during that final critical  weekend.  A 2-2  tie would thrust the issue into the lap of the very person who created the problem in the first place, the Caesar-like Republican Secretary of State Jon Husted.

When Wayne Jones, a Democrat, recently called for a vote on the extended week end hours, Republican Ray Weber, County Republican boss Alex Arshinkoff's surrogate, walked away from the table, saying there was no quorum to vote on it in the absence of Arshinkoff, who is recovering from injuries sustained in an auto accident.

There's no certainty that Arshinkoff is well enough to return to the board on Tuesday, so Weber may again deliver the dagger to the Democrat's proposal.

Isn't  this fun?  Trouble is, folks, now that the Republicans'  guardians of democracy can no longer malinger in their insistence on wiping out fraud where none exists, they are hanging over the cliff with other con jobs  to win the presidential election.

C'mon, you vote purifiers.   I've played enough poker to know when somebody is bluffing to win the big pot.  Considering the guys sitting around the poker table  in my hometown, you fellows are no more than troublesome amateurs.

The desperate hours continue to mount for GOP

It hasn't been a good couple of weeks for Mitt Romney's  Comeback to Bush Team.  Aside from the poll numbers, there have been a lot of conservatives screaming at Mitt, churlishly  accusing him of running an incoherent  unbusinesslike campaign.  He might even have to call an ambulance to send a campaign lacking mental health insurance  to an emergency room.

The Republicans, for example, have found no way to shed the image of being Akinistas since the Missouri congressman   damn well stayed in his senate race despite pleas from apopleptic party members.  Heavens, it wasn't that long ago that Reince Priebus, the always befuddled GOP national chairman, adamantly rejected any thought of a party endorsement  of Todd Akin , telling a reporter:  "No,  no , no." But on second thought, Riebus now says that since the party couldn't persuade Akin to withdraw, it will endorse him as the gateway to a Republican takeover of the Senate.

And talk about panic!  With voters ignoring the GOP's labeling of Obama as a socialist-communist-unAmerican-alien-cheater, Romney surrogate John Sununu  told Sean Hannity that the president was "absolutely lazy and detached." (Lazy?  In this context, I'll let you decode that one.)  Sununu said it was Obama's fault that Chris Stevens, American ambassador to Llbya,  was killed because Barack didn't attend  CIA briefings.  On the other hand, Sununu credited an alert George W. Bush with taking a keen interest in the briefings to protect America's security.  As he did in the lead-up to 9/ll, right?

UPDATE:  Almost forgot. Mike Huckabee told his Fox News audience that President Obama should be impeached for "lying" about the Libyan attack.  So I ask you:  Is that any way for a former Baptist preacher to show Christian love and forgiveness to a fellow-man - even by a dead-ender like Huckabee?

Scarborough: The GOP is "incredibly stupid"

Morning TV host Joe Scarborough, the former Republican congressman from Florida, is incensed by Todd Akin's "ligitimate rape" comments and complained that he's weary  of his party being called "incredibly stupid."

Lay off, Joe.  That's my line, all the way down to the county level.

But thanks for trying.

Reince Priebus: GOP's wannabe Jon Stewart

Readers,  what would we do without Republican National Chairman Reince Priebus offering us comic relief from the otherwise dreary narrative of  the party's election year playbook?  I mean, he's the megaphone of the national party and there he was telling Wolf Blitzer (who isn't that exciting himself) that  Rep. Allen West was "one of the most  dynamic new Republican stars in our Party...He's got a bright future."

That was  the chaiman's side-splitting response to  Blitzer's question about West describing Obama as a slave boss. Or as West put it earlier about Obama: "He'd rather you be his slave and be economically dependent on him."

Pressed by Blitzer to take the thought further, Priebus declared, "Allen West is an important member of Congress from South Florida.  I'm not going to throw Allen West in a ditch."

Funny that he should refer to West as a dynamic  Republican  star when the same rising star said recently that there were at least 80 or so Communists in Congress!.  On to the ditch, I say!

