The Republican American Dream is to turn the Nation into a Death Camp

"If he dies, he dies..." Ivan Drago, Trump's Asst Secretary of Health and Human Services 

"These people don't understand how capitalism works..." Republican Deathdealer Francis Roony of Florida.

There are several unforgivable crimes in America; being poor, being black.  Republicans have added being sick to this list. And the Republican sentence is death.

Before summer’s out, we'll repeal/replace Obamacare w/ system based on personal responsibility, free-market competition &; state-based reform - Vice President Pence, a vicious bigot and murderous attack dog of the Rich doesn't care about the sick, the elderly, or the disabled, except that they die.

Republicans are set to enact the only healthcare plan they've every really believed in: 1) Don't Get Sick, 2) If you do, Die Quickly.

Republicans, those lofty out-of-touch, safely ensconced bureaucrats in Washington D.C. view Americans as cogs in the gears of industry and war.  To be used with no protections, and discarded when broken or worn-out.

When Republicans pine for Capitalism they long for those heady days when children were sent into coal mines and train workers who lost an arm could be fired with no reprecussions or compensation, when women got cancer from making radioactive watches, and young girls were chained into their shirt factory to be burned alive as there were no job killing regulations just worker killing jobs.  Republicans want Americans to work until they die.

This is the Republican American Dream.  Legions of Americans working themselves to death, to further enrich the Plutocrats, who keep Republicans flush with campaign cash in safe gerrymandered districts, where voter supression and no absentee voting ensures only the comfortable elite vote while the poor, the sick, the elderly are sentenced to the best death camps ever devised; Republican controlled America.  The Republican American Dream is a Giant Death Camp.

Scott Walker's Socialism for the Rich and Cut-Throat Capitalism for the Poor

"Socialism, communism, whatever you want to call it, is never the answer." - Hank Steinbrenner, who received $1,200,000,000 Billion Dollars from the taxpayers of the City and State of New York to pay for the building of his baseball stadium.

Here's how Capitalism works in America. When a "private" business wants huge wads of taxpayer "relief" to finance some project, the discussion becomes a lofty, Grandiose debate on Utilitarian Principles and the greatest good for the greatest number; Highlighting the vast network of ancillary benefits to businesses, the community, the neighborhood, and the government. 

Therefore, it's only good and proper the Rich receive help. Also this is not Socialism. But, under Vulture Capitalism when were are talking about helping poor people with food assistance? Well, then the howls of lazy moochers and the mean-spirited tired cliche of 'feeding wild animals makes them too dependent' are trotted out. Also this is Socialism.

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker announced his plan to enact Socialism in Wisconsin. It's just that like all Republicans, Scott Walker believes in taking money from the Working Class and giving it to the Plutocracy. Socialism for the Rich and Corporations and Cut-Throat Capitalism for the Poor is the motto of the Modern Republican Party.

After slashing $250 million from the Wisconsin budget for Education, Scott Walker brazenly turned around, and in a massive Pay-to-Play Scam, gave Millionaires (who contributed vast amounts of money to his two election campaigns, recall fight, and Presidential Super PAC) hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars to pay for their new Milwaukee Bucks Basketball Stadium.

Scott Walker's entire governorship has been the forcible theft of Public Lands, Resources, and Monies for redistribution upwards to the Rich. That he feels free to do this so brazenly during the run-up to the 2016 Republican Nomination shows, that Walker would steal Billions from the American people writ large and transfer those monies up to the Plutocracy using the Awesome Power of the Federal Government.

How Capitalism drives Crime but only dark skinned criminals concern Conservatives

I've left a bigoted rambling comment up on my post about John Wrana's death and the trial of Officer Craig Taylor because it is illustrative of a terrible blight on this nation, How Conservative Bigotry blinds them and thus they focus on only dark-skinned criminals.

Here is the comment from Rational Nauseous,

Marty King was a communist who cheated on his wife frequently. He was a tremendous advocate for Negro self-sufficiency and a color blind society. So we honor his memory by not working, not going to school etc. But to be honest, I think if Marty was still alive he would commit suicide, if he saw what direction the black community has taken. Lets see all the accomplishment that the blacks have made since Marty King’s days, Black folks has denigrated so very badly, with their stupid music, stupid cloths, pants sagging down and their ass cracks showing, their willing to stand out in the cold at shoe stores for days and nights for a pair of stupid sneakers from a basketball player, Michael Jordan endorsed and made a fortune from, their teenage pregnancies and parent homes, multiple fathers to litters of children drawing welfare checks and food stamps, drinking Booze in the streets and drunk driving, pointless killings, looting and burning down homes and store and calling it “protesting”

When it comes to MLKJr, Right-Wingers are flummoxed. They fervently tried to destroy his image, beliefs and works before and after murdering his body, but have been absolutely unsuccessful so conservatives have tried to co-opt Doctor King as one of them while still believing the John Bircher propaganda.

