Republican Jackass of the Week

Meet Senator Thom Tillis, Republican (what else?) of North Carolina.

We've heard a handful of Regressive Republican rightwingers in Congress, and their teleprompter-reading puppeteers on Fox, suddenly declare this week that they're against basic childhood vaccinations. Yes, the ones that all but wiped out polio, measles, chicken pox and other horrific diseases in this country.

Now one of these science-challenged righties has stated he wants to eliminate -- maybe that's an unfortunate choice of words -- he wants to repeal health department laws mandating that restaurant workers must wash their hands after taking a dump.

Too many regulations, he says. Too restrictive.

Tillis actually states he's looking to "reduce the regulatory burdens" on businesses with this bizarre brainstorm. I'm wondering how long before he or one of these troglodytes will use the old chestnut, "How do we know there actually are germs? We can't see them."  I'm betting Sarah The Quitter will use that one.

These two examples perfectly illustrate where these Libertarians and Tea Baggers go off the tracks into Crazyland, with their irrational hatred of basic regulations.

Tillis said he doesn't care if restaurants don't mandate handwashing after using the restroom, "as long as they post a sign stating that it's not required."

So what this dumbass doesn't realize is that to eliminate the "burdensome regulation" of requiring handwashing, he'd have to create a new regulation requiring a sign stating this.

Little-known senator from North Carolina, Thom Tillis, forcing his way into the public consciousness through his own special brand of insanity, and earning the coveted title of Republican Jackass of the Week.

More here.

Why It's Important to Vote in Midterm Elections

Voting for president is important, fun, makes you feel good, etc.

But skipping the midterm elections can have disastrous consequences. After a record-breaking turnout in 2008 resulting in the overwhelming election of Barack Obama, millions of Progressives skipped the midterm elections of 2010. The result? A Regressive republican takeover of the US House and a loss of Progressive seats previously held by Democrats in the US Senate.

In addition, sitting back and allowing Regressives to load your state House and Senate with Republicans will result in horrendous laws and redistricting -- gerrymandering of voting districts that can make it almost impossible for the opposing political party to win for decades.

Just look at what happened in North Carolina. It now has a Regressive republican House, Senate and governor -- which means they can and will do anything they want, unopposed.

A quick look at some of the regressive, repressive bills that have sprung up since their takeover in North Carolina:

• Regressive republicans have introduced a bill to establish an official state religion. That one alone should have you terrified.
• Stooping slightly so as to allow the irony to fly right over their heads, they then introduced a bill to ban Sharia Law
• They've passed the country's most extreme abortion restriction bill
• They've cut funds for public education
• They've eliminated the estate tax, cut taxes for the rich, and shifted the tax burden onto the middle class and the poor in the state
• They've enacted the most restrictive voter suppression laws in the state, severely limiting registration drives, cutting voting hours, cutting early voting days, and allowing any "vigilante poll observers" from any district to challenge, on the spot on Election Day, any other North Carolina voter in any other district. This means any Klan member or Fox watcher can hang around any polling place to challenge -- create problems for -- any minority voter in any district.

Midterm elections are coming up in just over a year, in November of 2014. That's sooner than you think. These Regressives have all got to go, in every state.

Republican Jackass(es) of the Week

North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory (R-what else?) decided to go ahead and sign a voter suppression bill that's designed to stop the rampant voter fraud going on in that state (which has hovered around 0.001% over the last 3 decades).

Yes, another attempt to fix a problem that doesn't exist.

It's Pat.

And yes, another attempt to disenfranchise minorities, the young and the elderly -- all those who traditionally vote for Democrats.

It imposes strict voter picture ID requirements, drastically cuts early voting by about a week, kills state-sponsored voter registration drives, and repeals same day registration.

I've yet to hear how cutting a week of early voting also cuts voter fraud. Do those one or two voters each year who are convicted of voter fraud always vote early? Do they spring for plastic surgery so they can match someone else's picture? Of course this is nonsense. But not to North Carolina's Regressive governor and legislature.

The state is offering "free IDs" at DMV locations -- free in this case meaning it will cost taxpayers an estimated $800,000 to furnish these IDs to the approximately 300,000 people without acceptable picture IDs. Of course, the people this bill targets -- the poor, the elderly, minorities and students -- will have to spend money and a whole day shlepping around town to obtain birth certificate copies and wait in line at the DMV for these "free" treats.

