But they are coming for your vaginas Unlike the right of women to make their own reproductive choices, the right to bear arms faces no serious challenge in the United States of America. This is a comparison that unsettles me, of course. Anti-abortion rights folks grant personhood to any meeting of a sperm and the egg, but no one doubts […]

Maintaining a permanent Republican majority the easy way

Yesterday, delegates to the Michigan Electoral College cast Michigan’s 16 votes for Barack Obama. The President won Michigan handily, beating Mitt Romney by nearly 10 points. However, Republicans still maintain control over our state legislature and hour Congressional caucus. How is this possible?

Gerrymandering.

Find out how Republicans are trying to exploit this by changing how we choose our president after the jump.

How to turn your middle class into a pyramid scheme I went to see a comic perform in Grand Rapids a few years ago and he said, “So, this is the tip of the pyramid?” And the crowd sighed out laughter, knowing exactly what he meant. Grand Rapids, Michigan is the city Amway built. While the company may deny that […]

The one question you need to ask yourself whenever the GOP is fighting for something As Chris has been reporting, Michigan’s GOP is taking the thumping they received on November 6 as a sign they need to become even more extreme by pursuing privatization of schools and a “right to work” for less law. In their effort to bust unions […]

The rich are getting richer BECAUSE the poor are getting poorer

As we munch popcorn and watch the Republicans in their death match with President Obama over the fiscal speed bump and whether or not our economy will tumble to the ground if we raise taxes on the super-rich by 3.9%, a big part of the rhetoric we hear from the GOP is that this is a tax on business owners. Besides the fact that this is largely untrue and that in the small percentage of businesses affected, it only raises taxes on their income OVER $250,000 year, the fact is that our country’s economy is largely driven by large corporations and the contribution to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by small businesses is shrinking.

Big businesses, as it turns out, are doing just fine. Workers’ wages, on the other hand? Not so much.

At least we know who they work for now — they’ve made that clear

House Republicans have released a counter-proposal to President Obama’s budget plan to avoid plunging us off the fiscal cliff speed bump. Unsurprisingly, it raises tax revenue but doesn’t allow the Bush tax cuts to expire. In fact, according to analysis by the Washington Post, it appears to lower taxes for the top tax bracket.

Details and more GOPocrisy and insanity after the jump.

Pay no attention to the lobbyist behind the curtain

As LOLGOP pointed out this morning, there are Republicans who handily won re-election in their gerrymandered districts who do not fear the fiscal cliff. They can serve their two-percenter masters without fear that plunging our country into another recession will hurt their political careers in any way. But President Obama has a couple of things going for him. The first is that most Americans WILL blame the Republicans for “going there” if we do, indeed, go off the mythical cliff. Then there’s the fact that he won the election largely because he promised the super-wealthy would no longer be allowed to avoid paying their fair share in taxes.

Democrats are beginning to show some real spine in this debate. Politico reports today that many of them are ready to use their success on November 6th to restore some sanity to our budget.

Details after the jump.

Dorquist-(n) someone who would never cheat on Grover Norquist Here’s the problem: The GOP knows they lost the White House along with seats in the House and Senate. And they don’t really care. Sure, they recognize that if they lose the state of Texas the way they have California, they’re basically on a free-fall path to extinction. But the Republicans […]

It’s a death trap, it’s a suicide rap This week, Senator Saxby Chambliss of Georgia did what amazingly few elected Republicans do: He said that he cared more about his country than some “twenty year old pledge.” He means the Americans For Tax Reform Taxpayer Pledge, which is advocated for and enforced by the most powerful American who has never […]

They love you until you’re born

It’s getting pretty tough for Michigan Republicans to surprise me anymore but, dammit, they went ahead and did it anyway. This week, they introduced legislation that establishes a tax credit for unborn fetuses.

I’m not kidding.

Yes, Ronald Reagan Socialized Medicine In The United States There are two dirty secrets in American politics. The first is that the GOP is the real “food stamp party”. The second is that we already pay for each other’s health care in the dumbest possible way, thanks to Ronald Reagan. Every time an uninsured person waits to the last possible […]