It does not matter which moronic party controls Congress or the White House. Both parties have worked together and voted to spend nearly $9 Trillion (with a T) of military spending with not one single audit since 1996.
After all, an audit and honest accounting of tax dollars might slow down the wholesale theft of cash that weakens our defense efforts.
(Reuters) - Because of its persistent inability to tally its accounts, the Pentagon is the only federal agency that has not complied with a law that requires annual audits of all government departments. That means that the $8.5 trillion in taxpayer money doled out by Congress to the Pentagon since 1996, the first year it was supposed to be audited, has never been accounted for.
That sum exceeds the value of China's economic output last year.
At the DFAS offices that handle accounting for the Army, Navy, Air Force and other defense agencies, fudging the accounts with false entries is standard operating procedure, Reuters has found. And plugging isn't confined to DFAS (pronounced DEE-fass). Former military service officials say record-keeping at the operational level throughout the services is rife with made-up numbers to cover lost or missing information.
A review of multiple reports from oversight agencies in recent years shows that the Pentagon also has systematically ignored warnings about its accounting practices. "These types of adjustments, made without supporting documentation … can mask much larger problems in the original accounting data," the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, said in a December 2011 report.
Plugs also are symptomatic of one very large problem: the Pentagon's chronic failure to keep track of its money - how much it has, how much it pays out and how much is wasted or stolen.
In its investigation, Reuters has found that the Pentagon is largely incapable of keeping track of its vast stores of weapons, ammunition and other supplies; thus it continues to spend money on new supplies it doesn't need and on storing others long out of date.
It has amassed a backlog of more than half a trillion dollars in unaudited contracts with outside vendors; how much of that money paid for actual goods and services delivered isn't known. And it repeatedly falls prey to fraud and theft that can go undiscovered for years, often eventually detected by external law enforcement agencies.
USS Gerald Ford - $13 Billion in Scrap Metal Proper audits might stop the flow of cold hard cash into insane boondoggle spending projects. For example, the price tag for the USS Gerald Ford is now at $13 billion, it is 22% over budget with three more years to go before it is finished. . To compare, the navy of India just took delivery of INS Vikramaditya aircraft carrier for a cost of $2.35 billion.
"We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations. . This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence -- economic, political, even spiritual -- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society. . . In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. . . We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together." . General Dwight Eisenhower President of the United States Republican
Mark your calendar. The GOP actually did something.
By Gary;
It warms the cockles of my heart to see the Socialist Democrats get fucked on live TV.
It was a thing of beauty, and a wonder to behold, to watch 39 scumbag Democrats jump from the Obamacare ship and vote with the GOP to extend insurance policies.
And I just love the name of the bill - Keep Your Health Plan Act.
The House passed the bill, 261 to 157. The DNA basic instinct to save your own skin first is as old as the caveman, and Democrats are scared shitless. For some strange reason four Republicans voted against the bill.
A Warning - Keep in mind that we are dealing with the big government loving Republicans here. It appears that the bill by GOP Rep. Fred Upton would allow insurers to sell their plans that were active as of January 2013 into 2014.
So the GOP had the Democrats by the short and curlies and all the bill did was push enforcement back by only one year???? Why not a bill to permanently give Americans the right to buy the insurance of their choice forever and ever?
To me this would have been the perfect opportunity (a teachable moment) to stand up for private enterprise and the right of the people to purchase, or not purchase, the product of their choice.
Maybe there is a good reason for only going for one year, but I can't see it.
Comrade Obama is threatening a veto. He may think the Upton bill will get passed through a Democrat Senate in panic of losing seats and on to his desk.
Today we celebrate a small victory. . . . but like Michael Myers or Freddy Krueger, the horror of Socialism just won't die. It keeps coming back like a bad movie sequel. The battle goes on.
The American middle class is being devoured before our very eyes by technology and robotics.
