I was saddened when I opened my local newspaper on Independence Day and found a half page ad quoting and taking Thomas Jefferson quotes out of context. I’ll run through the list of quotes they have poisoned our newspaper with and give you the context so you can know what is really being said. One must ask, why would Scheels spend money on such a deceptive ad. To come up with a list of quotes, they must have spent the time to actually read the context, right? Right?

I just can’t believe that Scheels intended to disrespect the readers and America by publishing a biased political screed, but it’s hard to believe they didn’t research the quotes before publishing them. Shame on you, Scheels.

Here are the quotes and the context is described below.

1. My reading of history convinces me that most bad governments result from too much government.
2. I predict future happiness for Americans if they prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
3. The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
4. It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle if acted on would save on-half the wars of the world.
5. To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.
6. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
7. When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe.

Let’s start with the list as a whole. One would think from this list that these are the only things that Jefferson believed and never expressed views contrary to these. Obviously he has. No one is that one sided. Hence, just the fact that Scheels decided to only print quotes that are biased proves they have an agenda and are deceiving us.

Let’s take these quotes and look at them in debth:

1. My reading of history convinces me that most bad governments result from too much government.
   This sounds simple and true on the surface but as we’ve discussed in a previous post, we need to know the right size of a government and not just strive for smaller and smaller government. Only the rich, greedy, and unethical benefit from too small a government. Worse, still, this is the dog-whistle call to the unthinking tea baggers who chant all government is bad. Believe me, Jefferson didn’t think “We The People” was bad or too big.
2. I predict future happiness for Americans if they prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
   This is a misquote and in the context means something quite different than is implied in the context of the Scheels’ ad. Here is the real quote:

   As men become better informed, their rulers must respect them the more. I think you will be sensible that our citizens are fast returning, from the panic into which they were artfully thrown to the dictates of their own reason; and I believe the delusions they have seen themselves hurried into will be useful as a lesson under similar attempts on them in future. The good effects of our late fiscal arrangements will certainly tend to unite them in opinion, and in a confidence as to the views of their public functionaries, legislative & executive. The path we have to pursue is so quiet that we have nothing scarcely to propose to our Legislature. A noiseless course, not meddling with the affairs of others, unattractive of notice, is a mark that society is going on in happiness. If we can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy.

   You can read the entire text of the letter. As you can see here, Jefferson is talking about the country’s citizens becoming smarter and not feeling they need the government to make decision on their behalf. And, yes, we are happier when we don’t rely on the government to make our decisions, hence, “taking care of us”. This has nothing to do with taking care of our poor and mis fortunate. It has nothing to do with “We The People” uniting to fix the broken health care system.

3. The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
   Sorry folks. This is just a lie. Jefferson never said any such thing.
4. It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle if acted on would save on-half the wars of the world.
   Wonderful statement. Too bad republicans didn’t complain when the republicans were building up this debt, but only now find it appropriate to complain about it. Those who complain about the debt when the democrats are in power but are silent when the republicans are building up the debt are not just fools but are harmful to America.
5. To compel a man to subsidize with his taxes the propagation of ideas he disbelieves and abhors is sinful and tyrannical.
   This is a misquote as well. The real text says:

That to compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves, is sinful and tyrannical.

This is a quote from his rant on freedom from religion. This quote has nothing to do with taxes. In fact, the idea of taxes to pay for what the majority votes is the founding principle of a democracy. To refuse to be part of a system because you can claim you don’t agree with how part if of it works is foolishness. If that were the case, no one would pay taxes and America would cease to exist. Not too bright, but it plays straight into the hands of the rich who don’t want to pay their fair share.

6. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.
   This is one of the most over-quoted and deceptive quotes one hears from Jefferson. Jefferson was not condoning violent revolution as a way to fix problems in a democracy. In fact, later in life wrote to say that a democracy does not need such forms of correction since we have elections. There is a good comment on this at Huffington Post.
7. When we get piled upon one another in large cities, as in Europe, we shall become as corrupt as Europe.
   As sad as this comment is, we have become much more corrupt than Europe. Few nations have allowed corporations to take control of their governments. Big business has corrupted our country. Still, I agree. It’s time to reverse our over-population problem.

