Ted Rall for July 22, 2013

Couldn’t agree more.-Republican ‘leaders’:RomneyBoehnerMcConnellCantorPaul RyanRon PaulRand PaulRick PerryRick SantorumNewt GingrichBob McDonnellRush LimbaughMichelle BachmannThe Koch Brothers-And the TSE (tax somebody else) party.-And that doesn’t even include Bush, Cheney, and the neocons.

Forgot Grover Norquist.-Who does pay his salary, anyway?

Ted, I know these numbers are disturbing to you and your liberal buddies, but sometimes you have to look outside your Leftie cocoon.GovernorsRepublican-30Democrat -20House of RepresentativesRepublicans-234Democrats-201

If our Congressional districts were not gerrymandered, Dems would control the House. Texas is an especially egregious example.

Weeks ago, one of our commentators related statements given them by European friends who said that the the USA is not truly a democracy because we only have two parties. The fiasco in Venezuela shows what can happen when one party dominates nationally. Hugo Chavez became the elected dictator. In many of the states where the Republicans have the majority in the Governor’s office, and legislature, we see another example. Leaders who ran on the premise of job creation have instead moved on social issues and on passing laws and redistricting that will make voting harder for people who typically vote liberal and will make their grip on power stronger. Gay marriage and abortion are treated as more important that 20% of our bridges being substandard and crushing unemployment and underpaid people who are unable to pay the taxes or buy the goods that help grow our economy.Rule by a group is called an oligarchy. Nationally, we have a two party oligarchy that ‘eats its young’. They punish moderates who don’t put party before country, and fail to pass important legislation in a civil and respectful manner resulting in constant crises which the head of the IMF said is effecting not only our economy but the economy of the planet.I wish there was a moderate Republican I could get behind. I tire of voting against people and long for the chance to find someone for whom I can vote with hope and reasonable expectations for a better nation.We need two parties at least. Five might actually make us a representative democracy where parties have to work together in order to put together a legislative coalition.However, one thing on which our two parties work hard and in bipartisan manner is to prevent other parties from ever seeing the light of day.Respectfully,C.

They might be hoping for pitty votes.

Not really.[]Chavez made heavy use of artificial price controls in order to give the appearance of his making products more affordable to the average person, only for this to bite everyone in the nation hard.[]You see, a lot of Chavez’ prices were so low that a number of producers were taking a loss, and so rather than continue to take losses they simply quit producing. As a result, shortages of various commodities began to hit the country, grocery stores were forced to fill shelves with whatever random products they could get their hands on, and security needed to be on hand whenever certain products did finally make their way to the stores. []But rather than admit the price controls were wonky, however, Chavez responded by blaming it all on the producers.

Who was it that said:If you are not a liberal at 20, you have no heart.If you are not a conservative at 30, you have no soul.

I agree whole-heartedly with your first comment, Tigger. In today’s world, there is no reason for gerrymandering to exist. It is a simple program to divide up states into congressional districts by population density alone. Any number of programmers could create one that would take politics out of it completely. If I had the time, I would love to create a few and see just how each party fares in an election compared to how they fare in a non-gerrymandered situation.

Yes, it’s all that “free stuff” that swings politics, like to Exxon Mobil, Shell, Conoco, Chevron, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, GE, PG & E, Edison, and any other “energy” or “defense” provider you can think of.

Finding a liberal party is indeed difficult. Though there are token targets thrown out there for consumption in the “liberal” (right) press, “liberal” is an endangered species indeed. IF we had the devoted liberals the right whines about,we’d have single payer health insurance, and wouldn’t have invaded Iraq.

‘To halt gerrymandering, Both Parties should have an equal voice in how district lines are drawn instead of the Ruling Party of The White House’-Absolutely the wrong approach. When both parties have an equal voice, the result is as many safe districts as possible, with special protection for incumbents. -You can look at pretty much any state and see that this is true.-What is needed is a NON-partisan group, maybe ex-judges or something like that or a grand jury to redistrict every ten years.-It’s NOT a difficult task at all if you don’t have an agenda.-You or I could do it in a day for a small state, a week for the largest ones.

‘You listed 14 Republican leaders; can’t find half that many in the Congressional Democrats.’-You do realize that they all report to the Koch Brothers? Except maybe Rush, Newt and Michelle.-And who does pay Grover Norquist’s salary, anyway?

Actually, what Chavez did was part-and-parcel of the Soviet Communist playbook: impose requirements on suppliers that they cannot meet (in this case, low prices) and then blame the supplier when they fail to meet the requirement. []Couple that with the state appropriations of certain foreign-owned assets, the suppression of critics, and a number of other concerns, and it seems apparent that Chavez intended to turn Venezuela into a Soviet-style state.

I’ll have to go back and find it, but one of the business magazines I used to subscribe to (I’ve had money issues lately) had an article talking about the fact that due to price controls, unsustainable social spending, and a number of other poor decisions, Chavez actually hurt the quality of life for the average Venezuelan by wrecking the economy, causing commodity shortages, and frightening away foreign investors. []Thing is, the average person needed to be on the ground in Venezuela to see this due to a mixture of the government doing its best to push an artificial image of prosperity and the willingness of some foreign pundits to accept the image without question.