It's Always Been a MAGA Plague

Via Tengrain, we have a recap of Donald Trump's career as a COVID superspreader, including the shocking, but not surprising, revelation that Trump tested positive for the 'rona just days before his first debate with Joe Biden.  If you can't beat your opponent in the debate, or the campaign, use a biological weapon against him...

Tengrain's post details the superspreader events from September on, which infected members of Trump's inner circle as well as the rubes.  In one particularly pathetic case, Chris Christie probably contracted COVID from Trump while helping him with debate prep.

The real issue is that COVID-19 was always a MAGA plague.  The first COVID superspreader event was the 2020 CPAC conference, which resulted in the containment-and-quarantine of my beloved city of New Rochelle, NY.  It's still a MAGA plague, and MAGA politicians are determined to keep it that way.

The Dark Meatloaf Night of the Soul

Longtime readers will know that, of all of the politicians in these here United States, I find Chris Christie among the most contemptible. He's a despicable bully who used the power of the state to punish perceived enemies, and left his underlings, also despicable, to suffer the legal consequences. For a brief period of time, in 2015, during a brief presidential campaign, he tried to sound like the now-extinct moderate Northeastern Republican, but he quickly threw his lot in with Trump when he saw the direction his dyfunctional party was heading. After dropping his presidential campaign, Christie had a brief flirtation with being a Never Trumper until he lost his guts, became a typical Republican once again, and threw in his lot with Trump. After returning to the fold and getting behind Trump, Christie was publicly humiliated during a White House luncheon with his terrible boss:

i found the audio of Chris Christie telling the story of Trump forcing him to eat meatloaf because i needed to hear it from his mouth pic.twitter.com/4IQfkqVV9K

— Matt Binder (@MattBinder) February 17, 2017

Meatloaf Night is supposed to be a joyous occasion, not a source of shame and angst. Christie, the quintessential 'Phony Soprano' style Jersey bully, ran up to an even bigger Tri-State Asshole and caved in the most shameful fashion. Earlier this year, in May after the novel coronavirus had already ravaged New York and New Jersey, Christie toed the Trump line about the COVID-19 outbreak in a most repulsive manner, stating that businesses should be reopened because there would be deaths anyway. 

And now here we are, three years after the Meatloaf Incident, when a subservient Christie, a bundle of comorbidities, has tested positive for COVID-19 after helping Trump with a maskless debate prep. Christie completely rolled over for Trump back in 2016, and he might keel over for Trump in 2020. When he said 'there would be deaths', did he envision that he might be one of the dead? Oh, well, he wouldn't be the first New Jersey fixture that Trump destroyed. 

I hope that meatloaf was delicious.

My Contempt for Chris Christie Comes to the Fore Again

I have long held New Jersey governor Chris Christie in contempt, not only for his bullying nature, but for his scuttling of a much-needed sub-Hudson railway tunnel project. Well, now, seven years later, the Gateway Tunnel Program is in the news again, with Donald Trump seeming to agree to the project, at least at this moment.

I'm not exactly optimistic about the funding for the project- besides the money needed for post-multiple-hurricane recovery, the upcoming Debt Ceiling conflict bodes ill for any large infrastructure projects that would benefit 'blue' America. This project should have been funded seven years ago, but that would have been a victory for the Kenyan Usurper and those liberals in the New York City metropolitan area. If it had been started back then, the damn thing would probably have been finished by now.

Dirty Dog for Director

I have serious misgivings about Donald Trump's nominee for director of the FBI. This guy was Chris Christie's 'Bridgegate' defense attorney... while I realize that a defense attorney has to represent a defendant no matter how scummy they are, I don't have to trust said defense attorney. By the way, the architect of the Bridgegate ratfuckery has avoided prison time, leaving a couple of flacks to take the heat and do the time.

Even more troubling, Wray was a member of Dubya's Department of Justice and redacted documents provide tantalizing clues suggesting that Wray was probably involved in implementing the use of torture in prosecuting the 'Global War on Terror'. Wray's role in the response to the reports of inmate abuse at Abu Ghraib Prison suggests that he is the sort of person who values subservience to a regime over adherence to the rule of law.

Given the fact that the current administration is packed with oligarchs who view their positions as opportunities to steal, Wray's involvement in the Bush torture regime and his defense of Christie's vendetta against Democratic politicians and the commuters they serve, I doubt that Wray really would resign before dropping an investigation into his bosses... he has a loyalty to the loathsome, not the law.

Transit Travails

If there is one politician that I cannot stand, it's gotta be Chris Christie, I have been pointing out Christie's venality for years, starting with my contempt for his botching of a cross-Hudson rail tunnel. This month, Jersey's transit woes seemed to metastasize, with a couple of derailments, delays in track repairs, and in a grand finale of suckitude, a police-incident sparked stampede among pre-holiday weekend commuters waiting for already delayed trains.

