King of Corrupt Corporate Capitalism?

Michele Bachmann has made the self-serving attack on Rick Perry that he engages in rampant cronyism, and pay for play, where an individual or a corporation pays off a politician for special favors, legislation or contracts paid by state money. Perry is reputed to be more involved than even the usual amount of such activity.

This appears to substantiate those accusations. I don't find Perry's denials of being influenced, which amounts to bribery, as credible. If a person would take money for favors, they would as easily lie about it.

From MSNBC.com and the Center for Public Integrity:

HPV vaccine isn't the only procedure Rick Perry has mandated

iWatch News from the Center for Public Integrity
Texas Gov. Rick Perry has taken some heat from his fellow Republican presidential candidates for having signed a controversial executive order that mandated vaccines against human papillomavirus (HPV) for sixth-grade girls in 2007, an order the Legislature later overturned.
It turns out that isn't the only medical procedure Perry has ordered. Two years later, in 2009, Perry quietly signed a health insurance mandate that some experts say could waste vast sums of money and provide little medical benefit, according to the Center for Public Integrity (CPI), a nonprofit investigative group:

The 2009 measure, the Texas Heart Attack Prevention Bill, requires insurance companies to pay for CT scans and ultrasound tests that can detect heart disease. The companies must reimburse middle-aged and elderly citizens up to $200 for these tests, if they are either diabetic or at intermediate or higher risk of developing cardiovascular illness. They need not have any actual heart problems.
Nearly 2.4 million Texans fall into this group, estimates Dr. Amit Khera, a professor at Texas' Southwestern Medical Center. If one fourth of them had the appropriate insurance and took advantage of the benefit only once, insurance companies would be required to spend $120 million. There is no data on how many people have actually used the benefit.
Yet there is little evidence that the tests can improve people's health, some experts say, and the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force, an independent panel of health experts, does not recommend the tests for routine screening.

CPI reports that the measure was promoted by a medical group with a history of ties to Pfizer Inc., which makes the cholesterol-lowering drug Lipitor. Campaign finance reports show that Perry received more money from Pfizer than any other political candidate nationwide over the last six years.
CPI said a spokesman for Perry declined to address the issues raised by Pfizer's support, but he has previously dismissed assertions that he solicited funds from donors who sought special benefits as "ridiculous."
You can read the full iWatch News report here.
iWatch News is the website of the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit organization dedicated to investigative journalism.

A Different Kind of Bombing...

I'm talking here about the kind of bombing - failing - that the right is demonstrating in recent polls. This seems a pertinent observation in light of the most recent GOP presidential candidate debates.

For example, we have the Bloomberg/ WaPo poll here which shows a tremendous LACK of confidence in the conservatives to improve our economy.

1. If a Republican were president right now, do you think the economy would be better, worse, or about the same as it is now?

             Better   Worse   The same   No opinion
All adults     23      25         45           7 

and THAT includes Republicans and right-leaning Independents!

So, not only do the Republican and Tea Party members of congress have lower approval ratings and higher disapproval ratings than the Democrats, they don't have any faith that Republicans would have made  it better, and a higher percentage - 25% - believe the right would have made things WORSE.

But I particularly liked this question, both parts equally:

3a. Of the following possible Republican candidates for president, which one do you think would do the most to improve the economy?

All adults   Leaned GOP 
Mitt Romney                17            22
Herman Cain                10            20
Rick Perry                  7            12
Ron Paul                    7             8
Newt Gingrich               4             6
Michele Bachmann            4             3 
Jon Huntsman                2             *
Rick Santorum               1             1
None of these (VOL.)       16             5
Other (VOL.)                1             *
No opinion                 33            22

3b. Of the following possible Republican candidates for president, which one do you think would do the most damage to the economy?

All adults   Leaned GOP 
Michele Bachmann           15            14 
Rick Perry                 12             9 
Ron Paul                    7            11 
Newt Gingrich               6             5 
Mitt Romney                 5             7 
Jon Huntsman                2             3 
Herman Cain                 2             2 
Rick Santorum               2             1 
None of these (VOL.)        5             5 
Other (VOL.)                3             1 
No opinion                 42            43 

The no opinions are about double what the highest rating to improve the economy scored, and 'none of these' was only a point off - well within the poll's +/- %  range.

I wonder if Mitt Romney would fare as well if the low-information voters who gave him this not-so-high rating in this poll knew that he had selected some of the worst advisors to President 'W' Bush to draft his econimic proposal, and to be his economic advisors?  Or that his foreign policy advisors were pretty much 'W' recycled faces as well.

I bet not, given the numbers who still believe that 'W' was significantly / mostly responsible for our current economic crisis; and that is according to this poll and this poll, and this poll, and a number of other polls in between. That last poll, taken last month shows 50% believe the economy is POOR, with more thinking it isn't good, and with 53% blaming Bush and the Republicans for the problems.

The Republicans are not a party of new ideas, and increasingly as they support the 1%, they are less and less the party of people either.

And THAT is only likely to be a more widespread opinion, as the news gets out about the REAL job performance of 'businessmen' like Herman Cain, who was not it appears the "Captain of Industry" that he represents, according to this examination of his supposed success.   Nor is Romney going to be getting much credit for his career as it relates to jobs, when the facts get more circulation.


According to politifact.com, during Romney's tenure as governor, Massachusetts ranked 47th in job growth, one of the very worst states in the country.  And Romney can't really in honesty take credit for improving those stats either.  As an executive at Bain Capital, Romney's company consistently bought companies, and then sold them off piecemeal, resulting in the firing of thousands of people from their jobs as those jobs DISAPPEARED.  Per the Bloomberg report on Cain, his performance wasn't any better for 'creating jobs' while CEO of Godfather's Pizza, and it has ended up worse, in comparison to it's competitors, than when he took over. No one, except someone paid by Herman Cain, thinks his 9-9-9 proposal has a prayer of working as claimed.

