An Embarrassingly Drunken, Reeling Political Party

Tom Toles is my current favorite newspaper cartoonist. He’s very insightful and his stuff is often very cutting. You can take a look at some of his recent work, including a cartoon mentioned below, on the Washington Post web site (go here).
by Charlie Leck

A Tom Toles cartoon, that appeared in the last week or so in the Washington Post, shows an inebriated elephant lying drunk on the edge of an abyss, a broken champagne glass near him, there on the ground. A tiny caption says: “Drunk on ideology!” A bit larger caption says: “Socially Awkward!”

It’s amazing how a cartoon can speak paragraphs and paragraphs. I could blather on here, writing line after line, saying the same thing that the cartoon says in just a little 4 by 4 inch square. Again I say, amazing!

I wish Republicans, socially responsible and clear thinking Republicans, would speak out about the current state of their historic and formerly responsible party. It might do some good. I hate seeing it sprawled into insignificance – and down and out – in such an unsightly way. This is the formerly glorious party of some of America’s finest statesmen and problem solvers. If they are watching from their places in the stars, they must be cringing!

I’ve written here, too many times, about how the Grand Old Party is broken and dismembered. I won’t do it further. The party needs serious and immediate attention.

Tom Toles is about 62 years of age. He won the Pulitzer in 1990 for editorial cartooning. He also won National Cartoonist Society’s Editorial Cartoon Award in 2003. His cartoons appear in more than 200 newspapers around the nation. He graduated from the University of Buffalo (magna cum laude)

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GOP Platform

The platform that the GOP adopted at its convention in Tampa is startling! It includes a no exception ban on all abortions. It defines marriage as only between a man and a woman. As I expected, this is an agenda that caters to the extreme right-wing of the party and will likely offend its moderates.
by Charlie Leck

Well, the Republicans have gone and done it. They reshaped themselves into a party of far right-wingers, moving themselves dramatically away from the moderate center of American politics. So, what of it!

Here is one of  planks of the platform adopted by the GOP
at its national convention, regarding hunting out liberal bias in our colleges and universities.

“Ideological bias is deeply entrenched within the current university system. Whatever the solution in private institutions may be, in State institutions the trustees have a responsibility to the public to ensure that their enormous investment is not abused for political indoctrination. We call on State officials to ensure that our public colleges and universities be places of learning and the exchange of ideas,not zones of intellectual intolerance favoring the Left.”

Amazing! Simply amazing!

I believe (perhaps it is blind hope) that women and seniors will carry the day for President Obama this year. They’ll reject this hopeless and radical conservatism.

Give this Republican convention a week to settle down. Once the dust clears, the analysis will begin and the public will see just how far to the right the GOP has drifted. Republicans will win the hard South and the prairie states with no trouble. They’ll have trouble everywhere else. Their hard-right platform may have cost them states like Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan.

And explain to me what this GOP plank, about technology and ideology is trying to say.

““Liberty alone fosters scientific inquiry, technological innovation, entrepreneurship, and information exchange. Liberty must remain the core energy behind America’s environmental improvement.”

Okay!

Of course, I can’t forget that the GOP will spend hundreds of millions of dollars of Super PAC money in the next two months. We’ll see some of the most horrendous ads known to politics and they’ll turn many a stomach with their lies and misleading statements. That’s politics in 2012, even if we don’t like it.

Obama will begin answering these critics next week at the Democratic convention and in his own ad campaign that will begin the day the Democrats recess. How he spends his money will be vital; for he won’t have the amounts with which the rich GOP will get to play. Obama will need to depend on the American people sorting out truth from fiction. All of those who believe in him will have to give money to the campaign to the point that it actually hurts. We’ve no choice! We're up against people like the Koch brothers.

Then there is this plank about the minimum wage in the pacific territories, which is more truthfully a statement about the GOP and the minimum wage in the states.

“The Pacific territories should have flexibility to determine the minimum wage, which has seriously restricted progress in the private sector.”

In the NY Times on 29 August (Wednesday) an interesting article compares the GOP platform from the 1980 convention (which endorsed Ronald Reagan) to the platform of this year. It’s remarkable to see how far to the right the party has consistently drifted. Take a look at the comparison chart here! Or you can read the entire article (Platform’s Sharp Turn to the Right Leaves Conservatives Cheering!).

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A Good Morning Laugh

There’s nothing like beginning the day with a big, hearty laugh. I’ve gotten going that way two mornings in a row now and I give appropriate thanks!
by Charlie Leck

A reader of our local newspaper (The StarTribune of the Twin Cities) recently sent in a note that was posted on Tuesday morning as “The Letter of the day.” Martin Urberg, of Minneapolis, seems to be warning the Republicans:

“The Republican nomination race,” Mr. Urberg writes, “reminds me of an old nursery rhyme…”

There once were two cats of Kilkenny
Each though there was one cat too many
So they fought and they fit
and they scratched and they bit
‘til except for their nails
and the tips of their tails
instead of two cats there weren’t any

Kudos and thanks to Mr. Urberg. I loved it. Nothing like beginning the morning with a big laugh!

I got yesterday off to a rolling start as well, when I read an email from my old, old friend Rich (Little River, SC) who sent this along (he said he’s seen it in a number of places and can’t attribute it to anyone)…

Grandad [sic] remembering the good old days…

When I was a boy, my Momma would send me down to a corner store with $1, and I’d come back with 5 bags of potatoes, 2 loaves of bread, 3 bottles of milk, a hunk of cheese, a box of tea, and 6 eggs.

You can’t do that now. Too many f---in’ security cameras!

After Florida’s votes are in tonight (a winner-take-all primary) Mitt Romney will probably have 87 delegates in the bank. Sorry to tell you this, but he needs 1,144 to secure the nomination, so this process will go on for awhile. That, I am afraid, is no laughing matter!

Until tomorrow!

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If you read my blog regularly, why not become a follower? All you have to do is click in the upper right hand corner and establish a simple means of communication. Then you'll be informed every time a new blog is posted here. If all that's confusing, here's Google's explanation of how to do it! If you don’t want to post comments on the blog, but would like to communicate with me about it, send me an email if you’d like.