New Jersey's transit system is a bleeping disaster. As much as I kvetch about subway delays and service changes involving slower shuttle bus travel, the New York Metropolitan Transit Authority has a fine track record when it comes to getting people from point A to point B. Of course, we don't have a governor who is hostile to infrastructure spending like that asshole in Jersey. Part of me would feel sorry for the Jerseyites stuck in Penn Station, a rathole if ever there was one, but these assholes sent Christie back to the governor's mansion knowing that he had no interest in commuters' concerns. Elect a particularly nasty, bullying authoritarian, don't expect things to work out well for you.

Kansas on the Hudson

The big local news story these days is New Jersey's proposed gasoline tax hike. New Jersey has long had low gas taxes, and cheap gasoline. Years ago, whenever I took a trip that had me passing through Jersey, I, like many New Yorkers, would top off the tank before heading over the bridge, but I stopped doing that when Chris Christie was elected governor- I would rather pay higher gasoline taxes and have the revenue accrue to New York State than to save money by spending in Jersey. Yes, I do voluntarily pay higher taxes and, yes, fuck that Jersey asshole.

Buried at the end of the news story is the fact that the tax increase on gasoline is supposed to coincide with an elimination of the estate tax. Yet again, a Republican administration is shifting the tax burden from the extremely wealthy to the middle and working class to an even greater extent. This is the same sort of chicanery that Governor Brownback pulled in Kansas, but it's even worse- gasoline purchases are necessary for most Jerseyites, and rising fuel costs will increase the prices of all consumer goods.

I'd feel sorry for the folks across the river, but they voted these regressive assholes into office. In fact, I have to confess that I'm feeling a bit of relief here- now I won't even be tempted to top off the tank in Jersey on the way home.

America's Cafone Declares

Great, just great, Chris Christie, America's cafone, just announced that he is indeed running in the 2016 Republican presidential primary, or as Tengrain puts it, The Goat Rodeo. Although Christie is a mendacious bag of protoplasm, he's characterizing his run as "telling it like it is".

I have to confess that I have a fascination with Christie, much like I have a fascination with cane toads, which like Christie are bloated, venomous, and pernicious. I actually sat through his announcement speech this morning while pitting another haul of cherries. Most of Christie's announcement was a repeat of the self-hagiography he indulged in at the 2012 Republican convention, but there were a couple of things that caused my ears to prick up.

Christie, in a move that is sure to alienate the GOP base, paid lip service to diversity, in contrast with the other vulgar Northeasterner running in the primary:


See this place, this place that represents the most ethnically diverse state in the country. The most densely populated state in the country. We're all different and we're on top of each other like you're on top of each other in this gym. And what has come from that, what has come from that is the absolute belief that not only can all of us achieve whatever dream we want to achieve, because of the place where we live and the opportunities that it gives us, but not only can we do it together, but we have to do it together. We have no choice but to work together, this country needs to work together again, not against each other.


Chris, Chris, Chris, this is not going to win you friends in Iowa or South Carolina... it probably won't win you friends in New Hampshire either, seeing as it's the GOP primary you're running in.

Christie had some typical pablum about making the state work, even though one of his first acts as governor was to squash the construction of a trans-Hudson tunnel which would have provided numerous well-paying jobs and vastly improved the traffic flow in the New York Metropolitan Area:

When I became governor six years ago, we had a state that was in economic calamity and an eleven billion dollar deficient on a twenty nine billion dollar budget. A state that had taxes and fees raised on it one hundred and fifteen times in the eight years before I became governor. A state that no longer believed that any one person could make a difference in the lives of the people of this state so we rolled up our sleeves and we went to work.

Further on, Christie started talking like one of the Republican-funded "Third Way centrists" so beloved by the corporate media:


And both parties. Both parties have failed our country. Both parties have stood in the corner and held their breath and waited to get their own way. And both parties have lead us to believe that in America, a country that was built on compromise, that somehow now compromise is a dirty word. If Washington and Adams and Jefferson believed compromise was a dirty word, we'd still be under the crown of England.


I think Michael Bloomberg and the entirety of the Sunday morning talkers just got a "shiver up their legs". I don't see this playing well with the GOP base, though, and I don't see Christie running as a third party candidate, either. Like all "third way" types, though, Christie sure loves punching down on workers and retirees:


And now, as Livingston New Jersey turns it's gaze to the rest of America today, what do we see and what do we have to confront? We need a campaign of big ideas and hard truths and real opportunity for the America people. We need to fix a broken entitlement system that is bankrupting our country. We have candidates that say we cannot confront, because if we do we'll be lying and stealing from the American people. Let me fill everyone else in, the lying and stealing has already happened. The horse is already out of the barn. We've got to get it back in and you can only do it by force.


We've all heard this austerity pitch before, Christie, like Paul Ryan and Scott Walker, must be heavily invested in cat food futures.

