Everyone knows the GOP has been the party of “Just Say No” concerning healthcare reform. They do not see the goal of providing healthcare to every American as, well, American. It’s socialist, or some such bullshit, according to the leaders of the Republican Party, people such as Rush Limbaugh. And they are propagating falsehoods as a way to block healthcare reform, as well as inciting riots at congressional Town Hall meetings. What hasn’t been said is that at least one member of the GOP favors healthcare reform, but only veterinary healthcare. Yeah, it doesn’t get stupider than this.

His name is Thaddeus McCotter, and that’s his sorry mug on the left. As reported by The Michigan Messenger, Representative McCotter (R-Rover) has proposed House Resolution 3501, the Humanity and Pets Partnered Through the Years (HAPPY) Act in the House of Representatives. Here’s how the bill is described in an article from Pet Product News:

House Resolution 3501, commonly referred to as the Humanity and Pets Partnered Through the Years, or HAPPY Act, would amend the Internal Revenue Code to allow an individual to deduct up to $3,500 for “qualified pet care expenses.”

“Qualified pet care expenses” is defined as “amounts paid in connection with providing care (including veterinary care) for a qualified pet other than any expense in connection with the acquisition of the qualified pet.”

“Qualified pet” is defined as “a legally owned, domesticated, live animal.” It does not include animals used for research or owned or used in conjunction with a trade or business.

I know this looks like a joke. It really, really does. With all the rancor about healthcare a Republican comes up with a subsidy for pet healthcare? That’s a dream come true, isn’t it? Let’s see Olbermann or Maddow roll with this one, shall we? But it appears the bill is serious. There’s a trade group out there, a lobbying group, if you will, The Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council, with an actual policy statement about the bill. Here’s a little piece of it:

Providing pet owners the opportunity to deduct pet care expenses is an important step towards ensuring that pet owners provide adequate veterinary and other necessary pet care. It encourages responsible pet ownership and will hopefully reduce the abandonment of pets by people struggling as a result of the economic downturn.

OK, that seems to be saying that this bill is designed to help people in hard times. If you’ve lost your job, never fear — you can deduct up to $3,500 from your income so that you can keep your pet. Of course, if you’ve lost your job you might not have any income, but McCotter doesn’t let that get in the way. While the pet industry sees this bill as an evident band-aid in these hard economic times, McCotter himself seems to have written the bill as a way to solve the helathcare issue. Here it is from the findings in House Resolution 3501, HAPPY:

The Congress finds the following:

(1) According to the 2007-2008 National Pet Owners Survey, 63 percent of United States households own a pet.

(2) The Human-Animal Bond has been shown to have positive effects upon people’s emotional and physical well-being.

Now, it has been remarked many times that Republicans are all “Just Say No” concerning healthcare reform, but here’s proof that they truly care. They don’t want to support your going to a Doctor, but they are willing to subsidize your taking your pet to a vet. That’s supposed to make you healthy, so that, presumably, you don’t need a Doctor.

The only question I’ve got is who the stupid people are who elected this idiot.

The government is already going after the owners of Dinosaur Adventure Land, a creationist amusement park. It will be sold for back taxes according to a court order. Now they should go after other creationists. I’m betting on lots of bucks in taxes collected.

Teabaggers? First it was tea party organizer Michael Leahy who was caught with $150,000 in tax liens. Now it is teabagger Christian Hidalgo who owes $80,000 in back taxes. I think it might be time to investigate some other teabaggers, too.

Let’s not stop at creationists and teabaggers. Let’s examine the tax records of the birthers and all sorts of other extreme right wing whack jobs. Here we’ve got extremists driven by extremist religion, the creationists, and extremists driven by the anti-tax tea bagging thing. If we just put the IRS to work we might get enough money in the government’s coffers to pay for healthcare for everyone.

