TEA PARTY Continues To Create Havoc ... YAY!

In Colorado, Ken Buck formed the third leg of the terrible three -- Rand Paul in Kentucky and Sharron Angle in Nevada, the first two -- as the Tea Party Axis of Evil angles to terrorize the nation and wreack havoc with the political establishment. In a sense, one can say that the Tea Party is getting some wins as a counterinsurgent, counter-revolutionary movement in sliming the millions of voters for change who turned out to elect our first African American president, simply by occupying a vaccuum (90% of life is showing up, as they say). With the administration failing to deliver the change people voted for, the forces of reaction, well funded by corporate money, stepped into the breach like modern-day brown shirts brandishing copies of the Constitution eight years too late, as Gibby bitched about the “professional Left” (“I’m not sure I should take offense at that,” quipped Michael Moore) and the punditocracy elites bemoaned the Left’s impatience with incremental steps (Jon Alter) that look like a sellout to Republicans and corporate interests from where we stand.

And Gibby, it’s not that the President is like George W. Bush. It’s that he’s too much like Adlai Stevenson, the wonkish professorial liberal who twice carried the Democratic banner in the 50s against Dwight Eisenhower -- and lost. The Kennedys mocked him for not being tough enough. In the last century, there were only two Democratic agents of change -- real change: FDR and RFK. President Obama is like neither, although Jonathan Alter may disagree. It’s inconceivable to progressives that Bobby Kennedy would have caved to Republicans and corporate interests as often as President Obama has. Bobby would never have given up on the public option -- ever. And he would have called the Republicans on the carpet for obstructionism and the teabaggers for racism without hesitation or prevarication. Progressives are pulling for President Obama, waiting for more of that Trumanesque fire on the stump, railing (rightly) against a “do-nothing Congress.” We’ve given up on anything approaching FDR or RFK proportions -- which is a shame.

Meanwhile, “numbers guy” Chuck Todd was making silly predictions (if Obama’s candidate loses -- he didn’t ... then, “ekes out a win” -- he didn’t ... in what planet is 54-45% a squeaker? Only in the jaded world of the A-holes at POLITICO) to gin up MSNBC’s ratings with mischief-making. The low-down on the “authoritative” Chuck Todd is whatever he predicts, take the opposite view and you’ll be closer to reality. Todd was last seen mangling an interview with a Republican supply-sider in which he bought the “historical” fantasy that deficits do not grow under Republicans as a result of tax cuts for HIS tax bracket, and that such tax cuts would produce significant jobs and economic activity. Mr. Todd needs serious schooling in economics from Nobel laureate Paul Krugman and Robert Reich. It’s not hard; all he has to do is read Krugman’s analysis of the economic disaster that began with Reagan’s tax cuts for the rich and subsequent exploding deficits. Then, he might mention that Bill Clinton, a Democratic president, raised taxes on the rich, created 22 million jobs, and left GWB a surplus.

Speaking of 2012, Todd joked with a Democratic analyst, I take it you'll have “no horse in this race” (of course not, since the President is surely running for re-election). But it does point to an obnoxious pattern in Todd’s mischief-making M.O., which is to hope for maximum political disruption, and almost wistfully, for a Republican tsunami, because it’s good for his business and bottom line. And for his tax bracket, too. But, in fairness, he’s not any different from the vast majority of the useless punditocracy (with a few notable examples).

If anyone wants to know who’s in it for the right reasons, check out journolist. End of rant.