Christie then started talking about jobs (which he has a bad record on) and, even more hypocritically, as someone who thinks that eliminating college debt is wrong, started concern-trolling about college graduates:


We need to get our economy growing again at four percent or greater and the reason we do is because we have to make this once again the country that my mother and father told me it was. That as hard as you work, that's as hard and high as you'll rise. That's not the case anymore, we can't honestly look at our children and say that to them. Because we have an economy that is weak and doesn't present them with the same opportunities that Mary Pat and I were presented with in the mid 1980s when we graduated from college. When we graduated from college, we weren't worried about finding a job, we were worried about picking which job was the best for us. We didn't worry about whether we were going to be successful; we knew if we worked hard we were going to be successful. This country and it's leadership owes the same thing to my children and yours I'm ready to give it to you.


Of course, no Republican speech would be complete without a dig at the "Kenyan Usurper":


Well, here it comes. After seven years. After seven years, I heard the President of the United States say the other day that the world respects America more because of his leadership. This convinces me, this convinces me. This is the final confirmation that President Obama lives in his own world, not in our world. And the fact is this. After seven years of a weak and feckless foreign policy, run by Barack Obama, we'd better not turn it over to his second mate Hilary Clinton.


I'd hate to break it to him, but President Obama is much more respected than his predecessor, and it's Christie who lives in his own world. In Christie's world, he thinks he has a shot at the presidency.

While listening to the post-announcement commentary, one thread that ran through the analysis is that Christie's real goal in 2016 is to position himself as the GOP Vice Presidential candidate. His geographic origin, his inability to speak in evangelical dogwhistles, and his suspect conservative credentials will sink his presidential ambitions, but his reputation as a bully and a bloviator will make him the perfect "attack dog" on a GOP ticket.

Assholely Owned Subsidiary

It's nice when a bit of truth penetrates the media bubble, so I am really pleased that a college student told Jeb Bush to his face that his brother George created ISIS. I'm in total agreement, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Bush Maladministration- an assholely-owned subsidiary.

Who could have predicted that creating a bunch of heavily-armed, unemployed men who were now subject to a hated Shiite majority could have gone wrong? Who but every single individual outside of the maladministration's bubble and their media enablers?

It'll be interesting to see how Jeb Bush's campaign team will attempt to counter this sort of criticism. Even Chris Christie has hammered Bush 2.Big Zero on the Iraq War. It's going to be an ugly primary, and that a beautiful thing.

Now, THAT's What I Call Fiscal Responsibility!

From the Party of Fiscal Responsibility files, we have a local story about New Jersey's bond rating has been lowered for the 9th time in five years. Oh, yeah, that Chris Christie, the Hudson Harkonnen, really knows how to be a financial steward for his state.

This is the same sort of fiscal responsibility that is reducing Sam Brownback's Kansas to a third-world Thunderdome. Back in the day, I noted that Chris Christie is a reasonable man. Kansas, though, fits the "post-apocalyptic dustbowl hellhole" image better than the Garden State, though:





I'm sure Sam Brownback is a reasonable man...

We'll be hearing more about "fiscal responsibility" in the upcoming presidential election. Remember, though, no matter what any Republican candidate tells you, if elected, they will mess up the finances of any polity they are elected to run.

Fiscal Responsibility: Christie Style

Under fiscal conservative Chris Christie's leadership, New Jersey's debt has been downgraded for the second time this year and the fifth time overall. Once again, Republican policies fail to improve the fiscal standing of a Republican-led polity. I'm beginning to think that Republicans aren't about fiscal responsibility at all.

As if the debt downgrade wasn't enough, the Atlantic City casino industry is imploding, with the closing of a ,much-vaunted luxury casino being the start of what is probably an irreversible death-spiral for the city. Oh, well, a government pinning its economic hopes on gambling revenue (and Christie muffed the amount of cashola that legalized internet gambling would bring in to the state's coffers) is as stupid as an individual pinning his economic hopes on lottery tickets.

Christie's been an unmitigated disaster for New Jersey, all of the bombastic bloviation in the face of his critics can't hide the fact that he has done nothing to improve the economic standing of either New Jersey or New Jerseyans.

Gas Taxes

I was planning on filling my car up halfway in New York, and then topping off in New Jersey because gasoline is cheaper there. Before heading out, though, I had a change of heart- my gas taxes pay for road maintenance in my home state, and I'd rather spend more money at a place owned by a local guy I'm on a first name basis with, with the tax revenue going to my community, than to spend my money in New Jersey, where the asshole governor held up a major trans-Hudson rail project. I decided to spend a couple of dollars more and have it go to a better place- it's worth the extra money just to withold a lesser sum from Chris Christie's regime. Also, my favored route is the westerly one diagonally through Pennsylvania, so I avoid the New Jersey Turnpike tolls.

Not Even a Speedbump

Appropriately for Ash Wednesday, the **ack** Executive for my county of residence has announced that he is running on the Republican ticket against Governor Andrew Cuomo, whose approval rating stands at 63%.

