Horse Weather Predictions & The GOP's Dangerous Chicken

Suomi NPP satellite image (courtesy of NASA/NOAA)

This satellite image of the snowfall in the northeastern US taken on January 3rd pretty much sums it up for much of the country.

Some of the people in the company I work for deal directly with snow removal from parking lots and sidewalks.

Even back in Autumn when preparations for the winter were being made in terms of purchases of salt and equipment, the word amongst these guys was that this winter was going to be bad; and they were on the money.

One of the most interesting winter weather predictions I heard came not from the Weather Channel or Janice Huff - but from horses.

A plumber I work with has a good friend who resides in Pennsylvania and he keeps horses. Now I never knew this but it's normal for our sturdy four-legged friends to shed some of their hair after summer and grow a longer "winter coat" in preparation for colder temps.

This year his horses were shedding in late August, which is much earlier than usual, as their horse-sense told them winter was coming early. And sure enough we've had at least two snowfalls and temps down in the single digits BEFORE winter began this year - maybe the Weather Channel should have like a live "Horse-Cam" and have an actual horse-whisperer (like Monty Roberts) stand there and translate their weather observations.

Seriously though, how do horses know bad weather is coming months before it comes? Perhaps it's just evolution and horses having to find ways to prepare for winters for thousands of years.

Speaking of evolution, a recent ThinkProgress.org article cites recent polls showing a significant increase in the number of Republicans who do NOT believe in evolution. What's next for the Republican base, going back to the flat-Earth theory? 

The degree to which Tea Party extremists have shifted the base of the Republican party and moved its values to the far right is simply incredible. It's reached the point where even mainstream Republicans have now drawn a line in the sand and are actively raising funds to keep members of their OWN party safe from Tea Party supporters and their warped scorched-Earth policy views.

Eric Lipton wrote an interesting article in the New York Times on Friday about Steven C. LaTourette, a former long-time Ohio Congressman who left office over frustration with the massive gridlock in Washington caused by obstruction-obsessed members of the Tea Party who've adopted an inflexible policy of blocking virtually ANYTHING President Obama supports - even if most American voters support it.

Their "ideology over the good of the People" approach to governing has produced the least productive House of Representatives in US history. For instance, by June of this year, they had passed a total of thirteen laws, none of which had to do with creating jobs.

The Tea Party has torpedoed Republican approval ratings to record lows, to the degree that even main stream Republicans like Mr. LaTourette are now actively engaged in battling to keep them out of office. 

Isn't it interesting how it's taken the GOP this long to finally learn what an unqualified disaster the Koch Brother's-financed Tea Party is for the American people? Too bad these mainstream conservatives stood by when all these wing-nuts were crying about the president not being born in America or being a Muslim.

Now that Tea Baggers have embraced not believing in well-established scientific theory like evolution and climate change, and are all but tripping over themselves defending Duck Dynasty's Phil Roberts to trumpet their fundamental "Christian belief"s to boost their "street cred" with Bible-Belt district voters in the south and middle America - beliefs which have little to do with the actual teachings of Jesus by the way - centrist Republicans are scared.

These mainstream members of the GOP are waking up out of a six year slumber to realize this enormous dangerous chicken not only came home to roost long ago, it's now turned on them (and is not to be confused with the Vicious Chicken of Bristol).

It's not going to be easy getting it out of the hen house in time for the next Congressional elections or the 2016 presidential race either.

So congrats to our mainstream Republican friends! You've finally discovered what we've been saying all along - that chicken just ain't gonna fly with the mainstream voters you need to win the White House. And it's a really crazy bird - Allen West anyone?

What's the Deal with Allen West?

US Rep. Allen West (R) Florida, the new face of the far right?

This past week certainly represents one of the most pivotal moments in the 2012 presidential campaign, but there was also something sad and revealing about the nature of our society and who we are as a nation.

The implosion of Mittens' presidential aspirations in the wake of his shockingly elitist  comments caught on tape at a GOP fundraiser point not just to his inability to govern on behalf of all Americans; it was a stark reminder of the growing ideological and wealth gap that serves as the 21st century version of the Mason Dixon line.

As the GOP has reinvented itself as a virtual repository for a bizarre collection of right-wing fringe characters so far removed from the American mainstream they'd make Richard Nixon cringe, I'm fascinated with some of the people lauded as influential thinkers within the conservative ranks. Case in point, Republican House Rep Allen West who represents Florida's 22nd Congressional District.

West was a career military man who served with distinction in both Iraq wars until a controversial incident in which he personally interrogated a suspected terrorist (despite not being trained or authorized to do so by the Army) with a pistol landed him in hot water and ended his Army career.

He was selected as the first black Congressman elected in Florida since Reconstruction, joined the Congressional Black Caucus and is the new darling of the Tea Party, garnering media attention with his derisive public comments about, well, pretty much any Democrat; including the President whom he openly despises.

What I can't figure is the intensity of his hatred for opposing views. He's well-educated, a man of the world, a guy who's risked his life for his country fighting, yet he's been accused of being anti-Muslim, anti-Semitic and lately seems to have embraced a strange anti-Communist/Marxist schpeel; going so far as to publicly accuse the members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (a progressive liberal block of Democratic Congressional members) of being Communist.

Watch for yourself as Allen invokes 50's-era guilt by association.

I respect his right to free speech and I admire diversity of thought and opinion within the ranks of African-American politicians; but whipping up 'Commie hysteria' in 2012? Marxism and Socialism are the major problems confronting the American people? Really? McCarthyism was a dead horse back in the 50's and performing ideological CPR on the carcass of an animal isn't providing realistic solutions for the problems facing Americans.