Roberts: The Republicans unmentionable justice

 

Although the Republican leadership (?) has had very little to say about Chief Justice John Roberts, who was considered one of the good ol' boys in the conservatives' family, the party's raucous  Noise Wing is having a nervous breakdown over  Roberts' "betrayal".  Very shortly you will see IMPEACH ROBERTS  bumperstickers and torturered versions of it on Tea Party placards wherever three or more anarchists assemble.  (Or possibly on the door to Cuyahoga Falls Mayor Don Robart's office, now that he has lovingly cast himself in the cradle of the Tea Partiers' arms.)

Such  hostility toward a Republican chief justice has happened before.  That was back in the 1950s when racists and anti-communists joined  their attacks on Chief Justice Earl Warren, calling for his impeachment on billboards and other public places. Their grievance: Warren's progressive positions on desegregation as well as  the rights of criminals.  As we know, their virulent  campaign didn't work.  Nor will today's assault  on Roberts.

Still, for the other side, Roberts is a double windfall.  He not only  shocked the pundits and the right-wing panderers in sustaining the health care mandate.  He offered the Democrats a rare opportunity to praise a Bush appointee to the Supreme Court.  Can you imagine how much worse it would have been if a liberal chief justice had saved the health plan?  I don't want to think about it.

It was often said that only Richard Nixon's  own  fixation against the Red World  could have steeled him against charges of treason as he headed to China  - the first president ever to do do - to open relations between the U.S. and Chairman Mao. Considering the state of anti-Communist fervor in this country at that time , inflamed by the late Sen.  Joe McCarthy, a Democratic president who would have dared to go to China  on a diplomatic mission would have been barred from returning to these shores.

In Ohio, the current response from the GOP mandarins was hardly surprising:   Now that the milk has been spilled, there was only one solution:  Throw out President Obama in November and repeal the law.  With what?  They don't say. But what else can a senseless party of hollow suits, from Romney on down, say?

Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor, who also serves as the director of the Ohio Department of Insurance, has already rejected an insurance exchange under the law, arguing that she doesn't have enough information from the Feds.  A woman in her lofty position could ask, don't you think?

Meantime, Atty. Gen. Mike DeWine, who has staked his  reputation  as a minor legal scholar on his belief that the mandate is unconstitutional, was among the AGs who joined the lawsuit  that drove  the issue to the Supreme Court.  He told  the Associated Press that the health care reform law will be the "preeminent issue of the presidential campaign". He  said he will continue  to fight the law because it compels people to "violate their religious principles".  He's been wrong before.  He was the Romney supporter during the GOP primaries who jumped ship and endorsed Rick Santorum when he erringly  concluded that Santorum would be the party  nominee.

Religious principles? Oh, now we're getting to the bottom of this, which leads me to wonder whether the AG wants to serve as the state's top lawyer or as a robed bishop or preacher.

The coming months will be pretty  ugly.  If totally senseless, too.


P.S. The A.P.'s long wrapup of the comments of Ohio Republicans did not contain a single mention of  Justice R-----s.    

Mourdock leads way as the only way

ARE YOU READY for it,  America?  The Indiana voters, formerly known as Republicans, have pushed the Party of Lincoln over the cliff.  They replaced Richard Lugar, a grey eminence of the old GOP, with a truculent Tea Partier, state Treasurer  Richard Mourdock.  Who?  Never mind. The name could be generic fringe, for all that matters. In the teabaggers ascendancy to power, they have now become the other half of the two-party system with the old GOP gasping in extremis.