Astorino supports fracking in NY State, a position which is facing more opposition even upstate. Astorino brought gun shows back to the Westchester County Center, a divisive policy that won't win him any friends in the post "Sandy Hook" milieu.

In his announcement speech, Astorino said, "I'm tired of watching New York's decline."

Operating on the handy principle that Republicans are always wrong, a glance at New York's unemployment rate indicates that it has dropped to 7.1%, and that New York accounted for 12% of the country's private sector job growth in December. If that's a decline, I'm Rapunzel.

The best strategy the Cuomo campaign can come up with is to tie the Republican gubernatorial albatross around Astorino's neck and let the combined weight of Scott Walker, Chris Christie, John Kasich, and Ricks Snyder and Scott sink him into the depths of the tea-dark sea.

From an Ash Wednesday announcement to an ashy heap after the inevitable crash-and-burn, I don't think Astorino will even act as a speedbump to slow the Cuomo juggernaut. Cuomo's no doubt got his eye on the White House in the future, and he won't let the pissant Westchester County Executive stand in his way.

Desperate for False Equivalence

Given the extensive coverage of New Jersey governor and GOP Establishment darling Chris Christie's ever-widening web of scandal, right-leaning types have been desperate to find some false equivalence. Yesterday, Rupert Murdoch owned rag The New York Post tried to blame Mayor Bill De Blasio for poor snow removal on Manhattan's Upper East Side. Hilarity ensued...

The writers at the "Post" insisted that De Blasio botched snow removal on the wealthy UES as political payback because he didn't garner the percentage of votes there as he did in other neighborhoods:

“It really is a tale of two cities — this time with the tony Upper East Side getting the shaft!”

Of course, when these people receive the exact sort of service that the residents of the Outer Boroughs receive, they perceive it as an attack. It's particularly frustrating because the neighborhood is well-served by public transit. One entitled chucklehead interviewed on the radio whined about having to take five cabs to get from the 70s to the 90s, when a ride on the Lexington Avenue subway line would have gotten him there with no problem.

Even more hilariously, part of the perception of shoddy treatment resulted from a malfunctioning GPS unit which failed to update progress made by a plow that was operating in the vicinity. Yeah, a WATB sitting in a Starbucks checking snow removal performance on his iPhone would have thought that nothing was being done, while a glance at the street would have revealed the truth.

The recent snowstorm was no picnic- I spoke to a Yonkers police officer on line at the supermarket, and he indicated that there were auto accidents all over the place... and NYC received more snow than the City of Y______. The simple fact of the matter is that the snow removal proceeded at a normal pace, and the wealthy Upper East Siders had to get in line with everybody else in the city.

You know they've got nothing when, not only do they want to conflate a slow snow response to an actively hostile lane closure, but they have to lie about the speed of said snow response.

The Highway's Jammed by Right Wing Zeroes on a Fat Chance Power Trip

I've written quite a bit about New Jersey governor Chris Christie, aka the Hudson Harkonnen, America's cafone, and Phony Soprano. The latest Chris Christie news is a rapidly ballooning scandal, the closure of lanes on the George Washington Bridge by Christie Administration Port Authority apointees which caused major traffic snarls, seemingly to punish the Democratic mayor of Fort Lee, who didn't endorse him in his gubernatorial race. Predictably, Christie is blaming an underling for this d-baggery. Christie is just the sort of vindictive creep who'd place the lives of ordinary people at risk (the lane closures have been implicated in the death of a woman due to a delay in the arrival of medical help) to "punish" an "enemy".

To tell the truth, Christie's handling of Port Authority matters has been awful from the beginning of his tenure as governor, when he put the kibosh on a Hudson River rail crossing that would have been funded by the federal government. Even when he's not motivated by spite, the guy is an utter disaster.

I wonder if, had Christie's incompetent-at-best and depraved-at-worst Port Authority hires been exposed in November, the jerk would have won the gubernatorial election. By making people's commutes longer and more tedious, his administration hit people "where they live". I don't believe that even the most rabid GOPer would countenance a policy which directly harmed him... not only "those people" were affected by these traffic snarls.

Got buyers' remorse, Jerseyites?


Cross posted at Rumproast.

Jersey Equality

Today's big regional story is that New Jersey governor Chris Christie, the Harkonnen on the Hudson, has withdrawn New Jersey's appeal to uphold a same-sex marriage ban. Christie had appealed a Mercer county superior court judge's decision to allow same-sex marriages, but decided that he didn't want to continue his opposition to marriage equality when the case reached the New Jersey Supreme Court. His opposition to marriage equality has already cost the state millions of dollars... so much for Republican fiscal responsibility.

At any rate, same-sex marriages began in New Jersey today, with Newark mayor and senator-elect Cory Booker officiating over several marriages in the midnight hour. Congratulations to all of the couples who have finally been able to wed. It's a great day for New Jerseyites. Maybe now, my friend and co-worker **REDACTED**, who is one of the nicest guys on the planet, can marry his longtime companion if he wishes to.