In conclusion, many these comments are wrong, fabrications, and mis conceptions. Why would a major corporation like Scheels feel the need to publish such a biased advertisement?

It’s laughable to hear the conservatives decry the liberal media. Oh my gosh, how absolutely upside down. Will a multi-billion dollar industry be interested in advancing issues and ideas that are progressive in nature? Progressive policies generally strive for fairness. Fair taxes, fair benefits, fair opportunities. A monopoly does not want to advance liberal issues.

However, in the past few years, some news outlets have published facts that have a naughty habit of being liberal in nature. BP oil spill is a good example. How awful it must be for a conservative to watch the news and see stories about the devastation in the gulf caused by greed.

A truly unbiased media would be pointing out how unregulated greed caused the mess. It would be pointing out how the REPUBLICAN mantra of smaller government, and no regulations is the direct cause of this disaster.

Yes, a republican will think the media is biased but then they think the world if flat and free markets work so you wouldn’t expect them to understand the cause and effect of their failed policies.

We liberals know how biased the media is. We know that only the bravest of op/ed reporters will dare put this at the feet of the failed republican policies. We know the media is controlled by boards of directors which has many of the same directors that run the industrial military complex. We know those news outlets will never say anything about the harm wrought upon our nation by the ill conceived Bush wars.

But, just knowing these things doesn’t fix them. We need to get the big money out of our media. We need to break up the media. And we need to bring back the requirements that the media is to  serve the public interest. Now, there’s a novel idea.

What are “Activist Judges” and why don’t we want them?

Plain and simple, an activist judge is a judge who is intent on furthering his or her own ideology even if it goes against the prior decisions of the court or against the constitution or against the ideals of America’s founding fathers.

Here are a couple examples of activism on the Supreme Court. The constitution says nothing about the rights of businesses or international corporations, yet over the past 80 years there have been countless cases found in favor of corporations over the rights of the people. The judges who come from a background of defending corrupt corporations are most inclined to be activists because they’ve spent their entire careers arguing for corporations.

The most obvious example of activist judges causing harm to America is the latest five right-wing fanatics on the Supreme Court who decided that corporations should be allowed to spend unlimited money to drown out the voices of We The People. This is so blatantly wrong if for no other reason that our constitution says nothing whatsoever about corporations having free speech or freedoms granted to We The People.

And, these radical judges — what party are they? They are all from the party of the corporations, not from the party of We The People. Yes, my dear readers, they are all Republicans.

Surprised? No, I guess not.

The recent Harris poll makes obvious some downright despicable trends. Trends we’ve all known in our hearts but now there is no denying the facts. The 27% of America that still considers themselves Republicans are batshit crazy. No, I’m not talking about a little nuts around the edges, but just fully in the court of the insane. Take a quick look at the poll.

If you’re not outraged, you’re not paying attention.

There has been a bit of denial about this as one would expect. Even though every Republican I know personally fits this poll quite closely, they all say that it doesn’t represent the Republicans THEY know. I guess the Republicans I know don’t know each other.

OpenLeft has a great post on this issue. You might want to check it out.

Another thing that all my Republican friends agree on: they’re all mad as heck. Mad because the Democrats are forcing things through that America doesn’t want.

Just listen to that logic. America is finally waking up to the fact that the Republican policies that we’ve been following for the past 30 years are destroying America and resoundingly voted out the people responsible for the bad policies. Now the party voted out is all upset because they believe America really secretly wants to continue their failed policies and “hate” the fact that the filthy liberals are forcing through their Socialist agenda.

Anyone disparagingly calling America’s Liberals “Socialists” is obviously ignorant to the fact that America was founded on the ideas of helping one another, yes, a SOCIALIST agenda. Yes, these intelligent Republicans are sure that we need to get SOCIALISM out of our country even though the vast majority of America wants it. The vast majority of America voted the Liberals in and voted out the failed Republican policies. How much more obvious can it be before these Republicans begin to turn off the lies they’re being told instead of forwarding them with each disproven email they receive?