Glenn Beck recently claimed that the Tea Bagging movement was not just “stupid people with pitchforks.” I’ll have to agree. It’s also about many other kinds of stupid people. One of them is Joe Wurzelbacher, aka “Joe the Plumber,” who claims that God’s plan for him is to work in the faux grassroots Tea Bagging movement. From WingNutDaily:

“Americans in general have a short memory,” Wurzelbacher said. “After Sept. 11 happened, we were patriots for six months, and then half of them fell off. Now there’s a very real threat to our country. I don’t believe any one nation can take us out, but I definitely think we can take ourselves out.”

Asked if he has plans to run for public office, he replied, “I hope not. You know, I talked to God about that and he was like, ‘No.’”

He continued, “I believe he’s gotten me on this grassroots movement. If I can encourage leaders to step up, that’s what I would like to do. That’s a heavy role. That’s something I don’t know if I am prepared to do yet.”

But Wurzelbacher said he will keep that door open if God ever calls him to be that leader.

“I just know whenever I fall off his path, things get really hard,” he said. “So I just stick with what God tells me to do.”

OK, there’s more important stuff here than God being a teabagger. Joe Wurzelbacher says God has not given him the go-ahead to run for office. Oh, sure, Joe Wurzelbacher says he’s open to the notion of running for office if God whispers in his ear, but it seems clear we’re not going to see that happen in the near future. And that’s a shame. Every minute Joe Wurzelbacher is the face of conservatives is a bright day for liberals and Democrats. As such, God telling Joe not to run for office just might be a sign that God hates liberals and Democrats.

I apologiaze to anyone who now has an image of Joe the Plumber int he act of teabagging running around their brain. That image might be just as ugly as one of the man talking, and for that I apologize as well.

He was delinquent on his taxes, as well as several other bills. The story is broken by the Teablogging web site, where they have a link to public information about Leahy’s tax and debt delinquency, which totals around $150,000.

As a bonus, here’s Leahy’s own bio where he boasts of his role as co-founder of the Teabagging movement.

On February 20, 2009, he co-founded the Nationwide Tea Party Coalition, and called and moderated the very first conference call among grassroots activists that provided the centralized information coordination for Round 1 of the Tea Party Movement, a coordinated simultaneous nationwide event held at noon EST on February 27, 2009 in fifty different cities, which was attended by over 30,000 people.

From February 28, 2009 to April 15, 2009, he continued to moderate weekly conference calls among grassroots activists, again providing the centralized coordination for Round 2 of the Tea Party Movement, which took place in 900 cities across the country on April 15, 2009, and which was attended by over 1 million people.

On March 31, 2009, he became the host of two programs on Pajamas TV: TCOTonPJTV, and The Tea Party Coalition Show on PJTV.

Yes, this is the kind of young leadership the Republicans endorse, a man who can’t pay his taxes so he ups the ante. Instead of paying them, or merely whining about paying the taxes, he promotes others to protest about taxes. The bottom line is that the guy is a deadbeat. One of the reasons we have a deficit in this country is because of deadbeats like Michael Patrick Leahy who refuse to pay their taxes.

You know, I think I’m going to follow Micheal Leahy on Twitter and give him hell for a while. If you’d care to watch, I’m on Twitter as well. The guy is awfully proud of starting a coalition on Twitter, so I figure he needs some disruption, at least until he pays his taxes. ($59,556 owed to the IRS? Why isn’t this guy in jail?)

The Americans are revolting!

All across the country—from Boston to Atlanta to San Antonio—thousands of Americans, inspired by Fox News and radio conservative talk show hosts, took to the streets to protest.

They protested a fascist government that has restricted their freedom of speech and freedom of religion, protected by the First Amendment. They protested thousands of instances where the government infringed upon their rights of privacy, protected by the Fourth Amendment. They called out the government for violations of the rights of due process, protected by the fifth and sixth amendments. They protested the use of about $1 trillion to fight an unnecessary war in Iraq. They protested the apparently unregulated policies of the banks, money lenders, and Wall Street financiers who brought this nation into the current recession that has led to an 8.5 percent unemployment rate and several hundred thousand to lose their homes to foreclosure actions. They protested the fact that about 46 million Americans don’t have health insurance, that as many as five million Americans are homeless, about a fourth of them veterans. They protested the use of torture, of the destruction of the environment, of the awarding of no-bid sweetheart deals worth hundreds of million dollars to companies that do business with the President and Vice-President.