I Love It When They Fight

I've been cracking up at the war of words between turds, Chris Christie and Rand Paul. Christie mocked Paul's libertarianism (of course, Rand Paul's version of liberty is not for chix!), while Rand Paul countered with a not-so-veiled crack at Christie's weight, dubbing him the "king of pork", even though New Jersey pays more money into the treasury than it receives, while Kentucky receives more than it pays out.

Like I said, I'm tickled pink at this rift within the GOP, with the "could fake it as a moderate" Christie having been a huge favorite among conservatives until his photo ops with the Kenyan usurper. I guess Rand Paul wants to garner that conservative love from those who felt spurned by Christie. I even like the optics of the fight, with the toad-like Christie and the snake-like Paul squaring off like a couple of wingnut wuxia whiners. Even better, the squabbling Christie and Paul remind me of these two guys:

Cowardly, Callous, and Cruel

Never mind the Fiscal Cliff kerfuffle- what really chaps my ass is Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner's decision to abandon a vote on a Superstorm Sandy aid package.

I have made no bones about having an enormous amount of contempt for NJ Governor Chris Christie, and I have absolutely no use for odious GOP Representative for New York's Long Island Peter King. To summarize my assesment of these jerks- Christie is a loudmouth faux tough guy who doesn't give a damn for Johnny and Janie Paycheck, and King is a rabble-rousing anti-Muslim bigot who ignores the needs of the 9/11 first responders he invokes in his prejudiced tirades. Today, I view these clowns as the proverbial stopped clock- both Republicans have had choice words about House Speaker John Boehner.

Peter King first lambasted Boehner on the floor of the House of Representatives. King was even more pointed in his criticism of Boehner afterwards, going so far as to urge New York and New Jersey Republicans to stop donating money to the Republican Campaign Committee:





Christ Christie also came down on the Boehner like a two ton heavy thing:





Of course, Christie mendaciously throws in a criticism of New Jersy Senate Democrats, in order to play the "both sides do it" card.

Not content to passively ignore the impassioned pleas of New York and New Jersey representatives to bring this vote to the floor, Boehner apparently lashed out at NJ Republican Frank LoBiondo. The latest development in the case is that Boehner, cowed by the vehemence of his fellow Republicans has promised to bring Sandy aid up for a vote after the new Congress is sworn in. Too callous to bring up the vote on Tuesday, too cowardly to stand by his prior position.

John Boehner's a godawful fool-
He's cowardly, callous and cruel.

Norris/Nugent 2016!

One of the best things about the Romney campaign post mortem is reading the collective cri du cul emanating from the right-wingers. One interesting feature of their distorted view of the election is the contention that Romney, like his predecessor John McCain, was not conservative enough. Yes, even though paleolithic paleoconservative rape-apologists like Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock lost their senate bids because of their knuckle-dragger comments concerning women's rights, Mittens somehow lost because he wasn't regressive enough.

One axiom of the right-wing is that Conservatism can never fail, it can only be failed. Since Romney failed, he cannot be a conservative. So, what of 2016? Ryan would be the most likely choice, because he was the second banana on the ticket... the one hitch is that he will still have the Romney stench clinging to his P90X-toned frame. Former Tea Party heartthrob Chris Christie is being drummed out of the party because he praised President Obama's response to Superstorm Sandy. Rick Santorum is too much of a Big Government guy to be entrusted to run for the White House. Rick Perry is too soft on immigration. Let's face it, there are very few true conservatives worthy of running in 2016, but I have the perfect ticket:

NORRIS/NUGENT 2016

I believe this is the true conservative ticket that can win the White House back for the GOP. Let's meet the candidates, shall we? Here's the totally-not-insane presidential candidate, speaking calmly and eloquently about the importance of the separation of Church and State:





Here's the one-hundred-percent-not-sexually-confused Ted Nugent expressing the psychosexual aspects of the Second Amendment:





How could the GOP fail to capture the all three branches of government with such a dream team at the top of the ticket?

WOLVERINES!!!

Romney, Wrong on the Role of the Federal Government

Sitting in the dark on the job for two days, one has time for contemplation. Because I was sitting in the dark as a result of a major storm, disaster response has been on my mind. I'm going to riff off of one of the last blog posts I read before losing the electricity, Bette Noir's "compare and contrast" post about President Obama's approach to disaster relief and Mitt Romney's statements about disaster relief in one of the primary debates. Here's an excerpt from the transcript of the debate, hosted by CNN's John King:


“FEMA is about to run out of money, and there are some people who say do it on a case-by-case basis and some people who say, you know, maybe we're learning a lesson here that the states should take on more of this role,” Mr. King said. “How do you deal with something like that?”