Knock knock, wake up Republicans. Don’t hate it when Democracy works like it’s supposed to. Your policies have failed and America is kicking your butts out. How can you not understand that?

In retrospect, it is quite ironic how the Republican party during the awful Bush years was trying to quiet the critics by calling anything critical of Bush as being not just unpatriotic but being hate speech. Has anyone heard the Republican party lately and their pet project, the Tea Baggers?

There are so many examples from vulgarity to racism Republican congressmen calling Democratic congressmen “Baby Killer”. The list of absolutely awful and distasteful rhetoric seem to have no end. For just a short list of the most recent examples, check out the links below, if you really have the stomach for it.

There is no doubt that this violent and disgusting speech coming from the Republicans is doing harm to America not just in making it impossible to resolve our differences of opinions but because it brings outright violence.

Now, please don’t fool yourself into thinking that it’s just a few bad apples or that it’s not really the Republican party’s fault. It is the fault and the bad apples are killing people.

If it wasn’t the Republican Party’s intention to fan the flames of this hatred and racism, they would denounce it, but alas, they just support it more and more with each breath. The Republican part is not doing America any service by this, it is only for the benefit of the party.

If you are thinking of supporting this party in any way, think again. They are not helping anything that matters to the American people. They are only dividing us. They are responsible for the violence and the hate and the killings. What ever happened to the real Republican party? It is long gone.

Here is a sample of the awful and hateful things this party has given us just recently:

• New Orleans Joseph Cao
• Body Guard Attacks Demonstrators
• Democratic Offices Vandalized
• Right Wing Rage
• Threats of Secession
• Canada Tells Coulter to Tone it Down
• TeaBaggery Violence
• right wing violence rhetoric and its GOP mainstreaming
• Neugebauer
• Bill Bennett
• Steve King
• Texas Fools
• Military Coup
• Devin Nunes
• The END OF AMERICA

So here’s another strange personality defect present in today’s tea baggers and in the typical conservative. It’s called the Lemming trait. Of course, if’ you’re a conservative, you’ll find endless reasons why this isn’t you, regardless of the facts, but do yourself a favor and just think about it.

In the conservative (Authoritarian follower) mind set, being part of and being accepted by his group is as important as life. This makes for some of the most ridiculous behavior.

We can take examples from all around us in every day life, but we’ll just take an obvious one and leave it up to the readers (and commenters) to come up with their own examples or denials.

Example #1: News commentator Joe on one channel says there’s no such thing as global warming. Commentator Sue on another station says the same, and a third. When it is finally so obvious that temperatures are rising that no one can deny it any longer, these three commentators all come back with version two of their denial. Oh, it’s getting warmer, but not everywhere so it’s not getting warmer at all.

Your typical human with a functioning logic processor will say, hum, these people have been wrong and are now making up silly excuses why they’re not. But, everything else they say seems to make sense in my view so I’ll just ignore the inconsistencies.

Well, the next day these same commentators say, finally, oh bugger, I can’t deny it any longer so I guess we’re experiencing global warming, but the new twist is, oh, it’s not man’s fault.

Some even go so far off the tracks as to reverse themselves and say there’s still no warming just because they can find an area that is having a snow storm or because there was one flaw in the reams of evidence gathered.

Most people would quit believing commentators that are this often wrong and who refuse to adjust their positions based on evidence. But the conservative tea-bagger will just continue to follow them as if there’s nothing wrong with being wrong.

Why do conservatives continually follow those who are proven wrong so reliably? It’s because these commentators are their leaders, part of their cult or clan or group or political party. Group affiliation is more important than anything else.

I often hear the corporate (corrupt) media referring to the Democratic party as the Democrat party. This is just another of so many examples the defective media. The Republican party has been trying to re-brand the Democratic party like they’ve managed to cast a shadow on the term “liberal”.

Survey after survey shows that people say they don’t associate with the “liberal” agenda, but, when asked what policies they do agree with, they always predominantly choose policies that are liberal. The liberal media has done a great job, don’t you think? Does anyone really believe the “liberal media” lie? But, I digress.