As much as I slam Obama as the Food Stamp King, the food stamp issue started long before he appeared. Food stamps are only a symptom of the problem. Food stamps are the new normal.
We are not out of work because the economy is bad. The economy is bad because we are out of work.
It amazes me the more I study this story. If you listen to the so-called "experts" in the main stream media, you will believe that what happened to the global economy only happened starting in the latter part of 2008. They are way off base. For many years we have been seeing a slow motion job implosion of the Americans economy driven by the Internet, robotics and outsourcing.
A huge part of the food stamp explosion is millions of jobs being eliminated by robotics, the Internet and outsourcing to Asia and Latin America.
EBT cards are the modern version of the old Roman bread and circuses to keep the permanently unemployed mobs fed and entertained so they would not rise up against the political system.
The number of people enrolled in SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, aka "food stamps") has doubled to 47 million people in the past ten years. Perhaps more disturbingly, the number of people on the program increased during a period of economic growth, something that has never happened before.
Poverty used to fall in tandem with the jobless rate, reducing the need for food stamps but the researchers found poverty did not decline as the economy grew in the mid-2000s -- and in the recovery following the Great Recession, the number of people receiving food stamps kept rising.
The assumption has always been a stronger labor market would reduce the need for food stamps, the economists said, but the new trend suggests rising employment might no longer be enough.
SNAP is also being expanded in several states to include food from restaurants. Gift baskets that include both food and non-food items are also eligible to be purchased with SNAP.
The government is encouraging enrollment—and reliance—on their programs. EBT Bingo games occur in Rhode Island to enroll residents in the program.
China helped create the Food Stamp Explosion When China was admitted to the World Trade Organization in 2001, tariffs were lowered, and it became very profitable for American companies to relocate production to China’s sweatshops. . Millions of American jobs were lost, and those former workers have piled up on the food-stamp rolls. Experts say the cause of the ongoing crisis is trade imbalances created by then-President Clinton about 20 years ago when he granted China most-favored-nation trading status --- when he negotiated World Trade Organization membership for China.
Five years after the start of the Great Recession, the toll is terrifyingly clear: Millions of middle-class jobs have been lost in developed countries the world over.
And the situation is even worse than it appears.
Most of the jobs will never return, and millions more are likely to vanish as well, say experts who study the labor market. What's more, these jobs aren't just being lost to China and other developing countries, and they aren't just factory work. Increasingly, jobs are disappearing in the service sector, home to two-thirds of all workers.
They're being obliterated by technology.
Year after year, the software that runs computers and an array of other machines and devices becomes more sophisticated and powerful and capable of doing more efficiently tasks that humans have always done. For decades, science fiction warned of a future when we would be architects of our own obsolescence, replaced by our machines; an Associated Press analysis finds that the future has arrived. Read more at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/02/robot-wars-in-china-bugger-flipping.html#rmIlzyAFl702EfvB.99
Five years after the start of the Great Recession, the toll is terrifyingly clear: Millions of middle-class jobs have been lost in developed countries the world over.
And the situation is even worse than it appears.
Most of the jobs will never return, and millions more are likely to vanish as well, say experts who study the labor market. What's more, these jobs aren't just being lost to China and other developing countries, and they aren't just factory work. Increasingly, jobs are disappearing in the service sector, home to two-thirds of all workers.
They're being obliterated by technology.
Year after year, the software that runs computers and an array of other machines and devices becomes more sophisticated and powerful and capable of doing more efficiently tasks that humans have always done. For decades, science fiction warned of a future when we would be architects of our own obsolescence, replaced by our machines; an Associated Press analysis finds that the future has arrived. Read more at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/02/robot-wars-in-china-bugger-flipping.html#rmIlzyAFl702EfvB.99
Five years after the start of the Great Recession, the toll is terrifyingly clear: Millions of middle-class jobs have been lost in developed countries the world over.
And the situation is even worse than it appears.
