Al Franken gives lesson in how to handle teabaggers. Oh he is good!

He is calm, he is smart, and he comes equipped with a command of the facts to refute the Fox News propaganda.

This is how i want my Senator, Mark Begich, to handle these people. I wonder if Al could hold a seminar or something?

I just got back from a Teabaggers rally in front of the Egan Center in Anchorage.

The tea baggers were out in force. And they brought a big batch of crazy with them.

Is she admitting that this not a grass roots gathering?

RU kidding?

This guy is just not moving on.

Update: It looks like the Alaska Legislators just voted to accept that stimulus money which Palin rejected. Ooh that is going to piss of some of the teabaggers!

Update 2: AKM has a post over at Huffington about the special session and the vote.

Wasilla, where crazy is the new black, will host the next wingnut teabagging protest.

Once again the right wing leaps to attack the Obama administration over policies that have been implemented to repair the horrendous damage done to our country and our financial institutions by the Bushies. The ability to see that their President was ultimately responsible for this crisis seems to be denied to these simple, simple people.

But now they have taken it to even more bat-shit crazy heights. Just check out this "We the People Stimulus Package" that is featured on the Alaska Tea Party official website:


1. No legislator shall be in office for more than two (2) years term limits. (Go on.)

2. All legislators must pay into the Social Security yearly from their wages.

3. No legislator shall be able to give themselves raises, the American people will vote for these raises on the legislator’s record. (This way well organized voting blocs, like the ones put together in churches, could manipulate politicians by keeping them from earning more money if they did not jump through their particular hoops.)

4. All legislation shall be posted on the internet for five (5) days, the legislator has forty eight (48) hours to read said legislation before voting and a three (3) day cooling off period after legislation has been signed to recall said legislation before moving to the President for signing.

5. Any government official whether the President or the Janitor does not comply, honor, pledge the Constitution of the United States will be thrown out of office and newly elected will replace them. (I am curious as to WHO determines this.)

6. Any legislator that breaks the law, ex: (tax evasion, lobbying, conflict of interest) will not be rewarded with monies or committees. (Well I agree with this one as it will have the effect of keeping the Republicans from getting the huge amounts of money from the special interests that they use to outspend their Democratic opponents at every turn.)

7. The American people would have the right to throw any legislator out of office if anyone of them does not read legislation before voting on them. (Once again who determines this, and how?)

8. No government official shall start a war if they do not intend to win a war. (Somebody get George Bush to read this immediately!)

9. We need to abolish the Electoral College and the American people would determine who will be the President. (Damn I actually agree with this one. Oh well, I guess they ALL can't be crazy.)

10. All candidates for government service must go through a mandatory universal service either in the Armed Service or through Community involvement before being vetted for candidacy. (Well this is a silly and unnecessary requirement for public service.)

11. English would be our main language in the United States. (Sorry No hablo inglés.)

12. No more amnesty programs for illegal immigrants. All will abide by United States immigration laws or will be arrested and deported back to their countries. (It looks like Lou Dobbs had a hand in this document.)

13. Any immigrants in this country or coming to this country will abide by the laws of the United States of America. (Is that not the case now?)

14. The words “In God We Trust” would never be abolished from our monies, schools, government installations. (Ah now we get a little red meat for the Christianistas.)

15. The Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag will be restored back in our schools. (Pledges do not make people more patriotic. And for a group of people who seem determined to keep government OFF of their backs, the idea of having the government force their children to pay allegiance to them seems counter intuitive. Or am I missing something?)

16. Our constitution would never be amended; the founding structure would be forever the same. (Yeah why should we be allowed to bear arms anyway? Or have freedom of religion? Or a free press? Or allow women to vote? Or have the right to a speedy trial by a jury of our peers? No the Constitution was just perfect the way it was originally written. Are these idiots serious?)

17. The fair Tax would be instrumented to everyone.

18. Our military personnel active or veteran status would be afforded complete health care with no stipulations. (I would support this too.)

19. Christianity will again be restored as our main religious entity. (Okay now you lost me. Freedom of religion is the very foundation that this country was built on and it is completely unconstitutional for ANYBODY to insist that one religion be considered more important than any other.)

20.Big government will not be allowed, no handouts and accountability and transparency will be the law of the land. (Once again this is something that should have been addressed when George Bush was President and created numerous unnecessary agencies as well as increasing the size of our government to levels never seen in this country before. The problems they are talking about are NOT the result of the new administration, no matter how much they may want to believe that.)