The Democratic party hasn’t changed, except where some Blue Dog Democrats run as Republicans in Democratic clothing. The liberal/Democratic agenda has not changed. BUT!!!! The Republican party has. The term Republican and Conservative used to mean something a whole lot different than it does today. The party of big deficits, big wars, big government…

So, what should be the new name for the new Republican party?

Personally, my favorite is:
G.O.P. :Gridlock, Obstruction & Paralysis

Many people and the “liberal media” refuses to put proper light on the fact that the party has been nothing but the party of “NO”. America has never seen such gridlock in our government in the entire history of the union. The Republicans in office don’t care what happens to America, just so they get re-elected and they get their bribes from big business.

What are your favorite names for the New Republican Party?

From the Las Vegas Review Journal:

Nevada’s budget outlook is so bleak that lawmakers doubt whether state government can remain afloat without drastic cuts to everything from prisons to schools to state parks and services for the poor and elderly.

Legislators met Tuesday with Republican Gov. Jim Gibbons to discuss how they will cope with a short-term deficit of about $900 million during an upcoming special session of the Legislature. Some Democratic lawmakers acknowledge options to bridge the gap probably won’t include tax increases.
…
Assemblyman John Oceguera, D-Las Vegas, said pay cuts and layoffs for state employees are probably inevitable.

“These are drastic, drastic cuts. I would be surprised if some folks didn’t lose their jobs,” Oceguera said.
…
Taylor said such a cut would hit lower-wage employees extremely hard, especially because some lower-paying jobs are held by single parents raising children. There had been talks that salary cuts would be made only to employees earning more than $40,000 a year.

Oceguera was uncertain whether it would be considered “a socialist type thing” to tailor pay cuts according to earnings.

A Chamber of Commerce study released earlier this month found state and local government employees in 2008 earned an average pay of $55,657 in 2008, sixth highest among states and $6,800 higher than the national average. For state employees alone, the average pay was $55,266.

Teacher pay in Nevada averaged $48,257 a year in 2008, below the $50,852 national average, according to the chamber study. University and community college faculty members in Nevada earn $69,282 on average, compared with the national average of $72,959.

The study also found that Nevada has the fewest number of public employees on a per capita basis in the country, at 43.7 per 1,000 residents.

But Gibbons, who sets the agenda for the session, has long said he would veto any tax increases.

“Our only real option,” Horsford said, “is to eliminate or reduce spending.”

This is absolutely shocking. Gibbons is leading us in a race to the bottom.

Nevada state and local government employees get paid more than the average. That means the local employees get paid more than the average and the state employees get paid considerably less than average. But, that’s not what the Chamber of Commerce says since they might have a little difficulty being objective in this matter. What on earth are they even involved for? They’re the enemy and part of what made our current mess.

This seems so terribly obvious to any casual observer to be a race to the bottom. Nevada has been groveling at the bottom of everything important for so long, we just don’t know what to do if we’re not dead last. We seem to be winning the race to be the first state to resemble Haiti. Let’s all compete to see how low we can pay our state employees. Soon we’ll all be greeted by illegal aliens at the state agencies because they’ll work for less than Americans will. Is that what we want in America?

They’re afraid to affect the rich more than the poor because they’re afraid it’ll sound Socialist? This has to be about the most ridiculous thing I’ve heard in a while. When was it considered Socialist to expect those who benefit the most from society to pay the most? Socialist? If this is Socialism, then America’s founding fathers were all Socialists. They expected everyone to pay their fair share. Shame on you for disparaging the names of our forefathers!

And, if you were paying attention, Nevada is paying our educators well below the average. Obviously we’re dead last in education. We only get back what we’re willing to invest. We should be having a race to see how much more money we can put back in the hands of the middle and lower class and we should be expecting the wealthy to start paying their fair share.

Gibbon, oh what a fine example of Republican principles. No new taxes. We wouldn’t want the billionaires to pay their fair share, now would we? No, let’s just take it out of the pockets of those who need it the most.

When will America start to realize that this Republican approach is destroying our country?