Romney’s response: "Every time you have an occasion to take something from the federal government and send it back to the states, that's the right direction. And if you can go even further and send it back to the private sector, that's even better.

“Instead of thinking in the federal budget, what we should cut – we should ask ourselves the opposite question,” Romney continued. “What should we keep? We should take all of what we're doing at the federal level and say, what are the things we're doing that we don't have to do? And those things we've got to stop doing, because we're borrowing $1.6 trillion more this year than we're taking in. We cannot ...”

King interjected: “Including disaster relief, though?”

Romney replied: “We cannot – we cannot afford to do those things without jeopardizing the future for our kids. It is simply immoral, in my view, for us to continue to rack up larger and larger debts and pass them on to our kids, knowing full well that we'll all be dead and gone before it's paid off. It makes no sense at all.”


A quick glance at the map of Superstorm Sandy demonstrates the stupidity of Mitt Romney's proposal for diminishing the role of the federal government in disaster response. Hurricane Sandy was a vast storm which ravaged the Atlantic Coast of the United States from North Carolina to Massachusetts, with lesser, though significant effects felt as far west as Ohio. Simply put, the storm was too vast for any single state to be able to handle disaster response and relief. Damage to the infrastructure within a state hampers the coordination of relief efforts. Even now, days after the storm, there are communication problems (I have electricity, and I am having problems getting through on the phone for various reasons, those without power are even worse off). In much of the New York tri-state area, gasoline is in short supply. To put the burden of disaster relief on the overburdened states is asinine. Just because I want to twist the knife, so to speak, Mitt Romney's record as a governor responding to a natural disaster is not a good one.

In times of disaster, it is important to remember the original motto of the United States, E Pluribus Unum, which is Latin for "out of many, one". Combined, the states form a more powerful whole. In times of natural disaster, the federal government can coordinate the response more readily than the states which have been hit. The United States is a vast country, the nature of disasters differs from location to location- while different states can concentrate on their areas of expertise, a central coordinating agency is better able to marshal resources that will be needed after local resources are exhausted.

To compound Romney's idiocy, his assertion that he'd rather have the private sector administer disaster responses is truly a howler. Of course, Romney's not really an idiot- he's the sort of sociopath who would prefer that there's an executive skimming off the top when funds are allocated for disaster aid. If Romney gets elected president, expect well-connected wealthy insiders to get even wealthier on the misery of disaster victims. In anticipation of such a (literal) windfall, Jeb Bush has founded a for-profit disaster response corporation. If disaster response is privatized, there will be a two-tier approach to relief and recovery operations- the rich folks will be whisked out of the disaster area in luxurious helicopters with fully-stocked bars while Joe and Jane Schmo will die horribly... the executives have to make a profit, after all. I imagine Jeb Bush's privatized disaster response will be just as successful as his brother George's privatized war.

In the '90's the town of Rye Brook, New York decided to experiment with privatized firefighting services. The private firefighting corporation cut corners with wages, ensuring that the workers were poorly-trained and had a high turnover rate, and they refused to engage in a mutual assistance agreement with neighboring municipalities, and the result was disastrous. Imagine how poorly a private corporation, with an eye towards maximizing profits, would handle a disaster of the magnitude of a Sandy.

Hopefully, the example of Sandy will wake voters who would vote for Mitt Romney out of spite. Romney is unfit to run the country- Chris Christie, a man I can't stand, has praised President Obama's disaster response and is being lambasted by his former admirers for it. Former Republican and wishy-washy "third way" flack Mike Bloomberg has endorsed President Obama's candidacy. In the face of disaster, real leadership and a genuine desire for public service is needed. Mitt Romney is a callow, hollow simulacrum of a man, and his history of failed disaster response and putting personal profits over the public need renders him unacceptable as a President.

Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love, Sugar!

I had to work the graveyard shift this morning, so I woke up last night just in time to hear the Hudson Harkonnen's speech. I figure that, having been on Chris Christie's capacious ass for a couple of years already, I had to cover his GOP convention speech. I will be cutting-and-pasting excerpts from a transcript of Christie's speech, and giving my annotations. This is going to be a wild ride in which I'll be going all over the place, so strap your hands 'cross my engines. Here goes nothing:

I am the son of an Irish father and a Sicilian mother.

I didn't know Christie was a paisan, but I kinda sorta suspected that he was. This would explain his Phony Soprano Joisy tough guy schtick. Christie is just what our country needs right now, he's America's cafone. O Marone, che schifo!

They both lived hard lives. Dad grew up in poverty. After returning from Army service, he worked at the Breyers Ice Cream plant in the 1950s. With that job and the G.I. bill he put himself through Rutgers University at night to become the first in his family to earn a college degree. Our first family picture was on his graduation day, with Mom beaming next to him, six months pregnant with me.