But, let's focus on the henious lies and ignorant bigotry throughout conservative thinking illustrated by Rational Nauseous; who ascribes crime, food stamps, absentee fathers and teenage pregnancies as something inherent in the black community.

These issues are endemic in all races and cultures. In fact, the overwhelming majority who use food stamps, SSDI and other government assistance programs are "white" people. Currently, white conservatives have convinced themselves they "earned" their medicare, social security benefits and blithely ignore crime and the fraying of society amongst "whites".

As Martin Luther King Jr, observed Rich White Men have always been able to convince poor whites that while they and their children may be sickly, uneducated and broken by poverty at least they're not black.

But, what every Police Officer knows is that poverty and lack of economic opportunities drives much* criminal activity.

We are a full generation into the Ronald Reagan destruction of the American Dream and elimination of the Middle Class. Crimes and abberant behavior once ascribed solely to black and brown communities is becoming common-place amongst whites. Once Republicans destroyed the manufacturing base, transformed the Nation into a service-based economy and eliminated laws and regulations on the Financial Industry they made the bottom quarter of Americans into extraneous persons about whom they care not one jot or tittle.

The Housing Crash and Republican Recession of 2007 showed, Capitalism cares nothing for your belief system and once Glorious Capitalism deems you expendable then you are expendable. This is something African-American, Asian, and Hispanic communities have known for generations.

In some ways the Creation of the Tea Party was a response to Capitalism's evil treatment of the white American Working Class until the Koch Brothers and their Republican Operatives quickly usurped authority and transformed Tea Baggers into a lobbying arm for Plutocratic interests, while ensuring the anger of the white community was transfered from the Destructive nature of Capitalism and Corporate Criminality towards Government and the Social Safety Net.

David Simon, creator of The Wire, Treme and former reporter the Baltimore Sun correctly observed once economic opportunities were taken away so-called drug crime became the only option in minority communities,

"We do not need 10-12% of our population; they've been abandoned. They don't have barbed wire around them, but they might as well." As a result, "drugs are the only industry left in places such as Baltimore and east St Louis" – an industry that employs "children, old people, people who've been shooting drugs for 20 years, it doesn't matter. It's the only factory that's still open. The doors are open. Capitalism has tried to jail its way out of the problem, the prison industry has been given over to capitalism. If we need to get rid of these people, we might as well make some money out of getting rid of them."

           

It is not an inherent criminal nature in black and brown communities it's a systematic denial of the American Dream which fueled much of the crime in those communities.

Now we see Capitalism has throw aside the poor white communities and undermined the Middle Class Dream of White America.

Affluenza is worse than Benghazi

The actual "Affluenza" Case is, of course, far worse.

In the case, Judge Jean Boyd decided that 16 year old Ethan Couch, a pampered white juvenile delinquent who stole booze from a Walmart, got liquored up, and while driving recklessly, 30 miles-an-hour over the speed limit, with a BAC 0.24 KILLED 4 people, was not responsible for his actions because he suffered from "Affluenza", the crippling disability of not knowing right from wrong by virtue of being a little white entitled punk, who is rich and has been overly coddled.

The four people slaughtered by Couch were: Breanna Mitchell, who had crashed her SUV, Brian Jennings, a youth pastor at a local church, Hollie Boyles and her daughter Shelby Boyles who stopped to help Mitchell before the drunken little shit killed them with his dad's jeep.

While emergency crews were on the scene, Couch took a defiant attitude telling responders, 'I’m outta here' before attempting to leave the scene. Couch's parents apparently have a history of reckless driving as well.

Of course, previously Judge Boyd sentenced a 14-year-old African-American child to 10 years in a juvenile detention center after the little puke punched a man who died when he fell over and struck his head on the concrete.

I agree with giving the punching perp a tough sentence (his actions lead to the death of another person) but, how did the "Affluenza" defense not get laughed out of the courthouse? How did his past transgressions and previous offenses not come into play?  The State's Attorney wanted Couch tried as an adult and sought a sentence of at least 20 years for the four deaths he directly caused.

But, instead of being held responsible for 4 murders little Couch will go to a posh rehab clinic and be on probation for 10 years.

So when does Darryl Issa begin the House Oversight Hearings? When does every Republican Senator and Congressman take to Faux News to demand an investigation. After all 4 Americans died. According to the Right-Wing, there can never be a worse event.

Ah, but this incident involves a Rich White criminal. That's a Republican protected class.

The Republican Party exists only to guard and defend the Rich.

If you are Poor, black, a woman, a Catholic, a Veteran the Republicans have a simple message for you; Work Hard, Get Nothing from the Government, Die Quickly.

