Time Out for a Rant...

This has literally been the 'perfect storm' week.
I've been housebound with four days of snow, Martin Luther King Day was Monday--with school snow days all week following--and it's been the South Carolina lead-up week.
I'm usually a news hound, but I got an even heavier dose this week--including two GOP debates. I've resisted commenting on the shenanigans of the GOP primary (aka 'weeding-out') process but I just gotta make a brief rant.

Monday was filled with lots of historical media coverage as homage to MLK--most of which I love. Our local NPR station replayed most of the Massey guest lectureships he did after winning the Nobel Peace Prize--so poignant & as timely today as they were almost 45 years ago. Interspersed were the on-the-street news interviews during the zenith of the civil-rights movement. Even after witnessing that daily on the nightly news, the vehemence & violence of the hate-speech is truly shocking.
Fast forward to this week in South Carolina. Although more veiled in double-speak language, the blatant racism & prejudice is truly stunning. And it just keeps coming (...and not just from the Newt.).
I really do live in a thin blue sliver of the country I guess. It's been many months of entertainment but it feels like the humor is abating & the true horror is setting in...and the depression.
Recognition of Mitt as one of "the 1% of the 1%" seems to be a surprise to many as he announced he probably pays 'in the 15% range' of income tax--seriously, you're surprised?!
Rick S. (I still can't utter the last name--he will forever-after be the graphic descriptor pasted on him by Dan Savage) has now been 'given' the Iowa 'win' ('draw' still seems a better term...) & by the way: except for the debates, have you seen him out of his lucky-sweater-vest since Iowa?!

The other Rick--always a great source of comic relief--has finally bowed out & together with the Rogue-Girl, her cape flying, has thrown his (light) weight behind the Newt.
The Newt. Wow.
A standing ovation for his comments on 'you shoot your enemy' & taking on Juan Williams for trying to dig deeper & challenge him on his racist remarks. (Juan-the-amazing-conservative-Williams!!).
Who are those South Carolinians?!
What's happening to us?
All four Republican front-runners have signed on to the 'Personhood' campaign. (Yes, that includes Mitt.) You remember, don't you? The initiative in Mississippi in November that even that very red state couldn't even endorse? Really?! better start hoarding those BCP's just in case...
The fear language is staggering. The 501(c)(4) expenditures are staggering. Spending all that money assaulting each other in the GOP run-up has made for some amusement--but as the dollars start skyrocketing, it's turning mean, & you know by the time it starts aiming across the isle in the summer it will become lethal.
I'm of the mind that the majority-voting Supreme Court justices that passed the Citizens United finding--who then mockingly shook their heads at the President when he said 'shame on you'--should be made to watch every ad that will be run by the super-PACs all year long (I have this vision of Clockwork Orange's approach to 'required' movie watching...).

There have been some little, important flakes of positivity falling though, they just get lost in the roar:

This week Wisconsin voters submitted an over-the-top number of petition signatures to get the Recall Scott Walker campaign started, well before their required deadline.
(Run, Scott, Run!)

The ongoing, hilarious Colbert/Stewart satire on super-PACs has finally reached the mainstream, as Colbert makes a bid for the 'President of the United States of South Carolina'--by having voters vote for Herman Cain (as his name is on the ballot & Colbert's is not!).

The unemployment numbers have continued to show a positive upturn--in tiny increments; the aircraft carrier may be turning. Stay tuned...

Bill Moyers is back with his new series; Moyers & Company.

His interview with Hacker & Pierson should be required watching for every single voter before November (that means you, too!)  It isn't just the 1% vs the 99%.  The 1% income has increased over 250% since the Reagan administration while the 90%  income has actually gone down. The elite of the 1% (like Mitt) are now receiving 1 in every 8 dollars of US income. This is not the effect of global financial issues--this is personal. This belongs to us. Financially, we are much more like Egypt & Mexico & much less like Canada. And the Newt wants to make an issue of such a large number of citizens on food stamps now...
Watch it. Please.
And thanks, Bill! Welcome back!
Okay--rant over....for the time being, at least.