Most of the jobs will never return, and millions more are likely to vanish as well, say experts who study the labor market. What's more, these jobs aren't just being lost to China and other developing countries, and they aren't just factory work. Increasingly, jobs are disappearing in the service sector, home to two-thirds of all workers.
They're being obliterated by technology.
Year after year, the software that runs computers and an array of other machines and devices becomes more sophisticated and powerful and capable of doing more efficiently tasks that humans have always done. For decades, science fiction warned of a future when we would be architects of our own obsolescence, replaced by our machines; an Associated Press analysis finds that the future has arrived. Read more at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/02/robot-wars-in-china-bugger-flipping.html#rmIlzyAFl702EfvB.99
Five years after the start of the Great Recession, the toll is terrifyingly clear: Millions of middle-class jobs have been lost in developed countries the world over.
And the situation is even worse than it appears.
Most of the jobs will never return, and millions more are likely to vanish as well, say experts who study the labor market. What's more, these jobs aren't just being lost to China and other developing countries, and they aren't just factory work. Increasingly, jobs are disappearing in the service sector, home to two-thirds of all workers.
They're being obliterated by technology.
Year after year, the software that runs computers and an array of other machines and devices becomes more sophisticated and powerful and capable of doing more efficiently tasks that humans have always done. For decades, science fiction warned of a future when we would be architects of our own obsolescence, replaced by our machines; an Associated Press analysis finds that the future has arrived. Read more at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2013/02/robot-wars-in-china-bugger-flipping.html#rmIlzyAFl702EfvB.99
The Middle Class - Busted & Betrayed
While both parties fall all over themselves to legalize and import citizens of foreign nations, the jobs held by American citizens are being abolished by the millions.
Five years after the start of the Great Recession, the toll is terrifyingly clear: Millions of middle-class jobs have been lost in developed countries the world over.
And the situation is even worse than it appears.
Most of the jobs will never return, and millions more are likely to vanish as well, say experts who study the labor market. What's more, these jobs aren't just being lost to China and other developing countries, and they aren't just factory work. Increasingly, jobs are disappearing in the service sector, home to two-thirds of all workers.
Year after year, the software that runs computers and an array of other machines and devices becomes more sophisticated and powerful and capable of doing more efficiently tasks that humans have always done. For decades, science fiction warned of a future when we would be architects of our own obsolescence, replaced by our machines; an Associated Press analysis finds that the future has arrived.
"The jobs that are going away aren't coming back," says Andrew McAfee, principal research scientist at the Center for Digital Business at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and co-author of "Race Against the Machine." ''I have never seen a period where computers demonstrated as many skills and abilities as they have over the past seven years."
The global economy is being reshaped by machines that generate and analyze vast amounts of data; by devices such as smartphones and tablet computers that let people work just about anywhere, even when they're on the move; by smarter, nimbler robots; and by services that let businesses rent computing power when they need it, instead of installing expensive equipment and hiring IT staffs to run it.
Whole employment categories, from secretaries to travel agents, are starting to disappear.
The AP's key findings:
For more than three decades, technology has reduced the number of jobs in manufacturing. Robots and other machines controlled by computer programs work faster and make fewer mistakes than humans. Now, that same efficiency is being unleashed in the service economy, which employs more than two-thirds of the workforce in developed countries. Technology is eliminating jobs in office buildings, retail establishments and other businesses consumers deal with every day.
Technology is being adopted by every kind of organization that employs people. It's replacing workers in large corporations and small businesses, established companies and start-ups. It's being used by schools, colleges and universities; hospitals and other medical facilities; nonprofit organizations and the military.
The most vulnerable workers are doing repetitive tasks that programmers can write software for — an accountant checking a list of numbers, an office manager filing forms, a paralegal reviewing documents for key words to help in a case. As software becomes even more sophisticated, victims are expected to include those who juggle tasks, such as supervisors and managers — workers who thought they were protected by a college degree.