Meanwhile, Large Scale Affluenza is strangling the Nation, just as the 1% have plotted.

The problem with the Left is the idea that battles for Progressive Values can ever be considered "Won". Following their defeats during the 20th century, the Plutocracy began slowly building infrastructure for their Long March back to Dominance.

The effort has been a multi-front assault on the 99%, pushing for the weakening and eventual destruction of Unions, the slow elimination of Worker's Rights via "Right-to-Work" Laws, removing child-labor restrictions and sneaky legislative elimination of Collective Bargaining Rights, the cultivation of the wholly owned Republican Party and the corruption of the Democratic Party, the creation of Think-Tanks whose only job is to produce "studies" which conform to their dreams of a Neo-Feudalist Wage Slave State.

"Really poor children, in really poor neighborhoods have no habits of working and have nobody around them who works so they have no habit of showing up on Monday. But one of the things I’ve talked to the secretary of agriculture about: Why don’t you have the kids pay a dime, pay a nickel to instill in them that there is, in fact, no such thing as a free lunch?"  Republican Jack Kingston, maybe he imagines putting little poor children to work cleaning up Steve Stockman and Dana Rohrbacher's offices for a nickel a day?

Additionally, the 1% biggest coup has been the byzantine restructuring of the Tax System. Of course, they claim the tax loopholes which allow them to shelter billions have been unintentionally created, while the grossly unfair tax reorganization sees Working Class people paying far more in taxes the the 1%.

Corporations routinely have Negative Tax rates because of the off-shore tax havens and foreign structuring which rewards them for sending jobs and manufacturing overseas while hiding money in Ireland or the Cayman Islands.

Capital Gains, the making of money with money, and deferred income instead of actual work is now so unfairly rewarded that a Near-Billionaire like Mitt Romney can go a decade without paying any income taxes while Orrin Hatch takes to the Senate floor to despicably lie that poor people who have almost nothing aren't paying taxes.

Meanwhile, when the Rich get in trouble, because their Capitalist House of Cards is built upon a foundation of lies, thefts and legerdemain they scamper to the Government to have the middle class taxpayer fund their rescue.

This is Capitalism. It's a sickness. Affluenza describes Capitalism very well. It's system for raising wealth that is grossly unfair and unstable and creates a small cadre of criminals who have no sense of morality and no compunctions about treating humanity as disposable commodities.

Defend the Vatican Attack the Pope

Right-Wingers are geniuses. They are able to hold two ideas in direct opposition in their head at the same time.

The United States is closing it's Embassy in Vatican City and consolidating it with the Embassy and Consulate grounds the US has in Rome and throughout the Italian Peninsula.

Ka-boom! Right-Wingers took to their fainting couches to bemoan President Obama's continuing attacks on all that is Holy.

How is Nicholas Cage supposed to find the secret documents in the Vatican Archives which prove that Jesus hand wrote the Constitution so that conservatives could use their guns to crush liberal communists and rule America with an Iron Fist?

Of course, there isn't a U.S. Embassy in Vatican City, which is less than 1 mile across and doesn't have grounds for anything not associated with the Church, but hey details and truth are anathema to conservatives.

But... A funny thing happened recently. The New Pope Francis, having been born in Argentina (albeit safely from Italian immigrant parents) has been using the Papal Pulpit to point out how evil Capitalism actually is and how the unholy pursuit of money has led to huge suffering amongst people considered by Capitalists as disposable.

Some points from the Pope Francis' recent APOSTOLIC EXHORTATION,

How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly home- less person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?  

Human beings are themselves considered consumer goods to be used and then discarded.  

In this context, some people continue to defend trickle-down theories which assume that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world. This opinion, which has never been confirmed by the facts, expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power and in the sacralized workings of the prevailing economic system. Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting.  

A new tyranny is thus born, invisible and often virtual, which unilaterally and relentlessly imposes its own laws and rules

Everything the Pope has commented upon is the reflected in Dominant Ayn Randian Culture in America. Despicable Capitalists, guarded by their Republican lap dogs and Pro-Business Democrats, and serviced by well-paid media sycophants have introduced the vicious Rule of the 1% and their Piss Down Your Back and Tell You It's Raining Prosperity upon the Nation, where the Mass of Humanity is nothing and the beautiful, rich 'job-creator' class is everything. 

It so alarmed Rupert Murdoch and other Plutocratic swine the Media was brought in to begin the attacks on the Pope.

Faux News resident Upper Class Twit Stuart Varney, a reliably asinine Tory who holds nothing but hatred towards the poor, but is a stupid conservatives ideal of a smart man because he speaks with a RP accent, took time to scold the Pope and defend his Moneyed Masters.

