Guest post by Walter Rhett

The “cognitive dissonance” in arguing that leaders lead, President Obama needs to be assertive, cut deals, engage individual Congress members is in the article of faith that we can return to the Lyndon Johnson model. No more then the Wing T or two-hand set shot will win football or basketball games!

The error is contemporizing the past. It is a big part of the GOP ideology, and it is also the denial and hope of the liberal/left/Democrats who long for a return to era of success. Yet that success followed a long trail of citizen direct action–including street riots at the 1968 Chicago convention and physical confrontations on the convention floor.

Later, Clinton lost on welfare and healthcare. The GOP Senate led by Bob Dole passed the King Holiday bill. The senate, this December (2012) rebuked Dole, a favored elder, a wounded WWII veteran, a practitioner of Lyndon’s arts, its leader and a GOP Presidential candidate–when it voted down a treaty Dole worked the halls to support–over the farfetched idea of a conspiracy of UN hegemony over America supposedly embedded in a reporting function in the millennium goals of UN Agenda 21!

So Barack can’t lead? Who can? How many GOP senators resigned or lost primaries because they couldn’t mitigate their own voters attitudes and demands, or work effectively within their caucus? The biggest fail was Texas, where the backroom power brokers, including Rick Perry, utterly lost to Ted Cruz! (Who received fewer Latino votes than John Cornyn!).

Three times, Boehner, the ultimate old-style, power broker cut from Lyndon’s jib (he re-assigned several committee chairs, works the lobbyists, hands out favors) had to bring bills to the floor that his caucus didn’t back! With a “minority of the majority,” he passed VAWA, Sandy relief, and Fiscal Cliff legislation only with Democrat support!

Beyond current dysfunction, do we want the President to lead a return to the era of the backroom? I push for taking away more perks, like tax credits.

By Anonymous Guest Contributor

Dear Red States:

We’re ticked off at your Neanderthal attitudes and politics and we’ve decided we’re leaving.

We in New York intend to form our own country and we’re taking the other Blue States with us.

In case you aren’t aware that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and the rest of the Northeast.

We believe this split will be beneficial to the nation and especially to the people of the new country of The Enlightened States of America (E.S.A).

To sum up briefly:

• You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states. 
• We get stem cell research and the best beaches. 
• We get Andrew Cuomo and Elizabeth Warren.
• You get Bobby Jindal and Todd Akin.
• We get the Statue of Liberty.
• You get OpryLand.
• We get* Intel* and Microsoft.
• You get WorldCom.
• We get Harvard (*Princeton, Penn, Haverford, Colgate, U of R)*,.
• You get Ole’ Miss.
• We get 85 percent of America’s venture capital and entrepreneurs.
• You get Alabama.
• We get two-thirds of the tax revenue.
• You get to make the red states pay their fair share.
• Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the Christian Coalition’s, we get a bunch of happy families.
• You get a bunch of single moms..

With the Blue States in hand we will have firm control of 80% of the country’s fresh water, more than 90% of the pineapple and lettuce, 92% of the nation’s fresh fruit, *95% of America’s quality wines* (you can serve French wines at state dinners) 90% of all cheese, 90 percent of the high tech industry, most of the US low sulfur coal, all living redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools plus Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT.

With the Red States you will have to cope with 88% of all obese Americans and their projected health care costs, 92% of all US mosquitoes, nearly 100% of the tornadoes, 90% of the hurricanes, 99% of all Southern Baptists, virtually 100% of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh, Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia.

We get Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

38% of those in the Red states believe Jonah was actually swallowed by a whale, 62% believe life is sacred unless we’re discussing the death penalty or gun laws, 44% say that evolution is only a theory, 53% that Saddam was involved in 9/11 and 61% of you crazy bastards believe you are people with higher morals than we lefties.

We’re taking the good weed too. You can have that crap they grow in Mexico.

Sincerely,

Citizen of the Enlightened States of America
From Ray …. a lifelong bluey

By Dan Montes, Carson City, NV

So, the Associated Press reported the other day that Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R) is pushing for a Republican version of the DREAM Act.  Good luck with that.  Sen. Rubio is also a potential Vice Presidential pick for the upcoming presidential election.  Again, good luck with that.  So why do I make that statement; and why does it matter.

I’m sure that everyone is pretty much aware that the Republican Party is in deep trouble with the Hispanic voting bloc, almost all 21 million eligible voters.  Given the tone of anti-immigration talk that the Republican Party has been throwing about the last couple of years, can you blame them?  Sen. Rubio is working diligently to enhance his standing in the party to better his odds for a spot on the Republican ticket.  But a little reported issue within the Hispanic voting bloc stands in Rubio’s way, and it has the potential of making this VP selection imitate the Palin embarrassment.

Not to be condescending, but you Gringos just don’t get it.  Seen one Latino, seen them all. Not so I say.  Just ask a Salvadorian, a Nicaraguan, a Puerto Rican, a Mexican and the list goes on; as all the “Hispanic” nationalities have individual national pride and identity.  But most Gringos’ have the habit of just lumping them all together as Hispanics or Latinos.  As a Mexican-American that once lived in Florida, let me tell you it’s a bad idea to view the Hispanic vote as just one large voting bloc to corral. Republicans should listen up.

Besides Sen. Rubio’s obvious pandering to Latinos proposing his new and shiny version of the DREAM Act.  The larger issue is that he is of Cuban decent.  Why does that matter.  Because of the deep-seated resentment from the Hispanic community against the Cubans that is immeasurable.  Not many people are aware that the illegal Cuban immigrant is the only foreign national that has a special immigration status and residency pathway. The “Wet foot, Dry Foot” policy, the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, revised in 1995 provides for any Cuban that makes it to shore (“dry feet”) is allowed to remain in the United States.  All other illegal immigrants get a one-way ticket back to where ever they came from.  Do you get it now?  This has been a slow simmering issue with Latinos for some time now, just not discussed as openly as it should be, or maybe it will be if Sen. Rubio’s dreams are realized.

The 2008 election saw the Latino vote go 67-31 percent in favor of President Obama and favored Democrats 60-38 percent in the congressional race.  If Sen. Rubio is on the 2012 ticket, I’m guessing that the Republicans will pick up maybe another 500,000 votes, all from Miami, no big surprise, and not much of a gain to move the percentage points in the Republican column.  Do you get it now?  In all fairness I have to say that neither party has done anything measurable to solve the immigration problem in this country.  But now its election season, just watch them all scramble with more unfulfilled promises, should be entertaining.

Rubio Working on GOP Version of DREAM Act to Let Younger Illegal Aliens Stay Legally In U.S.

Rachel Maddow has some interesting thoughts on Immigration Policy, Mitt Romney and Marco Rubio

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