Technology is replacing workers in developed countries regardless of their politics, policies and laws. Union rules and labor laws may slow the dismissal of employees, but no country is attempting to prohibit organizations from using technology that allows them to operate more efficiently — and with fewer employees.
More American Workers Outsourcing Own Jobs Overseas
The droids are taking our jobs An Oxford University study concluded that 47% of all
Touch Screens at McDonalds Abolish Jobs. McDonald's and the Japanese sushi chain, Kura, just installed 7,000 touch-screens throughout Europe, eliminating the need for workers to take customers' orders. Kura, for its part, has been able to fully eliminate cashiers from their workforce.
. “The Master created humans first as the lowest type, most easily formed. Gradually, he replaced them by robots, the next higher step, and finally he created me, to take the place of the last humans.” ― Isaac Asimov - I, Robot
Republicans will keep Louisiana's 5th District congressional seat no matter who wins in runoff
A runoff with two Republicans and no Democrat. . . . the way all elections should be.
Louisiana's 5th District congressional seat will remain firmly in Republican hands, after two GOP contenders advanced to a November runoff and shut out the Democrats in their bid to retake the seat they held less than a decade ago.
State Sen. Neil Riser, a Republican from Columbia, and Vance McAllister, a businessman from Monroe, will compete in the Nov. 16 election, after winning the most support from voters in Saturday's election.
The real surprise wasn't that two Republicans will face off in the runoff, but that McAllister, a political newcomer, managed to distinguish himself among a pack of 14 candidates, including six elected officials, in only two months of campaigning reports The Republic.
A special election in the 5th district.
The self-made businessman poured an estimated $400,000 of his own cash into the race and got a sizable attention boost with the support of the highly popular "Duck Dynasty" television series star, Phil Robertson.
"I knew we worked hard. I did everything I could do, and it was in the Good Lord's hands," McAllister said Saturday night. "I'm kind of at a loss for words. I'm speechless. It's humbling to do know that this many people in this district can believe in somebody like that."
Riser received support from 32% of voters while McAllister had 18% in the low-turnout race, according to unofficial results from the secretary of state's office.
Going into the election, Riser was considered a lock on a runoff spot — but who would be his opponent was anybody's guess. Now facing a political outsider in a one-on-one competition, Riser focused on experience, saying he had a "proven record" and had already worked to pass balanced budgets in Louisiana.
McAllister had the support of the highly popular "Duck Dynasty" television series star, Phil Robertson.
A lawmaker since 2008 and owner of a funeral home business, Riser is best known for sponsoring a state constitutional amendment that makes it tougher to enact gun restrictions in Louisiana. He said he wouldn't change his campaign focus in the runoff.
"We're going to keep some sending the same message that D.C. needs to pass a balanced budget, that spending's out of control," he said.
McAllister ran as a political outsider and self-made businessman who could bring common sense to Washington, D.C. "They're ready for somebody who's real," he said.
Riser and McAllister beat five other elected officials vying for the runoff spot: Public Service Commissioner Clyde Holloway, a Republican; state Rep. Marcus Hunter, a Democrat; state Rep. Robert Johnson, a Democrat; Monroe Mayor Jamie Mayo, a Democrat; and state Rep. Jay Morris, a Republican.
The sprawling 5th District covers all or part of 24 parishes, from northeast and central Louisiana into the southeast.
Congress allows an UNLIMITED increase in the debt until February 7th.
The budget measure that ended the partial government shutdown allows for a 1% raise for Federal employees in January.
GOP abandons the Constitution. Allows the Senate alone to dictate all government spending.
For TV both parties pretend to focus on Obamacare, but work together behind the scenes to keep other spending programs fully funded and out of the debate.
By Gary;
Both parties have kicked the Socialist spending-debt can down the road yet again.
With the Democrats you get up-front honest Marxism, wealth re-distribution and an unconstitutional centralized 1984 Surveillance State.
