Asking: What Would Charlie Do?

Divide and Conquer

It's all they know. Charlie Manson wanted absolute power. He was willing to murder or have others murder for him, complete random strangers, in order to, in his twisted mind, have a race war spark up and set Whites against Blacks. "Helter Skelter" was his mission.

He figured that the races would fight and tear each other down until both were so weak, that all he had to do was stroll in and take over what was left.

Opportunity Squandered

It seems that the GOP has taken a few pages from the Playbook of Charlie Manson. Their wingnut conspiracies, laughable at best, being touted on major network/cable media as if valid.

The GOP had an opportunity to distinguish itself as NOT the party of Bush-Cheney and all the hideous baggage that comes with that, but as hard-working, team spirited, ready to work with the new Administration to start fixing some major problems, and building our nation back up, better than before.

They could have been a part of that. But they chose instead to snarl, bite, sabotage, sulk and become the party of "NO". They offered a counter budget proposal that had no numbers in it. Just tax breaks for the very wealthy, and perhaps, a few pennies for you and I. A 14 page document (including cover and backing) with NO numbers! Waved on high, at a press conference, as their 'Alternative budget.'

Health Care, which would make our nation able to compete with all the other nations who presently have the advantage of National Health Care, is the target they are aiming at now. They have no alternative to offer. In fact, after touting they would have one, they then proudly proclaimed, they didn't have to offer one. They just want this one to fail.

More importantly, they want it to fail so they can bring down the most intelligent, articulate, visionary president of our lifetime. "It will be his Waterloo..." Senator Kane said in his teleconference with other Republicans.

As this battle for power plays out, people are losing their jobs, their homes, their insurance. People are dying. The GOP is willing to allow random people to die so that they can have this war between themselves and one man.

To add to the noise, is a constant bleating of wingnuts and their fear conspiracies. "Terrorist, Muslim, Angry Black Man..." which now devolves into the outright "Racist!" being screamed from the airwaves by some of the biggest racists ever to grab a microphone. Bad enough those rife buzzwords get repeated on other media, but worse still, the totally insane "Birthers" who now have a solid place in the CNN format in the form of Lou Dobbs.

Everything is designed to not only make us mistrust Obama and defeat any of the good work he tries to do, but moreover, to once again rip this nation apart; Black v White. Riots in the streets.

That, my friends, is where they want this to go.
Keeping us divided is how they can conquer us. They? Who they? They are those who, while we are busy calling each other names, throwing rocks at each other, lynching, and yelling... quietly access the Biggest Piggy Bank ever: Tax Dollars.

Tax dollars that go into the war machine. Halliburton, KBR, are the best known. Tax dollars that come from taking our resources, OURS, the oil, the minerals, the timber and the water... and not paying for it. Further, getting 'tax breaks' for taking it and making themselves wealthy. Getting Bonus money, such as when W just handed an extra $8Billion to the oil companies, at the same time they brought in, what was at that time, RECORD profits. ("Have to reward them for their good work so they can keep doin' it.") He did that with the stroke of a pen.

And before we even knew the economy was in trouble, he gave over $80 Billion to AIG, and billions more to other companies-- All major contributors to his campaign, with not a word to congress or anyone.

There is money to be made and money for the taking as long as we stay divided, and at war amongst ourselves. An endless war fueled by fear, lies, and mindless attacks.

Those clown cars keep coming because someone is filling them, and giving them momentum to crash into our line of sight. At the cost of our nation's security, the lives of real people, and the future itself, these wingnuts are being flung into view to distract us until we lose sight of the work to be done.

The next election is already being funded by Insurance companies who are paying $1 Million or more, per day, to defeat legislation that will do two things: Give access to healthcare to tens of millions of our own people and force, by the competition of a public option, Insurance companies to compete for our business and play fair.

The delay past the summer break is time for them to keep hammering on the airwaves how bad it is to have healthcare for everyone. More time to fill the air with lies about what the program is and can or will do. They stand to make hundreds of billions in profits if they can defeat this healthcare legislation. They can only defeat this legislation if they get us to defeat it for them by being distracted...or...

...if they can play the biggest distraction our country has ever known: RACE Wars.

That is why you have Birthers, and racist signs held by Teabaggers, racist emails being sent around by Republican hard core.

They want to defeat this, regardless of who or how many die. They need a race war to make it possible. They have, in effect, taken a page out of the playbook of the biggest crazy we have ever put in prison: Charles Manson.

Helter Skelter, Y'all

So, as they are sitting in their offices, and in their C Street refuge, rest assured, they are not trying to think of how to help their constituents; not trying to fix all or any of what is broken. They are brainstorming to to please their masters: The insurance companies, the oil companies, the war machines, and the Financial Hogs at the trough.