Actually, they didn’t do any of that. Not now and certainly not during the Bush–Cheney years.

What they protested was taxes. For these protestors, April 15, the deadline for paying taxes, was Tea Day.

They cried out against taxation without representation, conveniently forgetting that the United States, because of its revolt against the monarchy more than two centuries ago, has one of the most representative democracies in history. Without understanding either history or government, the protestors wore tea bags on their baseball caps, wore revolutionary era costumes, threw tea bags onto the ground and into the rivers, and even littered the grounds outside the White House with tea bags. Since every protest has to have signs, these protestors also carried signs—”Give me liberty, not debt,” “No more spending,” and “Taxation is Piracy.” Ironically, it was tax-provided rescue equipment that volunteers used to rescue one protestor after she fell into the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania.

Their “official” website attacked the government for “spending trillions of borrowed dollars, leaving a debt our great-grandchildren will be paying,” conveniently forgetting that it was the Bush–Cheney Administration that left the nation with the largest deficit in history. Underlying the protest was their hatred of the policies of Barack Obama, whom they called a fascist, a socialist, and a Communist, unable to understand or differentiate among terms they loosely threw out. President Obama, although in office less than three months, is riding high with a 67 percent popularity rating. But these souls, very few of whom voted for him in November, have now not only protested policies that are bringing the nation out of a financial abyss, but are often calling for his impeachment, something they never called for during the previous eight years.

So, they complained about fascist—or socialist—or communistic—policies, and failed to understand that it’s only the wealthiest 5 percent whose taxes go back to the rate it was when George Bush took office and lowered taxes for the wealthy.

But, these protesting masses aren’t the rich, and they aren’t being forced to give up more of their income. In fact, the Obama tax cuts benefit about 95 percent of all Americans.

The idea of a Tea Party was probably that of CNBC commentator Rick Santelli, who ranted against any government assistance for persons who lost their homes through foreclosure. Pushing the tea bagging of America were Fox mouths Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Glenn Beck, and dozens of other conservative talking mouths who are among the top 5 percent, and whose seven-figure incomes would be reduced under the Obama plan to restore fiscal sanity to America.

Well, I guess it’s true. Americans really are revolting.

[Walter M. Brasch is a university professor of journalism, social issues columnist, and the author of 17 books. His current book is Sinking the Ship of State: The Presidency of George W. Bush, available from amazon.com, bn.com, and other stores. You may contact him through his website, www.walterbrasch.com]

Attention Teabaggers:

Every year about this time, the Tax Foundation calculates the date that the average American will have made enough money to cover their tax obligations for the coming year (federal, state, and local). This date is known as Tax Freedom Day. Guess what?

Tax Freedom Day will arrive on April 13 this year, according to the Tax Foundation’s annual calculation using the latest government data on income and taxes.

This is eight days earlier than in 2008, and a full two weeks earlier than in 2007…

That’s change I can believe in.

So, Teabaggers - where were you in 2008 and 2007? Oh, that’s right. Faux News and Rush Limpballs weren’t directing you to attend the “Obama Fail” (tea party) rally near you on Wednesday.

Yeah, I get it.

As many have commented here and other places over the past week or so, the upcoming Fox News-inspired “Tax Day Tea Party” this coming Wednesday raises the bar on the concept of total lunacy.

Teabaggin’. Do these morons simply not understand the cultural sexual references, both straight and gay? Perhaps this video will help them grasp the concept:

Every time that I think that Fox News (and GOP media hacks in general) has lowered the national discourse to its lowest possible level, they surprise me. But still, I suppose it “sells” to their core audience.

Jeff Lurie is a Billionaire, recently assessed as so by Fortune Magazine. He owns my beloved Philadelphia Eagles. And it appears he has a bunch of whiney excuses why he and his Philadelphia Eagles will continue to doge paying what they owe.

