Wednesday, May 15, 2013

Those wacky Republicans

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 [New York Republican Party corrupt as they come.  You probably haven't read much about it outside of NY, but this is what we're dealing with from the "family values" party. And as we just saw in South Carolina (Mark Sanford), Republican voters don't give a shit about the moral values of the people they elect. And so America continues to slide down a shithole. one elction at a time.

You can read more by clicking on the link.]
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From the Albany (NY) Times Union..

Why are Senate Republicans fighting so hard against proposals to stop corruption in Albany?

At a time when recent scandals have driven public anger over corruption to all-time highs, why are Dean Skelos and his GOP colleagues fighting so hard to protect the status quo?

It's hard to understand.

They're senators - and the GOP-led majority has sunk to subterranean levels in public opinion.

They're Republicans - and four out of five of the officials arrested and indicted in the scandal over the apparent auction process for the Republican nomination for mayor in New York City were, too.

They're Senate Republicans - and they've seen their leader, their colleague and a number of their allies (Joe Bruno, Vincent Leibell, Carl Kruger, Nicholas Spano and Pedro Espada) prosecuted, convicted and/or jailed in recent years.

You'd think they'd recognize it's time to end corruption. Or maybe it's more simple than that. Senate Republicans are defending the status quo because they are the status quo, and they're happy to keep it that way.

Trading big campaign contributions for legislative action - or, often, inaction - is pretty much the business model for the Senate GOP. Recent revelations that Wal-Mart made about $500,000 in campaign contributions to state Republicans (including six-figure checks to what's known as the Senate GOP's housekeeping account) in exchange for new taxpayer subsidies worth about $50 million are just the latest example.

But there have been others, too.HMOs, insurance companies and drug companies gave checks to reduce oversight and consumer protections and boost their own profits. Soda and beer wholesalers gave checks to keep unclaimed hundreds of millions of dollars in bottle deposits that should have gone back to the public. Lobbyists for industrial agriculture interests gave checks to block basic, humane labor law protections for farmworkers.Wall Street banks gave checks to eliminate state oversight and keep their massive tax loopholes wide open.

Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/opinion/article/GOP-s-money-model-4503346.php#ixzz2SzLydAdc

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