Another week, another blast of indecision...

How did the responsibility and blame for the economic crisis – the mortgage mess and all of the accompanying shady dealing, unemployment, fear and loathing - shift from the geniuses on Wall Street and their political accomplices to Obama?  This is the really impressive sleight of hand performed by Faux News and the republican party.  Now there are ten candidates, all trying hard to pin all of the country’s problems on one guy; the guy who was elected to try to fix them and who has been obstructed at every turn and every step of the way by congressional leaders who are determined to see him fail.  How is that OK? 

This week once again provided evidence that there is some secret test the republican presidential candidates have to take to verify they possess the necessary level of idiocy before being allowed to run.  It is no wonder that republican audiences, such as the one assembled at the Reagan Library for some sort of celebration recently, are clamoring for Chris Christie – or anyone, frankly – to get in the race, because the woeful field so far seems to guarantee Obama a second term and to the rabidly anti-Obama true believers, that’s their worst nightmare.

“On day one we will immediately begin to change government so it starts serving the will of the American people.”  This quote is from Newt Gingrich’s web site and begs the question; what is the will of the American people?  And more importantly, how in the world do you think you know what it is?  You’re cruising the Med with your trophy wife, (#3), and running up a six figure tab at Tiffany’s and you think you know what the American people want or need?   Hilarious…In a recent interview I saw he kept repeating that the reason he is going to win is that he’s the only candidate whose ideas are “big enough”, an inexplicable phrase but one he clearly thinks will resonate because he said it three times in a 5 minute interview.

He has laid out a ten point plan in a new “contract with America”, itself a tired “big” idea that he used to screw the GOP and lose control of the congress for 10 years when he was speaker of the house.    Among the ten, nine are variations on the corporate welfare that is at the heart of republican party theology, (increase domestic energy production, with “from oil and gas exploitation” left unsaid), with only a nod to “investing in brain science” to show his humanity while he goes door to door with the storm troopers taking back food stamps and poor folks’ satellite dishes. 

Meanwhile, Michele Bachman, in a flurry of forceful speeches that, unfortunately completely missed the point, tried her best to slam Obama by saying the Arab Spring uprising were his “fault” as if millions of people rising up against dictators and oligarchies and embracing democracy is somehow a bad thing, presumably because it somehow lets the infidels get closer to the temple and threatens Israel and, by extension, her Old Testament hallucinations.   That the republican party – and the entire foreign policy elite for the last 60 years – has made a policy of Nixonian repolitik and coddled cardboard cutouts of leaders as long as they played ball with us is an ongoing embarrassment and the change in US policy  over the last three years maybe the one thing Obama has gotten right.  But the voices in Bachman’s head won’t let here accept the idea that just maybe the vast non-white majority in the Middle East may have a legitimate point of view. 

But, saving the best for last, there was Rick “Let me start over” Perry’s first major domestic policy speech,  in which he touted his record on taxes, health care, employment, and the environment while he has been governor of Texas for the last 10 years.    Let’s see…Texas is tied with Mississippi for last – or maybe it should be considered first – in the percentage of jobs that pay the minimum wage, or less.   Nearly 1.5 million Texans have dropped below the poverty line while he was busy creating his famous 1 million new jobs.  Texas also leads the nation in the number of its citizens that are uninsured and children that go to bed hungry, prison population and executions while also having the lowest high school graduation rate.  Wow, sounds like a god damn paradise to me. 

His wife reportedly defending him this week for his sputtering performance in the last debate, saying he never had a debate coach or a speaking coach, as if hiding his inconsistent policy positions and questionable record in Texas with a smoother delivery is the answer.   If he thinks offering up his Texas “miracle” is all he needs to clarify to win the hearts and minds of voters, he is dumber than he seems.  Or we are…

On a lighter note, an East Bay Velero gas station was robbed one recent morning at 3:30 AM by six people wearing Halloween costumes.  They took a fistful of cash from the till, a couple of six-packs of beer and twenty packages of condoms.   Must have been a really good, but really early, Halloween party.