The Philadelphia Eagles have owed the City of Philadelphia $8 Million for at least nine years, and they’ve been delaying the payment of that bill for a long time. Yesterday, after several years of “no comment,” the Eagles finally revealed their strategy. Evidently the money was unelected in the mail by the dog, or something like that. Yeah, we’re talking a whiney excuse for not paying what Jeff Lurie and the Philadelphia Eagles owe, an excuse that rests on verbal agreements made by someone who doesn’t have the power to make such agreements. There’s a report in the Philadelphia Daily News, but this one is from KYW 1060:

Philadelphia Eagles owner Jeffrey Lurie says the city reneged on a never-before disclosed private deal between him and then-Mayor John Street to settle the dispute over Veterans Stadium sky box revenues.

The city has long contended that the Eagles owed $8 million over the sky box earnings.

But Lurie and team president Joe Banner have now filed affidavits in Common Pleas Court, in which they say they struck the verbal deal with Street through intermediaries during Street’s first term. Under terms of the deal, according to the affidavits, the Eagles would pay the city an unspecified amount less than $1 million to settle the matter.

Lurie’s attorney, Tom Leonard, says despite the agreement, John Street never abided by that deal for the remaining years of his tenure. Now, Leonard says, Lurie wants a judge to enforce that agreement:

“The people who were in the room are all prepared to testify that there was a deal. A deal is a deal, and it should be enforced.”

The affidavits do not specify when the agreement was reached. Leonard believes it occurred in late 2000. Banner and Lurie claim that verbal agreement was made during the negotiations between the Eagles and the city over construction of the new stadium, and they stipulate that the sky box agreement helped seal the stadium deal.

Let’s see. The Eagles are maintaining they don’t owe $8MM. After never mentioning a deal with former mayor John Street supposedly made nine years ago (a deal that Street arguably didn’t have the power to make), the Eagles want to force the city to live up to that deal.

Some disclaimers. My wife and I are Eagles season ticket holders, and we’re eager to show our new son Lincoln Financial Field when the NFL season starts. Yes, we are rabid fans who will take a baby to a football game, at least a pre-season one. After that adventure, we’ll reevaluate. We met at an Eagles game, and we’re rabid enough to go to playoff games that cost a ton of cash. But.

I do not jump up and criticize the Philadelphia Eagles every time they make a bonehead player move. Now let me tell you, that shows remarkable restraint around these parts where screaming about the weak wide receiver corps or the lack of a fullback is a full-time job for some fans. I am not a TATEr. (I’ll let someone else explain that term.) But I am a citizen who expects my fellow citizens to pay their taxes.

As such, Jeff Lurie offends me. I rail on this web page about whiney excuses all the time, and the Eagles can’t even figure out which whiney excuse to use here. I am offended, both as a fan and a citizen of Philly. But I am a fan of the Eagles team, and am proud of the players who take the field on game day. I had always assumed that I could be proud of the organization from the top down. That no longer holds.

Jeff Lurie and the Eagles, according to their story, basically put faith in ex-Mayor John Street to hold to an agreement he wouldn’t even put in writing. That’s simply stupid. More than dodging taxes and giving out whiney excuses, the Eagles should be disrespected because they trusted John Street to hold to a verbal agreement. I mean, owner Lurie and team President Joe Banner live here! They know John Street. They know trusting that guy to carry out a verbal agreement he wasn’t even authorized to make is madness. If they really believed they could trust then they are flat out stupid.

All hail and praise goes to Brendan Skwire, who has been pushing this issue for a while.

I just don’t get right wingers. They can take an issue that has some degree of resonance across the political spectrum, come up with a kicky idea that has PR punch, and then turn it into a steaming pile of fetid compost. (Check that - we all know that dittoheads would never compost their waste.)

You simply must check out this photo gallery from a “protest” in Stamford, Ct. over the weekend. Here’s a taste:

And here’s a link to a story on the tea party protest.

Anyone remember the post-election Brooks Brothers Riot in Miami, Florida in November, 2000 that stopped the presidential vote recounts? Yeah, these tea parties feel a lot like that.