That's not as crazy as it sounds.  The remnants of Republican moderates have left the stage and those who haven't  don't dare question anything about the intruders, unless it's by gaslight. Mourdock has already forewarned conscientious objectors on either side of the aisle that the Tea Party mentality is in supreme command with no margin for compromise even, I suppose, on dunking one or two lumps of sugar in the morning coffee. Aglow in his landslide victory, Mourdock was on Fox News charting the Draconian course that he believes lies ahead to Congress. If his ilk prevails,  Congress, which should represent the needs of  America, will be paralyzed by deadlock for years to come.  There will be, in Mourdock's words, no compromise.  None.  A graphic clue:  he opposed the bailout of the auto industry without which an enormous number of Hoosiers would have lost their jobs.

In his concession speech, Lugar  captured the essence of a Mourdock mindset:

"In effect, what he has promised in this campaign is reflexive votes for a rejectionist orthodoxy and rigid opposition to the actions and proposals of the other party.  His answer to the inevitable roadblocks  he will encounter in Congress is merely to campaign for more Republicans who embrace the same partisan outlook.   He has pledged his support to groups whose prime mission is to cleanse the Republican Party of those who stray from orthodoxy  as they see it.  This is not conducive to problem solving and governance."

Why Paul Ryan et al need the poor

THE CURRENT crop of Republican pols must count their blessings every minute of the day that there are poor people in America. Where else would they turn with what they describe as "bold and gutsy" proposed budget cuts?

There's no better evidence of the GOP's class warfare on the poor than Paul Ryan's budget that was quickly endorsed by McMitt Romney. It hones in on cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, education - these and other Federal programs that try to sustain a semblance of survival for the folks at the lower end of the economic ladder. But as the late Ohio Gov. Jim Rhodes was heard to say when he faced complaints about the state's shoddy underfunded mental health system - "Those people don't vote anyway."

But wait. People making more than $1 million would get a tax cut of $265,000 with an after-tax income rise of 12.5 pct. Need I add that people down the ladder would not enjoy relative benefits. Half of the those earning between $20,000 to $30,000, according to a report in Forbes, "would get no tax cut at all."

Corporate tax rates would be reduced to 25 pct. from 35 pct. But as Romney has told us, "Corporations are people". Unfortunately, the Republican tax proposals do not regard a lot of people as corporations.

While we're on the subject of Romneyana, when I hear his daily campaign gaffes, I always wish that I knew the first person who said:

"If you don't know anything, it's hard to learn anything else."

I know. You could say the same about the others in the crowd. But he may be headed for the nomination. Fair warning.

Limbaugh's landfill is overflowing

WHAT A SPECTACLE! I refer, of course, to the ugly meltdown of Rush Limbaugh, who delights in his slanderous attacks on Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke as a "slut" and "prostitute" while demanding that she provide videos for her alleged sexual encounters! It is the latest political porn from Limbaugh. This, from the guy who as early as 1994 was chosen by GOP congressional conservatives as an "honorary member" of their caucus. But by the looks of things, that, too, is hardly the worst of it. Rush is actually the heart and soul of the Republican Party, and their leaders would agree if they had an ounce of courage to confirm it as we head into the

Super Tuesday GOP primaries.

His intrusion into the campaigns' narrative has drawn the the two Abbot and Costello frontrunners - McMitt Romney and Mc.Rick Santorum - into offering silly, don't-

-bother-me responses. "It's not the language I would have used," shrugged Romney as though he was objecting to a distasteful dressing for his artichoke salad. If not that language, then what other one? He didn't say. Santorum said only that the choice of words was "absurd", but absurdity is not the same as outright slander. John Boehner's aide said the Speaker described Limbaugh's comment as"inappropriate," but added that was also true of the Democrats' trying to raise money from the viral controversy. The round-the-clock primal partisan, Boehner always try to draw blood from the other side.

Interesting how these guys who are forever accusing President Obama of being soft on our overseas enemies cannot solidify their spines to stand up to their honorary congressional member.

No one should be surprised that the Fox folks immediately circled the wagons around Rushbo by deflecting the issue away from birth control, while isolating the debate as solely a religious freedom matter. Echoing the maniacal Limbaugh, Bill O"Reilly accused Sandra Flute of wanting to have others pay for birth control with company-paid insurance. Huffed Dr. O'Reilly (father of two) that birth control was in no way related to health, while Viagra, which was OK with him, dealt with real male health problems. (He said what ?!?!?)

