Silliness from the opposition party

My, my, so what ideas for the nation are being proposed by today's Republican Party? Well, we've got this neat new website being touted as a way for citizens to tell the party what they want. Slight problem with how the idea is being executed, though:

Last week, the top five entries in the "Liberty and Freedom" category were: ban handguns, "drop the idea that we're a 'Christian' country," declare abortion "none of the government's business," allow gays to serve openly in the military and legalize marijuana.

Republican leaders mentioned none of these when they began highlighting proposals from the project.

Nothing wrong with saying certain citizen proposals are unacceptable, regardless of how popular they are with the public. Does kinda raise the question of why the party is even bothering to pretend that citizen input is even being solicited if party leaders are just going to cherry-pick the proposals they like anyway.


Sarah Palin starts off well:

"Something has to be done urgently to stop the out-of-control Obama-Reid-Pelosi spending machine, and no government agency should be immune from budget scrutiny."

Hmm, okay. I'll go with that. Sure, we can always find fraud, waste and abuse to cut out. How's things on the defense procurement front?

"Secretary Gates recently spoke about the future of the U.S. Navy. He said we have to ask whether the nation can really afford a Navy that relies on $3 [billion] to $6 billion destroyers, $7 billion submarines and $11 billion carriers. He went on to ask, 'Do we really need . . . more strike groups for another 30 years when no other country has more than one?' " Palin said. "Well, my answer is pretty simple: Yes, we can and yes, we do, because we must."

Um. So let me get this straight. The "Obama-Reid-Pelosi spending machine" is "out-of-control" and allow me to emphasize this phrase here "...no government agency should be immune from budget scrutiny." But cutting unnecessary weapons systems is completely off the table.


Got it.


How's tax policy going? How is this whole "pay as you go" idea working out when it comes to the Bush tax cuts that did nothing to boost the economy?

WALLACE: We’re running out of time, so how are you going to pay $678 billion just on the tax cuts for people making more than $250,000 a year?

KYL: You should never raise taxes in order to cut taxes. Surely congress has the authority and it would be right, if we decide we want to cut taxes to spur the economy, not to have to raise taxes in order to offset those costs. You do need to offset the cost of increased spending. And that’s what republicans object to. But you should never have to offset cost of a deliberate decision to reduce tax rates on Americans.

In other words, let's not cancel the useless Bush tax cuts, but the Minority Whip Senator John Kyl had zero problems voting against extending unemployment benefits for Americans who still don't have jobs. *Sigh*, so nice to see that some folks are so concerned about their fellow, less fortunate Americans.