Racist Limpballs (Rush Limbaugh), King of the Conservatives, managed to take time away from his dreams of raping Sandra Fluke and whatever other woman he wants, to decry the "pure marxism coming out of the mouth of the Pope". We all know what comes out of the mouth of Limpballs.

American Catholics, who have for years given their support to Republicans and the Right, are in for a shock when their "brethren" the anti-human, let'em die, kill the poor, guardians of Plutocracy and Vulture Capitalists, turn upon them.

They'll be surprised when conservatives begin to spit out epithets like papists and defame the 'Bishop of Rome' while expecting Catholics to toe-the-line and prostrate themselves in front of the conservative idols of Oppression, Subjugation, and adulation of the Rich.

And they'll be forced to choose between Supply-Side Jesus and the Vicar of Christ. Interesting times indeed.

Are you gonna pay Derrick Rose's Rent?

Everyone's your brother until the rent comes due. - Ronin 1998

The Chicago Bulls season ended last week with a trouncing by the LeFlop James led Miami Heat. Derrick Rose the erstwhile Bulls Superstar did not play a single minute during the Regular Season or Playoffs while rehabbing his knee. Rose suffered a torn ACL during the 2012 playoffs .

Now, the injury rehabilation became a sticking point for Rose, his family, the Bulls Organization and Fans. According to the post-operation schedule, the Doctor who performed the ACL reconstruction suggested Rose would be ready to play by early April and that a month of games in the regular season would be the final step in the healing process.

Starting in late March, Derrick Rose through his brother Reggie and his own Twitter account let it be known that he was listening to his family and while he might come back it was only when he could "dunk of his left foot" and his knee 'felt comfortable'.

This caused much confusion and consternation in Chicago Sports scene. As the regular season dragged on and various other players gutted through injuries or missed games themselves. Luol Deng missed the entire playoff series with the Heat because of a vicious flu strain which Doctors were worried was Viral Meningitis.

As the Bulls struggled the confusion morphed into mild displeasure and then grumbling anger towards Rose. Chicago "Fans" questioned his toughness, mental and physical. They accused him of malingering.

I don't know what the collective bargaining agreement betweeen Players and Owners in the NBA stipulates. I do know that the Bulls through insurance recovered 40% of Rose's salary for the Season, roughly $6.5 million of $16.4 million, with whomever, his contract is indemnified.

The story of Hunter Hillenmeyer of the Chicago Bears is illustrative:

On August 28 2010, Hillenmeyer suffered a concussion during a pre-season game. He was placed on injured reserve before the season and has never played again. The Bears terminated his contract Feb. 28, 2011, one month after the team's concussion consultant, Dr. Elizabeth Pieroth, a board certified clinical neuropsychologist, examined him and recommended he no longer play. The Bears cut him with one year and $1.8 million remaining on his contract. According to the union, Article 45 of the collective bargaining agreement stipulates Hillenmeyer is eligible for an injury protection benefit of 50 percent of his base salary up to $1 million.

The Chicago Bears have not paid the 50% of Hillenmeyer's final contract. In the modern world of Sports you're earning a million dollars one day and out of work the next. Careers, most often, end in men's early 30's. Derrick Rose doesn't owe Bulls Fans anything. When his career is over no one in Chicago is going to help him out.

But, this is where the narrative gets most muddled. Through his actions it appears Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf is one of the few sports franchise owners who goes out of his way to help up and look out for his former employees.

Several Bulls players hit upon hard times after their playing careers have ended.

Randy Brown, a fringe player, who averaged 5ppg over his career of 655 games was part of the Bulls Second 3-Peat. Brown had to file for Bankruptcy and auction off his 3 rings. Reinsdorf simply created a "special assistant" job for Brown and hired him in 2009.

Scottie Pippen who made several bad contracts and was outspokenly truculent with the Bulls about his perceived contractual slights also reportedly fell into bankruptcy after his career ended. In 2010, Pippen rejoined the Bulls as an "ambassador".  

“Jerry has been very warm towards me over the years and has never turned me down for anything,” said Pippen.

In 2003, another Bulls Point Guard, Jay Williams injured himself. This time it wasn't on the court but a motorcycle accident during the off-season, which almost resulted in Williams losing his leg and requiring Williams to undoe multiple surgeries, extended hospital time and an arduous long recovery. 

Even though the accident could have been prima facie evidence of a contract violation because the Bulls had written into Williams contract that he was not to ride motorcycles, the Bulls organization helped pay his medical bills and a portion of the second season salary. Williams never played an NBA game again.

Jerry Reinsdorf has a clear track record of being loyal and compassionate towards his former athlete  employees which goes beyond what is normally seen in the cut-throat world of Sports Capitalism.

So, I think Rose has reached an incorrect conclusion about his post playing career but I don't fault him for reaching it.