(h/t to Bob Cesca’s Awesome Goddamn Blog)

There’s a nexus coming together in this country, and while some are using the metaphor of pitchforks and the proles storming the castle (the rich, at AIG, at least, seem very afraid of this scorn, as evidenced here and here), it is beginning to seem to me as if the rich, those metaphorically living in the castle, are guilty of tea bagging, if not pitchforking, themselves.

I suppose I come to this conclusion first from Michael Hiltzik’s column in the Los Angeles Times. His title somewhat says it all: “The belief that the wealthy are worthy is waning.” The thesis here is that many in our country rallied against progressive income taxes that hit the rich because they themselves pictures themselves as being rich someday, sort of like Joe the Plumber, you know. They had a myopia concerning the true American condition. We all know that Joe the Plumber will get nowhere unless he milks the right wing media with his image, and Joe will therefore continue in self-delusion. But the average American, Hiltzik says, is beginning to see through this Republican myth.

Let’s face facts. The Republicans are the ones, perhaps further back than Gingrich or even Reagan, who perpetuated the myth that cutting taxes on the wealthy would result in good jobs for everyone, including the possibility that everyman may one day become rich himself. Not so much nowadays. The false veneer on this theory is peeling off, like a Laffer Curve going south. They set the stage with their constant attempts to reverse the progressive system of taxes in this country, led now by Grover Norquist and his Americans for Tax Reform, a group Republicans listen to almost as well as they bow to their leader, Rush Limbaugh, as mindnumbingly stupid as that act of bowing is.

What really blew the top off, though, is their penchant for deregulation. We’re seeing an economic meltdown because of unregulated securities now, and AIG’s insuring those risky schemes, but what we’re also seeing on the side is the steadily declining respect for the rich. Sure, many rich people are philanthropists, and there are fine people among the rich. When the taxes go up on them, as the current national feeling will assuredly lead to, they will go up on me and my family as well. But let’s make sure to note that the deregulation was spurred by a system of rewards cloaked as bonuses. Sure, the former Chair of AIG claims he wouldn’t have given out the bonuses that are so controversial now, but he gave out similar retention rewards. It was the name of the game for far too many years. Risky products are dreamed up by money managers whose bonus was directly tied to short-term success. They became the rich. By exploiting the system they have tea bagged themselves.

AIG’s defense? They are now going after taxes they say they don’t owe because they derived from offshore tax shelters. Yes, banking regulations evidently enabled them to legally shelter a whole batch of their tax obligations, and AIG wants that 306 Million Dollars back, even though the funds helping them fight the IRS were provided by the federal government. These folks just don’t know how to leave well enough alone. The gall, we say, at every turn where they spend our money on bonuses or suing us! Should we be so surprised?

Now the Republicans have started this stupid Tea Bag campaign. It mimics the Boston Harbor protest from our American Revolution, but there ain’t no redcoats here. As Bob Cesca notes, the Republican Tea Bag campaign is about reducing taxes on the wealthy at a time when the entire American electorate is glued to the TV waiting for the next shoe to drop in the Wall Street mess, caused by the Republican deregulation and greed that the Tea Bagging goal would ostensibly reward. Sure, Republicans are railing against AIG bonuses, but as usual they have no plan. They’d rather protest using Tea Bags, and referring to an insulting sex act. Yeah, Republicans claim to stand for high moral values, but even their protests are coarse and ugly. What they’ve done with such absurities is tea bag themselves.

It would be enough if the Republicans had only Tea Bagged themselves, but they have done the bidding of the markets and those who pretend to stand for the rich for so long that the rich are the ones feeling the Tea Bag, full in the face. Conspicuous Consumption is coming to an end, I’m guessing, at least for a long time, and I’m betting Thorstein Veblen would be proud. But this isn’t about a 120 year old theory. This is about today, about the dangers of runaway and unregulated capitalism and how it can destroy our economy. The Republicans called for that deregulation, trusting int he blind hand of supply and demand to care for everyone. That ship has sailed, and judging by their stupid Tea Bag campaign, the GOP is far, far from recognizing that fact.