"We oppose the national Democratic view that says the way to strengthen our country is to increase dependence on government. We believe the way to strengthen our country is to restrain spending in Washington, to empower individuals and small businesses to grow our economy and create jobs"says Bobby Jindal, the Republicans' attempt to offer an alternative dark complexioned spokesman in an effort to portray the differences between the GOP of the last 30 years with the Democratic Party as a matter of well considered philosophy. Averring that the Republicans simply lost sight of some basic principle rather than having steadfastly and corruptly pursued policies that fail again and again and again in cataclysmic fashion is the deception most plausible of their current defenses, and so in taking virtually every penny of the funds offered to Louisiana while posing as an opposer of government investment, he follows the lead of the Governor of Alaska, sucking up the earmarked funds while bleating about Government excess.
I can't help but remember how the very purchase of Louisiana by Tax and Spend Jefferson was opposed by the conservative element on the same pretended principles, but if I pursued all the ironic elements of Republican posturing, I'd be at it for years.
At a time when even Ayn Rand disciples like Alan Greenspan have come around to the position that no, markets are not self regulating and that regulation is needed to keep free markets free, Bobby J's restatement of the same old unfounded and debunked "principles" are sounding more and more like the 450 pound diet guru lecturing you about healthy eating.
Some of the government spending that made our insignificant nation the most wealthy and powerful of all time, were, like the Louisiana Purchase, howled about in the same way as this stimulus package: the purchase of Alaska, the building of the Erie Canal and the national highway system. Whatever the merits of any individual element of the stimulus package may be, the administration is proposing to spend American money in America, not turning it to smoke and bloody sand in Iraq and those who supported the unprecedented squandering of our fortune have a lot of nerve posing as responsible leaders who simply let the steering wheel slip for a moment.
13 comments:
Jindal was, simply, awful. I couldn't believe he brought up Hurricane Katrina as an example where government should just get out of the way. Huh? Maybe he's forgotten that govt., did get WAY out of the way... If "Bobby" is the strategy for the Republican resurgence, I'm all in favor of the approach!
P.S. His "Americans can do Anything" speech also made me cringe. Anything?
He's a bit like those who keep chirping that this was all caused by high taxes on billionaires and too much oversight.
All we get is the endless catechism and chanted formulae.
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If you look at his background, and his family's connections, it becomes obvious who he really is and what he represents: An unholy alliance between corporatism and the Christian Right.
He sucks up to Republican rednecks in La. by going to their churches on Sundays and acting all evangelical, conveniently Catholic though he is in the Old South's only (non-majority-Hispanic) Catholic-heavy State. That covers more than half the State, religio-politically.
His brother's Washington insider law firm represented the insurance industry in screwing Louisianians out of millions after Katrina. So much for the private sector, eh, "Bobby"?
His father's company managed the government's nuclear disasters at Hanford, Savannah River and Los Alamos, a fact he conveniently forgets to mention when he pitches nuclear power.
His Mom is a life-long government employee, and his wife was a chemist with a big multinational corporate polluter before she became the Pelican State's First Lady.
As to his roots, in India, both sides of his family come from the hereditary caste of merchants and moneylenders. "Christian" he may claim, loudly, to be, but his own marriage was an arranged one, like that of his (to him) politically embarrassing immigrant parents. I suspect that, like many Indians, he would like to see a caste system instituted in the U.S. Not that we don't already have one, after forty years of Repukelickin's & DINO's.
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well said indeed.
I consider it a good thing that the Republican Party is so want for anything approaching a viable person to follow, that it has to settle for the likes of Bobby Jindal and Sarah Palin.
After the last eight years of unmitigated hell, I've finally run out of adjectives to try to describe the likes of Jindal. I guess "vile" is the best I can come up with, and I think it serves.
Maybe it's part of the plan - if you place yourself beyond description, maybe nobody will try to describe you.
Of course we still try.
In light if the "his name was not Steve" post about Allen West... is it really proper to go the xenophobic route and bash Jindal for his unusual, NON-WASP surname?
There's better company to be in than those on the Right who make fun of Obama's ethnic name also.
If you knew me and saw my family, you'd think twice about calling me xenophobic. It can look a bit like the UN General Assembly at times.
Remember, this post was written in the middle of a war sold under false pretenses by the Bush Jingos and I don't see calling him jingo as more than tying him to the same miserable administration -- or Bobby J for that matter. I think Obama is a rather non-European name as well and I voted for him twice.
I know you aren't xenophobic from your posts. Nor is Shaw Kenawe, though she bashes Jindal for the unusual first name he no longer uses. But it's bad when it even looks that way.
I found this looking for the earlier source of when someone else called him Jingo. I was surprised to find yours.
A Jingo is simply a war monger, a chauvinist and our country has always been full of them ready to back any military action, any aggression with extreme enthusiasm and that's all I meant by it. Jingo just starts with a J as do several other names I might have considered. The whole Bush/Cheney team didn't escape that epithet.
From what I read many Americans of Indian extraction are bashing the hell out of him for changing his name. Obama used to go by the name of Barry, I hear and I actually don't blame Jindal for letting go of a name nobody in Louisiana can pronounce.
I'M rarely one to make fun of people's names, but there are some people who have given up the right to basic respect and all bets are off. Stay tuned.
And yes, I've even seen people on the Left bash Jindal for being "colored".
There are valid criticisms, and this is not one of them.
Even if one is an outright bigot, there are too many good reasons to dislike him to bother with his ancestry.
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