Michele Bachmann has shown true leadership in her call recently for a “redefinition” of earmarks.
She wants to take the tiny sliver representing earmarks in the chart below and make it smaller:
“Advocating for transportation projects for ones district in my mind does not equate to an earmark.”“I don’t believe that building roads and bridges and interchanges should be considered an earmark,” Bachmann said. “There’s a big difference between funding a tea pot museum and a bridge over a vital waterway.”
I couldn’t agree more. So now I’m going to follow her lead and suggest some further Republican “redefinitions” of my own.
Unemployment benefits
CURRENT MEANING: Money temporarily collected by people who have paid into an insurance system for years and have lost their jobs.
REDEFINITION: An unconscionable expenditure of money that increases the deficit without any tangible benefit to wealthy taxpayers job creators.
Upper class tax cuts
CURRENT MEANING: Tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% of Americans that create a $700 billion hole in our deficit without any appreciable job-creating characteristics and a redistribution of wealth from the middle class to the wealthy.
REDEFINITION: A necessary stimulative measure that will solve our unemployment crisis, eliminate the deficit through trickle-down effects, bring world peace, and cure teh gay.
Middle class tax cuts
CURRENT MEANING: Tax cuts on the first $250,000 of income that puts money in the pockets of 95+% of all working Americans.
REDEFINITION: A bargaining chip to be used to ensure Upper class tax cuts are made permanent which would be rendered unnecessary should Upper class tax cuts be made permanent through other means.
Bipartisanship
CURRENT MEANING: The act of Democrats and Republicans working together to solve the nation’s most-vexing problems and crises.
REDEFINITION: The act of Democrats agreeing with everything that Republicans put forth after a brief period of whinging and complaining in front of cameras.
Clean energy
CURRENT MEANING: Energy sources which do not pollute the environment (land, water, air, etc.), do not substantially deplete our natural resources and which are renewable.
REDEFINITION: Energy sources which do not benefit our biggest political contributors (Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Nuclear, etc.)
Cap-and-Trade
CURRENT MEANING: A system of regulating carbon emissions first suggested by Republicans which uses the free market system to ensure a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.
REDEFINITION: A burdensome regulatory system that diminishes the expansive profit-taking capabilities of our biggest political contributors (Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Nuclear, etc.) and increases energy costs.
Health insurance reform
CURRENT MEANING: A system of regulatory actions that increase health insurance coverage for millions of Americans and spell out a Patients’ Bill of Rights while reducing the national deficit.
REDEFINITION: An over-reaching regulatory system that diminishes the expansive profit-taking capabilities of our biggest political contributors (pharmaceutical companies, health insurance firms, etc.)
Immigration reform
CURRENT MEANING: A proposal to reconfigure our immigration policies to penalize companies that hire undocumented workers while establishing a clear and well-defined path for earned citizenship for people from other countries who wish to become American citizens.
REDEFINITION: An amnesty program from job-stealing foreigners tailored specifically toward illegal aliens who will vote for Democrats.
Education reform
CURRENT MEANING: A wide-ranging proposal designed to ensure promotion of “the best and the brightest” educators, the academic success of all American school children, and the ongoing effective and sustainable financial support of schools.
REDEFINITION: A means by which teachers’ unions assume total control of our education system for their own personal benefit with no regard to the quality of our children’s education.
Filibuster
CURRENT MEANING: A means for the minority party in the Senate to prevent over-reach by the majority party.
REDEFINITION: A means for the minority party in the Senate to obstruct and halt progress by the majority party on a wide array of issues from energy policy reform to the naming of post offices.
Reconciliation
CURRENT MEANING: A means of passing budgetary legislation that is not subject to the filibuster rule.
REDEFINITION: When used by Republicans, a perfectly legal procedural move used to “enhance revenues” for the wealthy. When used by Democrats, an unconstitutional abuse of power designed to ram unpopular, socialist programs down the throats of Americans.
Tea Party
CURRENT MEANING: An historical event where Americans threw off the shackles of British taxation and market manipulation.
REDEFINITION: A group of conservative Americans with little to no knowledge of the Constitution who decry anything they disagree with as “unconstitutional”, who claim to be fiscally-responsible while supporting ideas that increase the deficit, and who decry the intrusion of the federal government into their personal lives while promoting the ideas that all pregnancies should be monitored to ensure the baby is delivered, that all sexual activity should be monitored to ensure only heterosexuals engage in sex, and that any non-Christian religions and religious activities are marginalized and, in certain instances, condemned or outlawed.
And, finally:
Fiscal Conservative
CURRENT MEANING: A legislator who wishes to rein in spending of the federal government through a combination of tax cuts, spending cuts and elimination of federal programs.
REDEFINITION: A legislator who claims in public to support reining in spending of the federal government through a combination of tax cuts, spending cuts and elimination of federal programs while, in practice, supporting legislation and the actions of Republican presidential administrations who increase the federal deficit at record levels for the benefit of the wealthiest segments of America (i.e., their top political contributors.)
That’s all I have for the moment. Feel free to add yours in the Comments.
I’m just sayin’…