Nevada’s governor, Jim Gibbons, is your typical Republican politician. He has joined the cult swearing allegiance to “no new taxes” when it is supposed to be allegiance to the state of Nevada. In fact, Nevada has been almost strictly Republican for decades and when not strictly Republican their governor has still been a conservative Democrat.

And, what has this voting record brought to Nevada? As stated in an earlier post, we’re first in discouraged voters, last in education, first in bankruptcies, almost worst in unemployment, and almost last in most other indicators of a first world state.

One would think that even the really bone headed would eventually get tired of sticking their tongues on the frozen flag pole, but Nevada proves that there is no end to the stream of illogical voting.

Gibbons swears “no new taxes” while the rich get away without paying their fair share and the middle class get straddled with supporting the lazy stingy or just unethical rich. The only solution Gibbons has for fixing the state’s tax revenue shortfall is to take it out of the budgets of the state workers.

The first string of cuts stole 5% from the paychecks of every Nevada civil servant and in most cases, over a thousand dollars in benefits. For anyone who knows anything about state pay scales, you know that state employees are generally paid considerably less than employees in the private sector.

By “considerably less” I mean it is common to see state employees getting 20% less than similar jobs in the private sector. One of the few reasons why employees agree to work for such low wages is that benefits can make up for the difference.

I’m not talking about benefits that the state pays for as much as I’m saying a large employer can self insure its employees. Once the employer controls the insurance, they can control the costs and avoid the problem with unethical insurance companies dropping coverage for people when they need it.

So, Gibbon’s first round of cuts was on the backs of the state workers. Today he says he’s planning to steal more money from hard working Nevadans while chanting the cult mantra, “no new taxes”.

If you don’t expect the wealthy to pay their fair share, you end up with a state like Nevada and a country like the USA.

When will Nevada and the rest of America realize that conservative policies are destroying America.

This comment from my recent post, Harold Estes, is such a fine example of conservatives’ talking points that it warrants a post of its own. We are at a critical time in America’s history and some people really believe that parroting their talking points constitutes discussion, or scores one for their team. Why isn’t America their team?

Chuck writes:

DAVID IS CORRECT — Progressives are always right because facts, history and reality are adjustable so listen up:
1. Fair taxes – If you make too much (a floating number based on government need), Uncle Handout takes the rest. If you make less, we “spread the wealth”; oh that’s right we’re broke and it’s Bush’s fault.. Not-with-standing that the top one percent currently pay over 40 percent of all individual taxes and the top 25 percent pay over 87 percent (IRS for 2007), but, they don’t deserve to keep the fruits of their labor like under that foolish old capitalistic free market system.. However, all be be solved soon with the new Cap and Tax Bill, Medical Bill, Chris Dodd’s new financial control legislation, expiration of those silly Bush tax cuts — but no fear, these things won’t affect YOU!!!!!

This isn’t some elementary school spelling bee. These are important issues and should be addressed seriously. How can anyone just take a set of numbers and not look at all sides? My gosh, you mean the ultra rich are paying 87% of our taxes? Oh, cry me a river. Let’s see, that is what percent? Well, since the top 25% make 98% of America’s income and it’s still increasing, that is 11% (98 -87) of those taxes that must be paid for by the middle class and working poor along with paying our own taxes. If they’re making 98% of the wealth shouldn’t they be paying at least 98% of the tax? Why should they get welfare from America’s working class?

Obviously Chuck wasn’t alive eight months ago when Obama dropped the tax on the working people of America, because he’s still wetting his pants worrying that Obama will ask him to pay his fair share. Yes, I do expect them to affect ME. I expect things to get back to being fair like it was before we started subsidising the wealthy.

2. Health Care — Of course we should have manditory Obama government health care to control costs, raise taxes and surpress another private industry.. We need another bloated govt. agency that has the budget and fiscal success like USPS, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Amtrac, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid (oh, thats right, these three would have been OK but uncle stole the money for other “needs”), etc., etc.. But hey, we’ll all get healthier walking to government clinics, standing in lines and learning to deal with pain while awaiting for our lottery number for that surgical procedure like our socialist country friends.. Besides, if you are over 65 and retired you don’t “contribute” enough in taxes or to the “public good” so of what use are you!!!

