Ocassional Thoughts of an Independent Progressive Atheistic Humanist
The other day a conservative friend of mine posted a John Adams quote that was a rant about letting people who didn’t own property the right to vote. My friend tried to use to support his argument about our current government system. While Adams did write the words that were posted, taking his words out of context to support your fantasy view of the world could be dangerous.
Here is the quote in question:
Those zany conservatives at the Heritage Action and FreedomWorks groups complained that the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act is unfair to men. Besides the claim that men would lose their right of due process, the groups also complain that domestic violence is redefined into something vague where name calling would be classified as violence toward women. Like all zany conservative conspiracy theories, this one is also false and is only being used to raise money.
Former Republican Senator Chuck Hagel was nominated by President Obama to be the next Secretary of Defense. His confirmation hearing lasted almost nine hours and during that time the Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee decided to throw Hagel under the bus to score points on national security and Israel. Since they won’t block his confirmation this is the only way the GOP can thump their chest and act all indignant outside the usual reasons.
Here’s an example:
Hurricane Sandy damage along New Jersey coastAnother natural disaster and another opportunity for the Republicans in Congress to be dicks about approving federal disaster aid. It happened with the tornado in Joplin Missouri and the recent Hurricane Sandy on the east coast. Republicans say that any disaster aid has to be offset by spending cuts. Not only is the demand hurtful to those who depend on the target of the cuts, the social safety net, but the GOP demand is stupidly irrational. Federal disaster aid comes back as increased tax revenue from spending by restored businesses and residential restoration work.
We’ve had several major natural disasters in the past few years like the tornado that hit Joplin Missouri in 2011 and Hurricane Sandy that hit the east coast in October. Each time Federal disaster relief funds were requested in Congress and each time some Republicans said they would only approve the relief aid if the money was offset by spending cuts elsewhere in the budget.
The Congress, led by the Republicans, where members get free healthcare and a tax payer funded pension, are insisting that Social Security and Medicare must be cut to get a budget deal to prevent a fall off the fake fiscal cliff. Isn’t it great that people who don’t need a social safety net want to cut and gut it for those who do? Isn’t that what America is all about?