TEA Partiers Suck at History

More from the facts-challenged Michelle Bachmann: "the very founders that wrote those documents worked tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States....Men like John Quincy Adams, who would not rest until slavery was extinguished in the country."  Let’s see JQA died in 1848 and Lincoln didn’t deliver the emancipation proclamation until 1863.  Oh and one key reason why we even have a Constitution?  The Founding Fathers knew that slavery was such a toxic topic that it had to be kicked down the road (again and again) in order to get ratification.  It took 75 years after constitutional ratification before slavery was abolished.  Just because you wear a tri-corn hat, doesn’t mean you know shit about American History.

John Boehner and the rest of the Conservatives have accused President Obama of overreaching on his decision not to enforce the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).  Did Lincoln overreach with Emancipation proclamation?  Did Truman overreach with his executive order to integrate the armed forces?  Now I am not equating Emancipation and desegregation to DOMA in terms of scope, but I am saying that there are times when social injustice needs presidential action; funny how in all cases it was mostly the southern boys who went apoplectic.  Yeah, it’s funny.

The complete absence of the rule of law in Venezuela is getting to be ridiculous.  Chavez is imprisoning members of parliament, judges, and opposition mayors from some of Venezuela’s biggest cities.  Perhaps if this country was more worried about these matters instead of the latest Sheen, Lohan, and Spears escapades we could pressure on the regime via sanctions and stopping US companies such as Avon, Ford, and Colgate from doing business there.  I know we have our own major domestic problems, but we can’t be taken seriously as the defenders of democracy when we let it become secondary to our business interests.

Who said it? “By outlawing Solidarity, a free trade organization to which an overwhelming majority of Polish workers and farmers belong, they have made it clear that they never had any intention of restoring one of the most elemental human rights—the right to belong to a free trade union...” 

a)      Jimmy Carter

b)      Walter Mondale

c)      Ronald Reagan

d)      Bill Clinton

e)      Jimmy Hoffa

The answer is (c), the same man that Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker extolled as his hero to bust up the public unions.

A 27 year old New Mexico woman travelling from London through Baltimore may have exposed fellow travelers to measles.  No word yet from any of the major airlines of possible new fees for carrying on communicable diseases.