The funny thing about this document is that if you take the time to read it you will find that it contradicts itself a number of times and essentially makes no good sense whatsoever. But hey, it was good enough for the Alaska Tea Party website and I am sure it will be good enough for the low hanging fruit that attends this rally.

After all, it is only Wasilla.

P.S. I believe it is important to point out that not ALL Wasillians are crazy. Just most of them. For instance my friend Phil Munger, of Progressive Alaska, is decidedly NOT crazy. Of course, as he will often point out, he does not live in Wasilla proper.

"Socialism is like soup" so sayeth prophet of the North Don Young. Video is courtesy of my pal Dennis Zaki.

I was going to add something really snarky, but that comparison was so stupid that I think it broke my brain.

"Socialism is like soup with no vegetables, and no meat, and no salt, and no pepper", WTF?

So is it like water? Socialism is water? Is money like chunks of meat?

My brain hates Don Young.

Adventures in teabagging on the Last Frontier.

Have you ever had one of those days that is totally surreal? You know where things are slightly off kilter and you just can't seem to determine where imagination ends and reality begins?

Well that is the kind of day I had today.

I had to work and missed part of the Anchorage teabagging extravaganza, but from what I was able to observe in the half hour or so that I was there for, it was attended by about five hundred or so fired up anti-tax protesters. The signs ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous. One said "Obama: Chains you can believe in". Another was emblazoned with "Can you read my lipstick now?", all in bright red coloring. And yet another said "Honk Komrade" except the "K" in Komrade was backwards which I guess was meant to suggest that we are a communist or socialist country now. (Or perhaps he was just trying to identify the number of communist commuters that were on the road today.)

And speaking of honking, there was plenty of that. From pickup trucks and mini-vans, to SUV's and hybrid cars, the honks were loud and constant, a sad reminder that despite a Democrat in the Senate Alaska is still perhaps the reddest state in the union.

It did not take long for me to stumble upon my good friend AKMuckraker who had already been there for a while and had just about had enough of the crazy. Together we stood there amazed at the anger we saw directed at our new President and the complete lack of realization that the blame for our current financial crisis rested firmly on the shoulders of Republican George W. Bush.

But not in the minds of the frenzied throng before us. In their minds all things bad had to be the fault of the Democrats, and especially that "probable Muslim" Barack Obama.

I did ask a few questions of the some of the protesters and came away thinking that they were not terribly informed or cognizant of why they were rallying, but somebody suggested it and so here they were.

Eventually we drifted away as the group before us started to dissipate. I felt somewhat numb and a little nauseous, and to be honest more than a little sad.

AKM and went to a nearby restaurant and just kind of decompressed. (AKM took some great pictures and I will "borrow" some of them later for a follow up post.)

Our conversation centered mostly on how hypocritical it was that these people were so easily inflamed with a Democrat in the White house talking about increasing our debt and yet did not say anything when George Bush was borrowing billions of dollars from China to finance his illegal war and plunge our country into an endless vortex of debt. I volunteered that it was clear that the Republicans have a much easier time getting their people riled up and out on the streets because it seems they do not know what to think until somebody tells them, and then they simply follow that persons lead.

The leader in this case was local misogynist and talk radio douchebag Eddie Burke, and still he managed to gather a substantive crowd of sheeple. I find myself amazed that people would follow this guy across the street much less come out and protest due to his endorsement of the event.

I guess I owe Mr. Burke and his fellow "Teabaggers" a debt of gratitude for reminding me that I still live in Alaska, that the conservative mind is slow to change, and that we still have much work to do.

"The woods are lovely, dark, and deep.

But I have promises to keep.

And miles to go before I sleep.

Miles to go before I sleep."

This probably should not surprise most of us but the Conservative "Tea Bagging" gatherings have become downright insane.

Listen at the end for the woman who yells "burn the books". Apparently she does not want her little snowflake to learn about socialism, communism, or evolution in school. Remember "An ignorant child is more likely to vote Republican as an adult". Sadly that is a fact.

I guess fascism did not die with the end of the Bush administration.

According to the Huffington Post (which you can access by clicking the title) there is big money pouring into the groups responsible for these bizarre gatherings. I have to imagine that the Republicans are in some sort of a blind panic, and looking for some cause to throw money at in an attempt stave off their emotional collapse.

It is kind of humorous that many of them are probably donating more money to these groups then any sort of tax hike would take out of their pay.

By the way Anchorage is not inoculated against this kind of batshit protest. Our version will be held on Wednesday, at noon, in front of the Federal Building. I think I will try to make it if I can get away from work.

It should be good for an interesting post or two.