I am quite sad to see how little you think of America. Yes, we have some problems that we could clean up, but all in all I think America is a great nation. I wish you did, too. Someone has been nurturing some real hatred in you for your country.

I’m guessing Chuck has been nursing on the crap that Fox spews and the rest of the corporate media repeat. These are all lies and misconceptions. In fact, go to one of the many websites that try to set straight the lies. Any of these, these, these, or these would be a good place to start educating yourself.

The fact that this information is so freely available from the US government, I’m guessing Chuck hasn’t even tried finding the truth from the lies.

And, who do you think is going to pay for the national health reform? How about if the rich start paying their fair share, like Obama wants? Oh, that’s right, we can’t expect the rich to pay their own way, can we?

And, lastly, I bet we would all prefer any of these troubled organizations writing out my medical checks rather a billionaire CEO denying our claims so they can make more money but I’m sure that’s obvious.

3. Christian Nation – Of course we are not.. The 86 percent of the population that thinks we are just “cling to their bibles and guns” in times of stress anyway.. Therefore, ignor [sic] all those laws and rules in our judicial system, Constitution and Amendments because they have a basis in “morality” which comes from religion — bad!!!!

“Clinging to Bibles and guns.” You mean like McViegh and the Oklahoma City bombing by Christian radicals or others that have been discussed here, before?

If you think you get morals from religion, you’re sorely mistaken. Open your eyes. Are these the Christian morals you find in our constitution? No, you’re probably ignoring these. Please start naming them.

4. Immigration Control — Why?? You can’t be the Leader of the World until they are all here – “Come on Down” as they say on the game show..

This is another topic that we all agree on. Let’s find some common ground. Nobody wants illegal immigrants taking our jobs. Obviously we can’t build a big enough fence or murder enough to discourage them. The only way to discourage illegals from taking our jobs is to shut down the businesses that hire them. No jobs? They’ll all go home.

5. Military — Unnecessary… They just cause trouble, scare my friends and take money from our progressive agenda!!!

Our founding fathers would be horrified to know that we had a standing army during times of peace. That’s what the well-trained militia was supposed to be. Now we are controlled (more than half of our tax dollars spent to feed it) by the industrial military complex. We spend more on military than the rest of the world COMBINED!  Know that every dime spent there is a dime that isn’t being spent to make America a better place.

6. Pelosi Recommendation – Move the Capitol to San Fran. so I don’t have to wasted my time flying back and forth at least twice every week in my customized private Air Force jet!!!! The auto exec’s used to do that but we fixed them and are working on Wall Street and the finanical industry!!

Oh, please! Can you be serious?

6. Bowing and Apoligizing – We’re bad, really bad, and “I” know how to tell everyone that you greedy freedom and liberty loving capitalists are sorry… Ignor [sic] that as a nation, we have contributed more aid of every type, both foreign and domestic, than all other contries [sic] combined but YOU can do more and WE will arrange that!!!!

Please try to stay focused. Bowing and contributions and arrange for me, all in one breath? Nobody is saying we’re really bad. Can we and should we improve? The majority of American believe we can and should.

As for us being great contributors, this is so misleading. Americans spend most of our donations paying for million-dollar churches and paying the pay checks of billion dollar con artists. However, we, as a nation are the stingiest of the industrialised countries.

Etc., etc., etc…..
Comrade, I know these “truths to be self-evident” (because my Czars, tax evading appointees, lobbists [sic] and Chicago thugs told me so)!!!

Ah, yes, I believe this is another area where we can all agree: our broken government. Lobbyists are destroying our representative government. We need to get money out of our election process and corporate lawyers out of our Supreme Court. You know, the Supreme Court is soon to be deciding if multi-billion dollar corporations and international corporations should have freedom of speech by buying as much political advertising as they see fit. We need to get the lobbyists out of our government, we need to get money out of our elections and we need to get corporate lawyers out of our Supreme Court.