Somewhere, in a lonely isolated cell, sits a crazy man with a swastika carved into his forehead. His rage is still hot, and he knows he was ahead of his time. That were he free today, he would be the God of the GOP, and they would come to him for all their ideas... and he would see to it that people died, there was fear, there was terror, there was suspicion between the races.

Somewhere, in a GOP office, a Bluedog sits, confused as to whom he is supposed to serve. He is handed a playbook and told to go out and follow this script... And if there should come a time of doubt or crisis, they need only ask "WWCD?"

Playing the Crazy Card

Truth Hurts

Watching the GOP clown car crash and burn repeatedly has become a macabre event that repeats itself with ever more insane variations, daily, if not hourly.

Having nothing constructive to offer to government nor their constituencies, politicians on the Far Right went to the only deck of trump cards they had: "We are not like them. We have morals. God is on our side. Family Values. Tax breaks for the wealthy. Jesus Saved US."

They pointed to Clinton's peccadilloes as the 'shame of the nation!' and demanded his resignation. (I hear a rap beat in the background. Is that you, Michael Steele?) And it was true. Clinton's affair, was disgraceful. Not to our nation, but to himself and his marriage. They got over it. Republicans never did. That was their Clarion Call to arms.

Then came Bush. For some reason, the Right-to-Lifers fell for a man who distinguished himself by executing more prisoners than any other governor, ever. Even those who were innocent, were not allowed to get a new trial because the first one was good enough. They adored him.

So did their big bucks buddies. Every business he ever touched, he failed. His father's influence is all that ever saved him, financially. Arabs were happy to bail out Baby Bush, and gain influence in the US Government, and a friend in a CIA Chief, later VP, later President.
They loved him.

He took the nation from surplus into deep recession, all the while, cutting taxes for the wealthy, loosening the regulations that had kept the markets in balance and under control. He ignored the warnings from his own Security Advisers, (most notably, Richard Clark) and never read a Presidential Daily Briefing until after 9/11. He dismissed those who warned us of the greatest attack on our soil, ever--and the Right Wing gave him a bullhorn, a pile of smoking rubble to stand on, and called him a hero. Mission Accomplished.

The illusion was in full swing. Smoke, mirrors, even Condi Rice as an undulating assistant, kept us all from knowing the truth or daring to question, under the penalty of being called 'Traitor!', the wisdom of the White House and their League of distinguished radical idiots.

We went into wars we never would have had to enter, had the man just comprehended National Security in the first place. But the mantra was "He has kept us safe for 8 years!".

The truth is, he kept us terrified by his lies and his stupidity, for 8 years. Jesus, save us!

Having all the power was too much for the banner carriers of the Illusion to handle. Lies issued forth from the fountains of ignorance and arrogance at a rate that was hard to believe, much less sustain.

The truth started to leak out. There was the 'Wide Stance' of Larry Craig. Who pleaded guilty and then tried to plead not guilty. He said he would resign, then said he would never resign. One of the vocal critics of Clinton, himself caught in a most compromising and illegal sex scandal in a bathroom stall in a public venue.

Prior to him, Mark Foley, who should have been arrested for child molest, pursued young male pages. Not exactly the homophobic "Christian" values that are touted from the GOP on a steady basis.

Mark Foley was the exception, until "Wide Stance". Now, GOP had a problem. At least the Dems indiscretions were hetero. And the Dems never held themselves up as the Moral center of the Universe. GOP did, and does.

Now, the juggling act became a bit unwieldy. Gay, molesters, stalkers, conflicted with the hallowed image of the GOP. They could ignore the deaths, thousands and thousands of deaths, as long as women were being denied access to life saving abortions, they were happy. Life is a relative thing to the Right Wing. It only has value before first breath. After that, no value at all. Jesus Save us, all!

Still trying to present themselves and their party as the paragon of virtue, the GOP scrambled, badly, and rolled out the Palin Phenomenon. She was pretty. She could draw a crowd. She praised the shouts of of "Racist!" and "Kill HIM!" with "Bless you." Racists loved her. The rest of us saw through her rambling disconnected word trainwrecks and the election went to someone who was qualified, and history was made.

She blamed everyone else for her failures, ignore that the handprints at the scenes of the crimes were all hers. She bashed her own campaign ('I looked around and could not find one person to pray with..' indicating that the GOP were Godless?) and then whined when the campaign started bashing back. Her lies being exposed, and her alienating more people all the time, to her backwards thinking, is 'how you win elections', regardless of the fact that she has lost the election and has now quit the one job she had to finish, saying she's not a 'quitter'.

Saying one thing and doing another is exactly what the GOP has become. Only now, it shows. She IS the GOP, in a nutshell.