My beef is with the Republicans. I have Blogged from day one that the GOP is effectively a radical New Deal Leftist political movement. The party has adopted as their own, voted to fund and has protected every Liberal wet-dream spending or police state program ever conceived by FDR or LBJ plus a few the GOP dreamed up on their own.
So we have a nation without an opposition party.
The GOP talks a good game about small Constitutional government, but the party members eagerly latch on to the public teat. We are already seeing GOP Governors around the nation jumping on the Obamacare train in order to cash those Federal checks. In 2014 those Republicans will campaign for re-election that they "brought home the bacon" to their districts and states.
The GOP lost the public relations moral high ground in January, 2011. Except for holding hearings in the House to embarrass the other Big Government faction, the GOP has not fought to cut one single dime. They voted again and again to protect re-distribution of wealth spending programs and increase the debt limit.
In a world gone mad, the now capitalist Chinese are condemning U.S. big government spending. A Chinese ratings agency downgraded its US sovereign credit rating Thursday despite Washington's resolution of the debt ceiling deadlock, warning that fundamentals for a potential default remained "unchanged".
Dagong lowered its ratings for US local and foreign currency credit from A to A-, maintaining a negative outlook.
Look out Greece, here we come.
The "Billionaires" of Zimbabwe know full well about the endless printing of money.
Dr. Peter Venkman: This city is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions. Mayor: What do you mean, "biblical"? Dr. Ray Stantz: What he means is Old Testament, Mr. Mayor, real wrath of God type stuff. Dr. Peter Venkman: Exactly. Dr. Ray Stantz: Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling! Dr. Egon Spengler: Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes... Winston Zeddemore: The dead rising from the grave! Dr. Peter Venkman: Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together... mass hysteria!
By Gary;
The above routine from "Ghostbusters" basically summarizes the socialist policies of the Democrats. The Leftists are screaming that we are all going to die in rivers of blood unless the government teat keeps pumping cash into the corrupt system.
Many GOP legislators, not normally known for their high IQs, are at a loss for words on how to respond effectively to leftist claims of triple amputee children with leukemia needing their government checks.
Quite a few Republicans are simply incoherent on TV while other Republicans are plotting behind the scenes to cut the legs out from under those willing to fight socialism.
It may be just a matter of time until a pussy Peter King "moderate" faction of 25 or so Republicans breaks ranks and votes with the Democrats to keep the cash flowing to their districts.
Politics is a game of poker. You need to know when to fold 'em and cut your losses.
Kick 'em where it hurts.
It is pretty obvious that the Democrats are not going to back down on Obamacare. So be it. One must survive the battle, regroup and fight another day.
It's Nut Kicking Time
Notice that the GOP focus is on Obamacare, but not on the rest of government spending. I expected that. Republicans love spending our money just as much as Democrats do.
So I say it is time for the GOP House to pivot, pull back on Obamacare, and kick the Democrats hard in the nuts where it hurts.
How about going through the budget and yank the funding for 30 or 40 smaller but pet leftist programs in key Democrat House districts around the country. Then send that budget over to the Senate.
The Democrat Senate can vote to pass that bill and keep Obamacare and government running while fucking over their fellow Democrats in the House.
The Republicans can go on TV saying we have funded the government. Let the Democrat Senate be the ones to refuse to fund Obamacare because of a few dozen corrupt programs.
Only when you grab someone by the balls will you get their attention.
The GOP should go to this back-up plan and start squeezing leftist nuts as hard as they can.
Ghostbusters - Mass Hysteria
The Democrats Hate America What these bastard Leftist scumbags did to 90 year old vets in wheelchairs was both staggering and enlightening. . In their leftist insanity they showed America their deep and seething hatred for our nation. They want to destroy all that is good and honorable in our culture. We are at war with evil. We cannot win every battle, but every battle must be fought.
