ROME ALL OVER AGAIN?

What's been happening on the political scene the past four years has made me so mad and disgusted I could spit tacks, nails, barbed wire (you name the analogy).  This article sums it up pretty well:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/21/mitt-romney-ad-massachusetts_n_1998052.html

We elected a president four years ago and he came into office with high hopes and solid plans to turn the nation around.  Millions, including me, had high hopes.

The opposiiton blatantly set out to sabotage everything that president Obama set out to do -- even denouncing  and standing in the way of things they originally were in favor of and championed.  All to discredit and drive out of office that very president.  And, they were cocky enough to do it while owning the fact of what they were doing.

Now, a great many of my fellow Americans are too dumb to see the subterfuge and the hypocrisy.  They're falling for the lies!  We're in danger of having these lying would-be despots actually pulling it off. 

If they do, America is doomed, as far as I can see.  Like ancient Rome, we'll be headed into fascism driven by theocracy.  Our democratic republic will probably be over -- forever.  What follows will only be a deceitful sham.

Romney would load the federal government with hand picked purveyors of his insane Mormon philosophy.  He'd also let Ryan run rampant with his Catholic doctrine as long as it agreed with his mormonism (much of it does).  I remember the fiasco Ed Mecham brought to the state of Arizona.  Romney would do even worse to the United States of America.  Our standing in the civilized, rational world would go to zilch overnight.

Forget any real freedom of conscience and personal belief if this cabal seizes power!  The same lies and subterfuge seen in this campaign would soon become the modus operandi of our national government.  They'd load the Supreme Court with fanatics like themselves.

Denounce me as an alarmist or whatever you wish.  I stand with Cato, the great Roman patriot and inspiration to Washington and his army, who was so distraught over Caesar's rise to power that he commited suicide by disemboweling himself.  We all know, or should, what happened to Rome.  But, then, not many people like history, and they very well may be doomed to repeat it, as numerous historians have pointed out. 

THAT INDOLENT 47%

Sorry, Mitt.  We just can't seem to keep ourselves from showing up your inane pronouncements.  We're such troublesome debunkers of your stereotypes.

Here I am, at 78, With a carpet repair job booked for Friday afternoon and a wedding ceremony for Saturday.  Maybe another call will come in for earlier in the week.  And, I'm working Aflac as well.  Have to get busy tomorrow making the monthly checkup on active accounts.  I'm so lazy and dependent, you know.  I just can't bring myself to take any responsibility for my own welfare. 

On top of that, can't seem to keep myself off this internet and feel compeled to voice my opinions on so much nonsense and drivel that you and others feel compelled to spout.

Then, there's my little wife, Phyllis.  She's been tossing around ideas for doing something productive as well -- at the ripe young age of 76.  Just this past week, an opportunity dropped in her lap.

For many years, she taught defensive driving classes here in the state of Arizona, evenings and weekends while holding down a regular career job during the day.  She was very good because she set up the state program when she worked for the Arizona Supreme Court and knew it and Arizona traffic laws backward and forward.  I used to go with her and do the paperwork.

Seems the state of Arizona is in deep need of qualified class monitors to go around to defensive driving classes periodically and check up on schools and individual teachers, so she has been offered a position as one of those monitors.

She plans to take it.  It entails three days of preparatory classes in Phoenix to get certified and a good bit of driving around the state.  I will likely accompany her most of the time.  I'm very good at finding locations and programming the GPS.  She, not as much.

So, Mitt, want to comment again about how dependent and irresponsible we of the 47% are?

Incidentally, we have already voted in this election, and not one single vote went to you or any of your theocratic fascist friends.  Go run for Mormon president.  They'd love to have your closed, deluded mind running their so-called "Christian" cult!  It's only a little more stupid than regular Christianity.

THE LIES ILLUMINATED

I've been branding Romney and Ryan as liars.  Some people might take issue with that.

Here's a fact saturated article that states much better than I can exactly why they are liars:  http://www.alternet.org/election-2012/10-things-mitt-romney-and-paul-ryan-dont-want-americans-know?page=0%2C1

I hope some people will take the few minutes necessary to read that article.

EXTOL "LOVE" -- PRACTICE "HATE"

If you read the whole account cited in my last blog, you know exactly what I'm referring to.  Theists can wax eloquent about "love" up until the moment someone dares to call into question anything about their "faith."

As soon as that happens, the fangs and claws immediately appear.  All pretense of tolerance or love suddenly disappears in a flurry of denunciation, vitriol and outright hateful violence.  Nothing is deemed off limits to the most extreme of these fascist-minded idealogues.

If one wants to know what the most extreme cases of human-on-human brutality happen to be, all they have to do is check the records of religiously based pogroms and holocausts.  They are myriad and become especially horrific when another ideology -- politics -- enters into the picture.  That's why our national founders were so insistent on separating those two dangerous mindsets.

Modern extremists set on totally controlling their neighbors and the world chafe under that wise separation provision incorporated into our Constitution and seek any and all crafty means of circumventing and nullifying it.  Chief among these efforts is the seeding of the Supreme Court with "conservative" idealogues who will undermine personal liberty with ideological tyranny.