Mom also came from nothing. She was raised by a single mother who took three buses to get to work every day. And mom spent the time she was supposed to be a kid actually raising children – her two younger siblings. She was tough as nails and didn't suffer fools at all. The truth was she couldn't afford to. She spoke the truth – bluntly, directly and without much varnish.

One thing strikes me about this narrative, the fact that both of Christie's parents benefitted from government programs. His dad benefited from the G.I. Bill (which the current crop of Republicans, including the Sainted McCain, has been hostile to), and attended a public university. His mother's mother relied on public transportation to get to work, and would have benefited from equal pay provisions. I don't know if the ice cream plant that employed his father was a union shop, but I imagine that it probably was. So much for the "we built this", Randian model...

I was her son as I listened to "Darkness on the Edge of Town" with my high school friends on the Jersey Shore.

This is kinda weird to me, the song that he references is about penury and desperation. For all of Christie's unrequited crush on "The Boss", it's safe to say that Christie didn't learn a goddamn thing from a three minute record.

The greatest lesson Mom ever taught me, though, was this one: she told me there would be times in your life when you have to choose between being loved and being respected. She said to always pick being respected, that love without respect was always fleeting — but that respect could grow into real, lasting love.
Now, of course, she was talking about women.
But I have learned over time that it applies just as much to leadership. In fact, I think that advice applies to America today more than ever.
I believe we have become paralyzed by our desire to be loved.
Our Founding Fathers had the wisdom to know that social acceptance and popularity is fleeting and that this country's principles needed to be rooted in strengths greater than the passions and emotions of the times.

Thom Hartmann covered this pretty extensively today- Christie is basically paraphrasing beloved Founding Father Niccolò Machiavelli here.

Our leaders today have decided it is more important to be popular, to do what is easy and say "yes," rather than to say no when "no" is what's required.
In recent years, we as a country have too often chosen the same path.
It's been easy for our leaders to say not us, and not now, in taking on the tough issues. And we've stood silently by and let them get away with it.
But tonight, I say enough.
I say, together, let's make a much different choice. Tonight, we are speaking up for ourselves and stepping up.
We are beginning to do what is right and what is necessary to make our country great again.
We are demanding that our leaders stop tearing each other down, and work together to take action on the big things facing America.
Tonight, we choose respect over love.

I'm grateful that Christie isn't choosing love, because "Christie Love" conjures up images of him sporting an afro wig and a form-fitting "mod" getup, an image which would have all but the most self-hating, bear-loving Log Cabin Republicans running toward the exits, trying not to puke. As an aside, when I clicked on the "Log Cabin Republican" link at teh Wikiwakiwoo, I was redirected to "Homosexual Republican"... it seems that the American Family Association is messing with Wikipedia. Of course, while claiming not to be seeking love, Christie has pandered to the Tea Party from day one... he pretty much painted his prodigious ass purple and waved it in front of the knuckle-dragging Koch baboons. He's just not seeking your love, Joe and Jane Schmo.

We are the great grandchildren of men and women who broke their backs in the name of American ingenuity; the grandchildren of the Greatest Generation; the sons and daughters of immigrants; the brothers and sisters of everyday heroes; the neighbors of entrepreneurs and firefighters, teachers and farmers, veterans and factory workers and everyone in-between who shows up not just on the big days or the good days, but on the bad days and on the hard days.
Each and every day. All 365 of them.
We are the United States of America.

We are the great grandchildren of the men and women who were saved from destitution by the New Deal, and protected from rapacious bosses by unions. To honor them, Christie's going to sell out their legacy.

Now we must lead the way our citizens live. To lead as my mother insisted I live, not by avoiding truths, especially the hard ones, but by facing up to them and being the better for it.

This is why he's lying.

We cannot afford to do anything less.

I know because this was the challenge in New Jersey.
When I came into office, I could continue on the same path that led to wealth, jobs and people leaving the state or I could do the job the people elected me to do – to do the big things.
There were those who said it couldn't be done. The problems were too big, too politically charged, too broken to fix. But we were on a path we could no longer afford to follow.

Of course, he doesn't mention that New Jersey's unemployment rate is considerably higher than the national average. How's that Jersey Comeback going, guv?

They said it was impossible to cut taxes in a state where taxes were raised 115 times in eight years. That it was impossible to balance a budget at the same time, with an $11 billion deficit. Three years later, we have three balanced budgets with lower taxes.

We did it.

Christie basically shifted the tax burden from the wealthy to the middle and lower class, which is exactly what Ryan and Romney would do.

The disciples of yesterday's politics underestimated the will of the people. They assumed our people were selfish; that when told of the difficult problems, tough choices and complicated solutions, they would simply turn their backs, that they would decide it was every man for himself.
Instead, the people of New Jersey stepped up and shared in the sacrifice.

Of course, not everyone shared in the sacrifice...

I know this simple truth and I'm not afraid to say it: our ideas are right for America and their ideas have failed America.

Yeah, the liberal ideas which FDR promulgated failed America, and the post-Reagonomics conservative ideas have worked. Nice use of figures to prove your point, Christie.