"The President is to be commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States. . . . It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first General and Admiral of the Confederacy; while that of the British king extends to the declaring of war and the raising and regulating of fleets and armies, -- all of which by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature."
Alexander Hamilton
(The Federalist Papers, 69, 1788.)
By Gary;
Syria is not some BS Democrat vs. Republican issue. The debate for war cuts across party lines and comes down to Authoritarianism vs. Constitutional Federalism.
Alexander Hamilton had it right. No one man should be able to send a nation to war against another nation that has not even threatened to attack the U.S. Congress has that power.
The rapid spread of news and ideas through a free Internet Media forced a vote in the British Parliament that defeated war.
The British defeat caused the war plans of the bipartisan Washington Elite to be thrown off balance, and forced Obama to seek Congressional approval. The Elites are not used to the Internet Media that can point out the BS and lies of both government and their lap-dog establishment media.
In many ways it will be a phony debate. Congress has pretended for a long time now that the CIA was not active in funding and arming the Syrian rebels. We have already been at war using Islamic Turkey, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States as front men.
What the debate is really about is should the U.S. go in the deep end of the pool or stay in the shallow end and go on pretending we are not supporting the rebels.
Syrian Rebels. The bipartisan Washington Elites have already been running an unconstitutional war in Syria through the CIA. A vote by Congress only gives the Elites legal cover to expand their actions.
Warmongers line up to back Obama The wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and Yemen were not enough. Now the Washington Elites want to go into Syria.
Retired Army Gen. David Petraeus, former CIA director, called strongly Saturday for Congress to back the White House on Syria, declaring that military action against the regime is “necessary” to deter “Iran, North Korea and other would-be aggressors.”
“Failure of Congress to approve the president’s request would have serious ramifications not just in the Mideast but around the world,” Petraeus said in a four-sentence statement provided to Politico.
Nancy Pelosi - “It is in our national interest to respond to the Syrian government’s unspeakable use of chemical weapons."
John McCain - “I think it would be a very serious situation where we are now 535 commanders in chief. Look, the president of the United States is the only commander.”
Eric Cantor - “There are no easy solutions and a one-off military strike is not by itself an adequate strategy, but I am convinced that the risks of inaction outweigh the risks of a limited intervention."
Peter King - Presidents from both parties have not hesitated to take quick and effective military action when they believed it was essential to our national interest. And they did it without seeking prior approval from Congress. These presidents acted pursuant to their constitutional and statutory powers as commander-in-chief. They knew that for America's security and credibility, we cannot have 535 commanders-in-chief.
Pat Buchanan Syria Is Dress Rehearsal For War With Iran
While there are some differences between the political "factions" that rule America, it is also true that both sides traditionally close ranks to protect the Elites of Washington from the prying eyes of those pesky voters back home.
Now it is leaking out that the House GOP Leadership may prevent a floor vote on Syria if it looks like Obama would be defeated.
“I just don’t believe that if defeat is certain, the House leadership will want to see a president utterly humiliated on the House floor in a public vote,” one top aide to the Republican leadership told the National Review.
Should the full Senate vote to approve an attack on Syria — as still appears somewhat likely — the battle would shift to the House.
“An attempt would be made to let the whole thing go away. I don’t think it would be done to give the GOP any extra leverage in debt-ceiling or budget negotiations — Obama isn’t the grateful type — but simply because the weakness it would demonstrate wouldn’t be good for the country,” the aide told the National Review.
Good for the country my ass. The GOP wants to protect Obama's ass and the future ass of any GOP President to wage war.
GOP Speaker Boehner insults the Russians by refusing to
even meet with their members of Parliament.
Gary Rule #1 - People are fucking idiots. . It is comforting to see that my main rule of life is confirmed nearly every day.
In a deliberate act of rudeness and stupidity the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives has refused to meet with Russian Members of Parliament to discuss the situation in Syria when they come to Washington. Boehner effectively told the Russian MPs to fuck off. Hell, it is only WAR. What on earth is there to talk about?