Well, some of Limbaugh's sposnors , including Dan Gilbert, the owner of Quicken Loans Inc. and the Cleveland Cavaliers, has now reversed himself as the kitchen got hotter and withdrawn his ads from Limbaugh's syndicated radio show. But we would be more impressed if Limbaugh's fearful minions in the GOP told him that enough is enough. Fat chance. It's tough to give up your pre-Jurassic notions.

Christie's obesity finally noticed

NOW THAT THE "class warfare' rattle has paused for a good 15 minutes among the GOP presidential candidates, the media have turned to Chris Christie to reinvigorate the narrative. The story can now be told that the ample New Jersey governor is...um...obese. Not just obese, mind you. Morbidly obese! That, plus asthma attacks, and you have a non-presidential candidate no matter how much his Republican half-loonies want none of the above who are current.

If I may speak from experience, I'd say that Christie's resistance to a national candidacy is probably the wisest decision he will ever make. As one who has labored through several presidential and gubernatorial campaigns, I will trouble any disappointed Christie fans out there with my doubts that he could survive the merciless grind. As a much younger and able-bodied political reporter, I still ended up in traction and other therapy for months with painful back spasms that forced me to write my columns face-down on the living room floor with the typewriter inches from my chin.

For reporters, such stress, bad food and 20- hour days without week-end breaks still had a slight advantage over the candidates. No one cared whether our clothes were a disaster or whether we didn't trouble ourselves with a comb. Ill-tempered? So were our working colleagues. In other words, we didn't have to look pretty and sound presidential in front of an audience.

A politically incorrect way to describe Christie is that he is just plain perspiring fat. If a tough presidential campaign wouldn't imperil him, a lot of other health issues could send him to the emergency room at any moment on the trail. Let's leave it at that, since he seems to understand that more than everyone in his cheering section. Way to go, governor.

And the Republican nominee isn't...

WHILE MANY OF us enjoyed a perfect weather week end of walking, digging, mowing. Marathon running or poring over the Sunday New York Times crossword, there was another event or two that consumed the pundits with new lines of chatter: Herman Cain, the widely described pizza mogul, won the Florida straw vote and Mitt Romney, who was clobbered by Cain, won Michigan. If you've been foolishly keeping score, that gives Cain, Romney and Michele Bachmann (have you forgotten the Iowa outcome already?) each a straw vote victory as they slog for the Republican presidential nomination.

And once again, we are witnessing the media nonsense to be the first to forecast the winner with these meaningless annoyances with the presidential election still 13 months away.

Historians tell us that the first such straw vote occurred in 1824 when reporters from the Harrisburg Pennsylvanian threw straws into the air to determine which way the political winds were blowing. Obviously that was preferable to spinning bottles that could have hurt someone had they been sent aloft.

But what good is a pre-primary campaign if you can't have a front-runner? So far, we've seen mentioned as nominee-designates Sarah Palin, Mitch Daniels, Mike Huckabee, Tim Pawlenty, Michele Bachmann, Mitt Romney, Rick Perry and Fred Thompson. Whoops. Thompson's 15 minutes of media speculation was four years ago. Nowadays he's coming at us on TV with mortgage commercials in a reassuring voice so much like Dr. Welby's.

It is, however, of passing interest that the conservative folks who were dumping on Romney are now out for a quick end to Perry's dream. Brit Hume , the Fox guru, accused Perry of "throwing up" during the last debate. Words like "collapse" and "weak" were tossed about by the Fox panel that vivisected Perry. It was enough to make him return to sheep-farming.

Others are saying it's time for Chris Christie to reconsider, but that may be like waiting for Godot. Meantime, as puzzles go on warm autumn afternoons, I prefer the big one in the Sunday Times.