So.......for that question about making the economy worse?  Yes, ALL of the Republicans in contention for the presidential race would make it worse. ALL of them; the only questions are: "how very much worse?", and "worse than 'W', or only as bad?".

Racism, Secession, and Rick Perry: The Niggerhead Controversy

The Perry campaign is disagreeing with the date when the offending N word was removed from the entrance to the long-time family hunting ranch.

This doesn't appear to be unique or unusual in right wing Texas politics, just same old, same old, as with the proposal to offer confederate license plates.  For those who learned their American History in bad schools - like many of those in Texas and across the 'old South', or who never properly learned  U.S. history at all, Texas joined the confederacy specifically to maintain slavery of blacks.




The Civil War was a treasonous episode in U.S. history, and should NEVER be honored or recognized by a state or federal government entity.  According to an article in the Houston Chronicle, by R. C. Lee:

A mock plate was posted on the DMV's website in March. Comments were overwhelmingly positive: 186 in favor, 3 against.

"I think it is a wonderful idea to honor our Confederate Veterans during the 150th anniversary years of the war between the states," one resident wrote.

And by any chance, were those blacks who fought for the Confederacy slaves at the time?  Or are their descendants either freaking tenthers, or just willing to kiss the asses of the right wing at any cost?  The article continues:

Fighting for approval

But not all comments were positive.

"I think your "Sons of the Confederacy" plate will open up some old wounds that this country has been trying for years to heal. What will be next? One with a Swastika?" wrote one resident.

The SCV has won approval of the license plates in nine other states, including Georgia, Maryland and Tennessee, the organization's headquarters. It has filed and won lawsuits in states where its requests were denied, said national executive director Ben Sewell.

The group also is seeking approval of plates with its logo in Florida, Kentucky and Mississippi.

I wonder if we are going to hear from Aztec Red on this topic; he has been uncharacheristically  absent of late...
From MSNBC.com :

Republican presidential hopeful Herman Cain criticized the name of a hunting camp once leased by Gov. Rick Perry's family as "just plain insensitive" in an appearance on Fox News Sunday.

The name of the camp — "Niggerhead" — was first reported by the Washington Post on Saturday. The paper said the name was painted on a rock at the entrance of the property.

Perry reportedly began hosting fellow lawmakers, friends and supporters at the secluded ranch early in his career. The offensive phrase has been painted over, but the Post's sources and the Perry campaign differ on when that was done.

The Post reports that the name can still be seen through the paint. (large font, my emphasis added - DG)

"My reaction is, that's just very insensitive," Cain told Fox. "[There] isn't a more vile, negative word than the N-word, and for him to leave it there as long as he did, before I hear that they finally painted over it, is just plain insensitive to a lot of black people in this country."

Ray Sullivan, Perry's communication's director, pushed back against the Post report on Sunday.

Sullivan said the governor's father, Ray, painted over the name in the early 1980s. That conflicts with the accounts of seven sources who spoke to the Post on the condition of anonymity. They claim the offensive name was visible during the 1980s and 1990s, when Perry launched his political career, with one source saying the word could be seen as late as 2008.  (the article continues at MSNBC.com)

So, whenever it was that the offensive slur was painted over, it appears that it was in place for YEARS, even decades, without Perry family, friends, OR POLITICAL SUPPORTERS objecting to it.

This would be the same Rick Perry who was inaccurately claiming that Texas might secede, not that long ago.  Perry clearly neither correctly knows his state's history, or that of the U.S.  But 'Tenthers', those who believe that the states are sovereign, and CAN legally secede per the tenth amendment, are a popular segment of the base on the right wing fringe.  If these lunatics ever gain any significant traction, instead of being marginalized where they belong, with the truthers, birthers, and other lunatics, we could have to fight the damn Civil War all over again. For those of you not familiar with these particular crazies, states rights, aka the tenth amendment relating to the rights of states, was directly the primary cause of the Civil War. The conflict was over the rights of states, rather than the federal government, to determine if slavery would be legal, and if there was a disagreement, that the states could secede if they chose:

Tenther movement  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Tenther movement is a term used to describe a political ideology and a social movement in the United States which espouses that many actions of the United States government are unconstitutional.^[1] Adherents invoke the concept that the states share sovereignty with the federal government and with the people by citing the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution as the basis for their legal and ideological beliefs:

“

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

”

Adherents believe that political authority enumerated in the United States Constitution as belonging to the Federal Government must be read very narrowly to exclude much of what the national government already does.^[2] They argue for the recognition of limited sovereignty of the States.^[3] Opponents use the term in order to draw parallels between adherents and nineteenth century states' rights secessionistsCivil Rights legislation.^[4]
Some object to the name "Tenther" as it originated as a pejorative used by those opposed to the movement's ideas, in an attempt to reference and draw parallels to conspiratorial movements such as Birthers and Truthers.^[5]

Examples of political authority opposed

Adherents oppose a broad range of federal government programs, including the War on Drugs, federal surveillance, and other limitations on privacy and civil and economic liberties, plus numerous New Deal legislation to Great Society legislation, such as Medicaid, Medicare, the VA health system and the G.I. Bill.^[2]

You don't believe Rick Perry and the politically insane in Texas wouldn't like to return to what they imagine are the glory days of the 19th century?

We neither need nor want another ignorant Texan, who's political success is based on playing to the religious right and to corrupt crony capitalist special interest money in the 2012 election.

FYI, for those who are curious, Texas does NOT retain any right to secede, never did; the state did retain the right to subdivide into up to four or five smaller states - the exact same way as ANY OTHER STATE.