But there is some good news. Just hours after the governor signed this voter suppression bill, lawsuits were filed. The ACLU of North Carolina and the NAACP of North Carolina filed suit claiming the bill violates the Constitution's equal protection clause and what's left of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

This same governor recently signed bills that would reduce jobless benefits, reject the Medicaid expansion under Obamacare, cut school funding, tighten restrictions for abortion clinics in the state, and loosen restrictions on concealed-carry permits in bars and restaurants. Excellent choice there, mixing guns and alcohol. What could possibly go wrong?

How do the residents of North Carolina feel about this guy? Not so good.

A recent PPP poll shows his approval rating badly underwater: 39% approve, 51% disapprove.

North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory, our Republican Jackass of the Week.

And Dishonorable Mention goes to Representative Paul Stam (R of course) also, coincidentally, from North Carolina.

This genius doesn't like new school testing requirements for children that June Atkinson, the superintendent of schools, has devised, so he stated she should "stick to her own knitting."

A tad misogynistic there, Paul?

North Carolina: New Champ in Voter Suppression Laws

They're at it again. This time it's North Carolina that's leading the nation in voter suppression laws.

Suppressing the votes of minorities, the poor and the elderly has been the Republican goal in many states over the last few years with varying results: in some states it seemed to work, while in others, like in Florida during the presidential election of 2012, blacks, hispanics, young people and retirees refused to give up, causing a backlash to these tactics -- as well as 7 hour waits at the polls.

Now that the Supreme Court has eliminated a major part of the Voting Rights Act (the part that mandates states with a long history of discrimination must first obtain federal permission to make changes to their voting laws), many of these rightwing red states are brazenly enacting the changes to their voting laws that were prohibited until the recent ruling.

And now North Carolina is enacting what's been called "the most sweeping anti-voter law in decades."

Among the changes:

Apparently signing voter suppression laws is fun.

• Requiring government-issued photo ID cards to vote (but disallowing student IDs, public employee IDs, or those issued by public assistance agencies)
• Banning same-day registering to vote
• Prohibiting paid voter registration drives
• Shortening the number of early voting days
• Allowing any "vigilante poll observers" to challenge anyone else's right to vote on the spot, and giving them new powers to do so
• Ending pre-registration for 16- and 17-year-olds

 Rightwingers who praise these new draconian rules that target mostly Democratic voters claim it's to end "voter fraud."

But guess how much voter fraud goes on in this state? One percent? Two percent? Three percent of the vote?

Not even close.

One-thousandth of one percent. That's right: 0.001%. In 2012, there were 121 allegations -- not proven instances, but allegations -- of voter fraud. That's out of 7,000,000 votes cast.

0.001%.

Rightwing Governor Pat McCrory said last week he'd sign the bill into law, as well as one that drastically limits the number of women's health clinics and abortion clinics. Both voting and having an abortion are legal, Constitutionally-protected rights. But that doesn't mean these far rightwing nutjobs will try to inflict their will on tax-paying Americans by throwing as many stumbling blocks in the way as possible.

So what if you're raped and want an abortion, and the closest clinic is now 300 miles away? So what if you'd like to vote, which is your right, in an upcoming election, but because you live in a minority area, there are half as many voting machines, half as many early voting days, and lines that are 9 or 10 hours long?

The only way to end this problem is to brave those long lines and vote out every Regressive Republican who wants to inhibit any of your Constitutional rights.

Republican Jackass of the Week

Meet Edgar Starnes.

Here is a man who is so full of Christian love and Christian goodwill that he just can't help himself -- he wants to force his wonderful Christian religion on everyone in his state.

Yep. Welcome to North Carolina, the only state in the history of the USA that will have its very own, official, state religion.

I'll wait until you stop laughing.

Okay now? On with the story.

Seems like Ol' Edgar here never heard of that there dern ol' Constitution, pro-hibitin' the establishment of religion.

(Sorry. Whenever I think of one of these old redneck types, all I hear in my head is that old commercial where a hillbilly yells, "Yahooooo! Mountain Dew!" Nonetheless, I'll get back to writing in regular English now.)

See, Edgar done thunk -- er, Edgar thought he could get around the "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion" clause because Congress wasn't establishing a religion on a federal level, the state of North Carolina was. See? Isn't that clever?

I guess Edgar never got up to the 14th Amendment, which basically says that no state shall make or enforce any law which would abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the country, or their life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, blah blah blah.

It means no local Jackass can overrule the US Constitution, plain and simple.

It had zero chance of ever passing.

It had zero chance of being deemed Constitutional, since, for over 100 years, the Supreme Court has ruled that the First Amendment does indeed cover state governments.

And the bill was withdrawn yesterday by the Speaker of the North Carolina House of Representatives.

But it was fun while it lasted. 

Edgar Starnes, Republican Jackass of the Week. Now back to regular programming...