Senator John Ensign, R-Nevada, his tanned Marlboro Cowboy looks, expensive hairstyle, bleached smile, and wealthy family, was being groomed as a contender for 2012. He had the Good Looks the GOP was looking for. Style over substance. Smile baby, you are on.. oh dear, you had an affair? He dumped his Twitter account, made his announcement, and claimed to be the victim of an extortion plot by an unscrupulous lover and her family. (Jesus answered our prayahs! He's NOT Gay! We are saved, Martha! We are saved!)

It was about to get worse. But before it did, Governor Sanford, of South Carolina, became only the latest in the bizarre tumbles from Grace. He staged a disappearing act, on Father's Day, and we now know that he was not hiking the Appalachian trail on Naked Hiking Day, but rather indulging in the pleasure trail of Argentina. (We are saved again! He's not gay!)

Ensign was now back burner, bottom of the bird cage, so 'yesterday'. Wide Stance was tamed down to just a closeted old man who lies to his family. Foley was allowed to scamper off into oblivion.

But, almost as if there was a competition to see who could wear the Crazy Crown for the GOP, Palin jumped in to quit her job and do it because she was not a quitter. Her rambling reading of the GOP talking points scrabble board had question marks popping up like prairie dogs in the assembled media. Her answers only brought out more question marks. Mostly, she blamed the media. The next day, just to stay on the news cycle, elbowing out other contenders, she called another presser, to explain to the media why it was not her fault and why quitting is her way of succeeding. She did this wearing waders, sporting a brand new French Manicure (which is what we all do when we are going to gut fish for three days at fish camp) and with her hair and make up just perfect, (again, what we all do).

The crown secured, Ensign was almost irrelevent, Sanford's lovesick interviews were both comical and pathetic, Palin was the clear winner of the Loser of the Week title. But, apparently, she could not find anyone to pray with. She got blasted by those formerly in her camp, the ex boyfriend of her unmarried daughter, former campaign staffers, and former allies in her own party, in her own State of "Al LASK UH". Jesus Save Us!

And then, almost as if on cue, Ensign surfaces like a Salmon leaping for the bait, and here comes the letter, handwritten mind you, that is his dismissal of his mistress from his life. Bad enough that, but then it got worse. Turns out that another stalwart GOP Senator, Coburn, from Oklahoma, helped him draft it. Having your friends help you write a letter to someone you had sex with shows a lot of larger issues, flaws in the man, than anything up until this point.

Then it got worse. Turns out that after he wrote the letter, he restarted the affair. Some are painting him as a sexual predator, stalking his mistress, using his authority as her boss to engage her, repeatedly.

Then it got even worse. Turns out that Ensign, in trying to cover up this mess, had his Daddy come in and pay off the mistress! When a 51 yr. Old man, with great hair, rugged outdoor looks, bleached teeth, expensive suits, being groomed for 2012 has to have a buddy write his Dear Jane letter and his Daddy pay off his bimbo, what is left to hold up the facade?

And now, as I come to the conclusion of this piece, Palin is fishing for more excuses, her lies stinking up the place like dead fish; Ensign is sucking his thumb in a corner somewhere, being coddled by his mommy and daddy; Sanford is whimpering and pining for Argentina, trying to fall back in love with his wife; Larry Craig is secretly practicing his wide stance in public bathrooms in airports all over the nation; and Mark Foley is just graduating from his "Pray Away the Gay" classes. Heads are spinning trying to keep up with the Clown Car of GOP scandals.

The polished illusion has cracked, shattered and crumbled. Yet, hard core conservatives are continuing to mask their racism as "Teaparties", which are denying they are astroturfed, but which are clearly sponsored by the same people who sponsor the WWE mentality of FOX.

Lost in all of this is government. Hypocrites are entertaining. They can even bring down a party. But we end up with a competitive chaos that makes a lot of noise, spins wheels and deals, but at the end of the day, we still don't have Healthcare. We still have not repealed Don't Ask, Don't Tell. We still have not closed Gitmo. Banks and Credit Card Companies are still practicing Usary and killing the economy that feeds it.

The GOP has, by playing the Crazy Card, distracted us from all that we, as a nation, should be doing the work on to make this a better place for our children and the children yet to come.

At the end of the day, the work is not only not finished, it has really not even begun. We need to focus people. Focus on the work that needs to be done and those who should be doing it. The rest is just distraction.

It's loud, it's noisy. It's full of lies and it is full of hate and violence. But those are not minds we can change because they don't want to change. They only want to stop us from doing the work we must do to save ourselves.

They are the minority. They are the crazy, lying, batshit nutso minority. Their only power left is the power of distraction. Let's fool them by not being tricked into failing to pay attention.

We can choose to do the important work, or just to linger over the writhing, undulating hypocrisy that is the GOP. They are as fake as their sunbed tans, bleached teeth, eye lifts. We know that, now move on.