Let's be clear with the American people tonight. Here's what we believe as Republicans and what they believe as Democrats.
We believe in telling hard working families the truth about our country's fiscal realities. Telling them what they already know – the math of federal spending doesn't add up.
With $5 trillion in debt added over the last four years, we have no other option but to make the hard choices, cut federal spending and fundamentally reduce the size of government.
They believe that the American people don't want to hear the truth about the extent of our fiscal difficulties and need to be coddled by big government.
They believe the American people are content to live the lie with them.
We believe in telling seniors the truth about our overburdened entitlements.
We know seniors not only want these programs to survive, but they just as badly want them secured for their grandchildren.
Seniors are not selfish.
They believe seniors will always put themselves ahead of their grandchildren. So they prey on their vulnerabilities and scare them with misinformation for the cynical purpose of winning the next election.
Their plan: whistle a happy tune while driving us off the fiscal cliff, as long as they are behind the wheel of power.
We believe that the majority of teachers in America know our system must be reformed to put students first so that America can compete.
Teachers don't teach to become rich or famous. They teach because they love children.
We believe that we should honor and reward the good ones while doing what's best for our nation's future – demanding accountability, higher standards and the best teacher in every classroom.
They believe the educational establishment will always put themselves ahead of children. That self-interest trumps common sense.
They believe in pitting unions against teachers, educators against parents, and lobbyists against children.
They believe in teacher's unions.
We believe in teachers.
We believe that if we tell the people the truth they will act bigger than the pettiness of Washington, D.C.
We believe it's possible to forge bipartisan compromise and stand up for conservative principles.
It's the power of our ideas, not of our rhetoric, that attracts people to our Party.
We win when we make it about what needs to be done; we lose when we play along with their game of scaring and dividing.

It's nice to be told what you believe- Chris Christie does a bang-up job telling the convention attendees what the liberal strawmen in his head believe. There's so much mendacity in this bit that it would take a long time to rebut it point-by-point. That being said, when Christie says "we win when we make it about what needs to be done", he doesn't mention that voter suppression is really what "needs to be done" for them to win. Also, when he says "we lose when we play along with their game of scaring and dividing", he's being disingenous or he's straight up lying (I just picked those two examples, there's a plethora of them).

After some platitudes, and (finally!) a mention of Mitt Romney, Christie continues:

There's only one thing missing now. Leadership. It takes leadership that you don't get from reading a poll.
You see, Mr. President – real leaders don't follow polls. Real leaders change polls.
That's what we need to do now.
Change polls through the power of our principles.
Change polls through the strength of our convictions.

This is an interesting "tell"... Christie talks about changing polls, but he doesn't mention that they are changing polls by using biased polling organizations. Silly Christie, this is the sort of things one should only discuss in quiet rooms.

I don't know about you, but I don't want my children and grandchildren to have to read in a history book what it was like to live in an American century.
I don't want their only inheritance to be an enormous government that has overtaxed, overspent and over-borrowed a great people into second-class citizenship.
I want them to live in a second American century.
A second American century of strong economic growth where those who are willing to work hard will have good paying jobs to support their families and reach their dreams.
A second American century where real American exceptionalism is not a political punch line, but is evident to everyone in the world just by watching the way our government conducts its business and everyday Americans live their lives.
A second American century where our military is strong, our values are sure, our work ethic is unmatched and our Constitution remains a model for anyone in the world struggling for liberty.
Let us choose a path that will be remembered for generations to come. Standing strong for freedom will make the next century as great an American century as the last one.

Wow, Christie's talking about a New American Century, and we all know how that went. If you want a new New American Century, I'll tell you what, send Mitt's sons to Iran or whatever the hell else front you want, let their thin, blue blood stain the sand for the cause of FREEDUMB! and Dick Cheney's stock portfolio.

This is the American way.
We have never been victims of destiny.
We have always been masters of our own.
I won't be part of the generation that fails that test and neither will you.
It's now time to stand up. There's no time left to waste.
If you're willing to stand up with me for America's future, I will stand up with you.
If you're willing to fight with me for Mitt Romney, I will fight with you.
If you're willing to hear the truth about the hard road ahead, and the rewards for America that truth will bear, I'm here to begin with you this new era of truth-telling.
Tonight, we choose the path that has always defined our nation's history.
Tonight, we finally and firmly answer the call that so many generations have had the courage to answer before us.
Tonight, we stand up for Mitt Romney as the next President of the United States.
And, together, we stand up once again for American greatness.

Man, he's laying it on thick now, he's calling on his audience to heed the call to have the courage to saunter into a booth to vote for a sociopathic socialite who likes to fire people who aren't willing to work for a pittance behind barbed wire fences. Now, that's a Profile in Courage if ever I saw one!

Cross posted on delay at Rumproast, because I didn't want to step on Bette Noir's current post.