Offer Boehner Booze Maybe the Russians could attract the old drunk to a meeting with vodka.
The Duma members plan to visit Washington next week to persuade their American counterparts not to attack Syria.
Number three in Washington's political hierarchy, House Speaker John Boehner, a Conservative from Ohio, has turned down a request from the Russian Embassy to hold a meeting with the delegation of lawmakers.
But Russian MPs plan to pay a visit to the Capitol Hill anyway and are currently busy verifying who exactly will be in the delegation reports RT News.
“We’re planning the visit,” a spokesman of the Russian embassy in Washington told CNN. “We can’t tell you the exact time, but it will be next week,” he said, specifying that members of the upper and lower chambers of the Russian parliament plan to meet with both Republican and Democrat senators and members of Congress.
“I believe we can maintain a dialogue with our partners from the Congress, exchange opinions and arguments for a better understanding of each other,” Federation Council speaker Valentina Matvienko shared, stressing that in absence of solid arguments the Congress would turn down the proposed military operation against Syria. . “The speaker has declined the Russian embassy’s request that he meet with a delegation," said Boehner spokesman Michael Steel.
The US Senate Foreign Relations Committee has already voted on Wednesday to approve President Barack Obama's plan to strike Syria.
GOP Insults Russia's Parliament. I used to think the most stupid person on earth was a liberal Democrat, but I was wrong. The Conservative Republicans are right up there at the idiot level. . Common courtesy says that when an embassy from a nation thousands of miles away comes on a visit to talk about war and regional problems you sit down for a drink and have a discussion. Instead the GOP House Speaker effectively tells the Russian MPs from the #2 nuclear power on earth to "Fuck off and get lost." . No wonder we are at war all the time.
The GOP is schizophrenic. It thinks it is an opposition party
when in reality it is a branch of the Democrat Party.
By Gary;
The GOP leadership is pulling the party apart to back Comrade Obama on Syria. But I suspect some 75% of GOP opposition to Syria has a lot more to do with self preservation in the 2014 elections than anything else.
This GOP schizophrenia should be expected. It has been my contention for some time that the "Conservative" Republican Party does not exist. We basically have a one-party state with two factions that pretend to fight with each other.
Sure there are a few social issues each faction exploits to drum up support: gays, abortion & guns. But on the important issues of Big Government growth and spending, Police State spying and war the parties are nearly identical.
Matt Drudge asks Who are the Republicans?
The only real argument is which faction gets to hand out free crap from the US Treasury to reward their followers.
But the GOP is stumped about Syria.
Obama and the CIA have been running guns to the rebels for some time now. But Republicans want to pretend they are both blind and deaf. "We see nothing." Never mind the stories of gun running are in the British papers for the world to read.
Matt Drudge, founder and editor of the influential Drudge Report, is a conservative by all accounts and he has picked up on this general theme. This last week he lashed out at the GOP and he was anti-Republican Party.
“Why would anyone vote Republican?” Drudge tweeted. “Please give reason. Raised taxes; marching us off to war again; approved more NSA snooping. WHO ARE THEY?!”
The tweet came after another that was also critical of the GOP. “It’s now Authoritarian vs. Libertarian,” Drudge wrote. “Since Democrats vs. Republicans has been obliterated, no real difference between parties.”
Libertarian is a nice catch all code word, but it is a bit off.
It is really Authoritarian vs. Constitutional Federalism. You either believe in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights or your don't.
That's where the confusion happens on issues like Syria. You have "Liberal" Democrats and "Conservative" Republicans standing together demanding that the Constitution be ignored and Obama be allowed to bomb the crap out of any nation he wants to.
That is the contest within the GOP for 2014 and 2016.
Will the rather small and underfunded Constitutional Federalist wing of the Republican Party be able to overcome the mountains of special interest money out of Washington and take control of the party?
