Political Theatre category archive

The Republican war on women continues.

(With apologies to Neil Young.)

The Camden County, New Jersey, Republican Party has withdrawn support from their state Senate candidate because he repeatedly twitted on Twitter.

Mitsch, 62, a former real estate broker from Merchantville, posted a tweet to his more than 44,000 Twitter followers that read, “Women, you increase your odds of keeping your men by being faithful, a lady in the living room and a whore in the bedroom.” He posted it several times, including most recently on Sept. 2.

(snip)

Earlier this week, Mitsch defended his tweet, telling The Inquirer’s editorial board on Wednesday that it was “a great tip” that “shows the utmost respect for women.”

If the Republican Party pulled support from every candidate who repeatedly said gratuitously stupid, hurtful, or vindictive things, many ballots would be shorter.

Indeed, The CNN “presidential” debates would be virtually depopulated.

Donald Kaul:

I’ve said this before and I’m saying it again: If money is speech then why is bribery illegal? All you’re doing is trying to convince somebody of the worth of your cause by using a form of speech often more persuasive than mere words.

Via The Progressive Populist.

From Peter Bergman.

Right wing hands, that is.

Keith Olbermann discusses the incident in the NYPD hit-and-stay of an observer (not a protestor) of Occupy Wall Street.

The NYPD claims he threw himself under the vehicle.

Watch the video and decide for yourself:

America’s original sin resurges:

While both liberal and conservative Americans are basking in The Help’s candy-coloured fantasy of civil rights victories past, a process of re-segregation is quietly gathering pace, in the place where it counts the most – American schools. According to a 2009 study, US schools are more segregated now than at any time since the 1954 Brown v Board of Education ruling set state desegregation programmes in motion. Figures from the last US census show that the average black or Latino student attends a school with almost three-quarter minority students, while around 40% are educated in schools that are 90%-100% ethnic minority.

The Civil Rights struggle, as it is often called, continues.

Also, this.

Via Kiko’s House.

Axel Caballero, writing in the Guardian, reports on Alabama’s moves to reinstitute slavery and forced labor:

So, here is how it goes. First, the state passes a harsh immigration law. Then, it detains large numbers of immigrants. Third, private prisons (LCS, CCA, GEO) receive fresh inmates. And finally, the artificially created labor shortage is supplied by the new inmates. Does this sound like modern-day slavery to anyone?

Dick Polman considers lure of Herman Cain and find his appeal to simple:

. . . The tea partyers yearn for simple answers, and Cain’s “9-9-9” catechism fits the bill. How easy it all sounds, via endless repetition: Scrap the current federal tax code. Replace it with a 9 percent income tax, a 9 percent business tax, and a 9 percent national sales tax. Better yet, Cain didn’t get the idea from some smarty-pants, fat-resume Ivy League economist in evil Washington, D.C.; quite the contrary, he got the idea from an investment adviser who works for Wells Fargo in Pepper Pike, Ohio, out there in real America. The whole tableau oozes populism.

(snip)

The truth, as already ferreted out by most economists, is that Cain’s 9-9-9 would impose new tax burdens on low-income and middle-income Americans. Which is why a number of prominent conservative organs – including FreedomWorks, the Cato Institute, Americans for Tax Reform (home of Grover Norquist’s never-raise-taxes pledge), and the Wall Street Journal editorial board – have already begun taking their whacks at it.

Matthew 6:5.

Via Balloon Juice.

Leonard Pitts, Jr., considers Occupy Wall Street. A nugget:

Some observers dismiss the protests as “street theater,” an easy charge, given the loopy eccentrics who have been attracted to the movement like iron shavings to electromagnets. On the other hand, much of the antiwar movement, the women’s movement and the civil rights movement (rest in peace, Fred Shuttlesworth) also was street theater, and those seem to have turned out fairly well.

Nothing wrong with street theatre. It gets the attention of the audience.

CLick for a larger image.

In a related story, Shaun Mullen considers Occupy Wall Street. A nugget:

Cantor (R, Tool–ed.) has joined the chorus in denouncing the Occupy Wall Street “mobs” that have taken over Zuccotti Park in Manhattan and city halls and malls elsewhere, accusing them of . . . are you ready for this? Class warfare.

The House majority leader symbolizes more than any other Republican the moral rot at the heart of today’s GOP.

President Obama has sent up to Capitol Hill a jobs creation bill that by any measure is modest but at least begins to address the major reason that the aftereffects of the Bush Recession linger, but Cantor says he won’t even allow the bill to come up for a vote.

Main Street is in deep distress, Wall Street is sipping the champagne of record profits and it still is more important to Cantor and his ilk to be obstructionist than actually help the president govern, a tactical decision that they will come to regret next November 6 when the votes are counted.

This is because while there is anger out there toward Obama, the contrast between the party’s stances on helping the middle class, not to mention the poor, elderly and infirm, could not be more striking, and while a lot of us are pissed off even more of us have retained some perspective. And compassion.