If you don't think you will be hated if you dare to reveal yourself as a non-believer, just go down to Mississippi and Alabama and publicly try to establish a secular or atheist organization.  Just defend the right of a woman to terminate an unwanted pregnancy and see how fast you will be vilified and ostracized, and even murdered if you get too involved in any organization so dedicated.

Humans are good at saying one thing while emotionally practicing another.  Nowhere is this more pronounced than where religious and political ideology becomes involved. 

Ideology turns fanatic humans into murderous monsters!

ELOQUENT STATEMENT TO THEOCRATIC FASCISTS

"A Greek atheist stands up against Christian fascists.  (Click on this link to read the whole account of her experience which could just as easily have happened right here.)

"I wish I could tell them: I am not a lesbian, but even if I were, what would it matter? I have a husband and a child, but even if I didn’t, what would it matter? I’m not Albanian, but even if I was, what would it matter? I’m not a communist, but even if I was, what would it matter? I don’t believe in God, but what does it matter? Some people have a different opinion about God and Christ and the Virgin Mary — what does it matter? You demand respect for your right to believe in God as you like, why don’t you respect others’ rights to believe in a different way, or not to believe at all?"

The quote above was taken from the Pharyngula blog.  It states very succinctly what I have felt for a long time.

The news is filled with vitriolic attacks which sling supposedly negative terminology around like the waste water it resembles.  "Socialist," "communist," "unchristian," etc., etc.  Name calling has become standard stock in trade in politics -- always trying to create prejudices and then using those subtle prejudices to influence and deceive gullible people.

Because I believe the healthiest economies and the best societies are created through a carefully thought out and crafted blend of capitalism and socialism, I can expect to be denounced as a hated socialist or even a communist.  No thought.  No careful analysis.  My carefully thought out world view is summarily dismissed by utilizing mindless prejudice against a phastasmic boogeyman or "boogeyidea."

I can also expect to be hatefully denounced as a "murderer" because I believe a woman should have the right to practice birth control and end a pregnancy if she feels unprepared to follow through with an unwanted and ill-advised pregnancy.

Instead of my atheism being accepted as the result of careful thought, reasoning and research, I am denounced as some monster with no morals who is totally unworthy of acceptance in civilized society.

Our government has been almost totally paralyzed for nearly four years now by a concerted effort by one party to demonize the other party and its champion who just happens to be the lawfully elected and installed President.  They publicly stated that their goal was to make sure he would not be re-elected.  Many people have forgotten that and blame him for his inability to do more to extricate our nation from the financial catastrophe that same obstructionist party brought about.

Let's get real here!  American presidents are not kings!  They can't rule by fiat!  To get things done, they have to have the cooperation of congress! 

Instead of condemning and thinking they might not vote for Obama, they should be congratulating him on the rather outstanding things he has accomplished against all the naysaying, obstructionism and grandstanding he has had to put up with.

Far too many people (and I have to watch myself in this area) act on emotion, not reason.  That is why negative campaign slogans work so well.  Emotion tends to turn the mind off.  Angry people are not thinking people most of the time.  Many a murderer came to that realization after letting his/her emotional anger precipitate a fatal attack on someone that put them in prison for life or sitting on death row.

Emotions are not evil in and of themselves.  However, they must be based on and held in check by careful thought.  The theocratic fascists of the Republican party know they must get people to feel first and think later (or never) if they are going to win in about three weeks.

I'm hoping enough thought can be generated to offset all this mindless sloganeering.

LIES ARE LIES

Robert Gibbs has stated that Mitt Romney's debate statements were "fundamentally dishonest." 

They sure were, but I prefer a much less "nicey nice" approach in terminology.

THEY WERE LIES!  MITT ROMNEY IS A LIAR!

Barack should have challenged them as such during the debate, and I hope he will do so in the coming debates instead of letting himself be bowled over by the confusing, totally lying change of approach Mitt used.

The whole damn Republican party has become a bastion of lies and liars!!  The "big lie" is their stock in trade!

We've become a nation of put the gloves on and be nice water downers.  Plain speaking is judged "uncouth" in most circles, so we use euphemisms like "fundamentally dishonest" when "lie" would be much more accurate and hard hitting.

Lies are lies, dammit.

Let's speak clearly.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN, REPUBLICAN?

There is no such thing as a Republican party anymore.  It's a total misnomer for what is in fact the American Fascist party. 

I just heard on MSNBC from Rachel Maddow that even though the courts had disallowed the Pennsylvania photo voter ID law, official Pennsylvania state websites still published the draconian rules that struck down law mandated until she and MSNBC called them on it and forced them to change what their website was stating.  They were still trying to intimidate non-republican voters into not exercising their constitutional rights.

I don't care who likes my saying it.  The Republican party ceased to exist a long time ago and has been replaced by a theocratic fascist party which has comandeered the name "Republican."  Their stock in trade is lies, obfuscation and strong arm oppression. 

Romney and Ryan are the fuhrers of that party and just as dedicated to the big lie and oppression as any European fascist ever was.