Tim Scott's Anti-Environmental Agenda

Hooray for Tim Scott!  Once again, he has received an award -- and just in time for the upcoming election -- for his service to, well, to the wealthy and powerful.  In Newspeak, it is called, The Award for Manufacturing Legislative Excellence.  With emphasis on the word "legislative" of course.  What it means is that our Tim has worked hardest of all hard-bought legislators to make laws that protect big business.

You might not be surprised to learn that the National Association of Manufacturers is associated with our friends the Koch brothers.  Their agenda is also not much of a surprise:  they are anti-environmental regulation and have fought efforts by the government to control greenhouse gas emission.  Most recently, they lobbied to exempt certain external power supplies from complying with federal energy standards in February of 2014.  Yeah, Tim!

It's been a bit like word-puzzle fun to get an email from Tim about an award and trying to figure out what it really means, but not that much of a challenge.  As usual, Tim doesn't ever break new ground.  He pretty much does what all those fancy corporate lobbying groups tell him to do.

But I am tired of our state being held hostage by ALEC and the Kochs.  Our workers are underpaid and there are too many unemployed (latest figures show the numbers creeping up in spite of the nation's continued downward trend).  We sacrifice improving schools and roads and bridges so we can cut taxes on big corporations who are willing to do business in South Carolina if we treat them real good.  Too many in South Carolina are needlessly uninsured and suffer poor nutrition because Tim continues to vote against programs that would give his constituents a fighting chance.

Tim Scott and his buddy Nikki Haley have gotten pretty tiresome.  Their press releases are lies that cover up their true alliances as we continue to hold down the bottom rungs of any measure of education, health, public safety.

This is why we need to talk up the November 4 election.  Lots of our friends and family don't know it's coming up, and too many don't think it is important.  With only two more years of the Obama administration we need to give him a Congress that will support his environmental, health care, and immigration initiatives.  We need to give him a Congress that does not force him to compromise on programs that will truly move us forward.

Joyce Dickerson is a woman who will accomplish that in the US Senate.  She has been fighting to be heard over all the cash that is flowing on the other side, and she needs our help to let others know who she is.  She is the candidate that will work for better health care, better education, better services for seniors and veterans.  She will fight so that we all can earn a living wage, and so that women have the same rights as men.  She will protect our rights to privacy and a safe and healthy environment.

So please, spread the word.  The time is getting short and this election is too important to skip out on.  Use Facebook and Twitter, send out emails, call your friends and family and talk to your co-workers.  Tell them how Tim Scott's votes have kept them from improving their lives and those of their family.  Let's not let the phony awards get in the way of the truth.

Joyce Dickerson

for US Senate

November 4

Let the Games Begin -- So Soon???

I haven't yet had an anxiety dream over it, but when I left the shelter of Wadmalaw Island today to visit civilization, and read the Post & Courier article speculating about Haley's appointment to DeMint's Senate seat, I felt my little heart start to pound.

Because if Haley does appoint Tim Scott to the Senate seat (and Tim Scott's people are all over that), that would leave his House seat open.  AND there would be no appointment for that seat; we would be back to the voting booths, people.

Now I could name a grunch (i.e., greater than a bunch) of y'all who I would love to see have another go at that House seat.  We dems have no shortage of really good, really smart, really qualified people to run that race.

What worries me is that, in order to have a shot at winning, we would need three things:

1.  Money -- Those super-sized billboards you may have noticed cost bucks.  And for those many voters who get their news from FOX, it is going to take TV and radio ads galore to "inform" those folk.  Not to mention mailings to compete with the last minute quality stuff people like Peter McCoy might be sending out.

2.  Money -- If you've just recently run a campaign in this state, you just might not be able to quit your day job, or put your life on hold to do it again.  Those volunteers who worked their tails off in lieu of a paid campaign committee might really want to do it again, but I guarantee they will lack some of the verve they had not so long ago.

3.  Money -- All those awards officeholders like Tim Scott and Peter McCoy have gotten while in office don't come cheap.  You need to be willing to work for your money, and they have.  That means a nearly unending stream of funds from out-of-state big business lobbying groups with big pockets will be making sure that the republican candidate of their choice won't have to lose sleep over the race.  These are the real "party planners."

So, given that, to all you wonderful Democrats who have probably heard nothing since Thursday but, "Well, are you going to do it?" I would like to say, "So are you?"

Because if you are, I am with you.  Let's WIN THIS THING.

(sigh)

Taking the "Think" Out of "Think Tank"

The Heritage Foundation has pretty much always been more about greed than about smarts.  But yesterday, Jim DeMint announced his plans to dumb down the organization just that much more.

If you've been out of town, or perhaps on a space shuttle back from Mars, you may have missed Jim DeMint's resignation, effective January, from the Senate.  He tells us that his decision to accept the position of president of the Heritage Foundation is because the conservative movement "needs strong ideas."  This is like Big Bird trying to convince ETV that he is leaving to teach omelette making.

I see three reasons for Mr. DeMint's jumping ship.

First of all, he may not be smart, but he is shrewd.  I imagine he started to squirm as the national election results began to come in.  It appears he has decided to leave his Tea Party compatriots blowin' in the wind of the electorate's move to more progressive, less corporate, ideals.

Secondly, DeMint is hardly very smart, but he is greedy.  This move will bring him in many more dollars with which he can continue to fight taxation for the common good.

Finally, DeMint is most decidedly not smart, but he knows what he likes.  He does not like talking to people who will ask him annoying questions, or expect him to be accountable for his decisions.  His last election campaign, Running for Re-Election for Dummies, was aided by anonymous donors who vaulted the mysterious and comedic Alvin Greene into the Democratic nominee position, right over a candidate with brains.

Jim DeMint is right up there with Clarence Thomas when it comes to sulking and refusing to talk.  Both believe that their positions of power should not involve having to rub elbows with the peasants they rule.  Beyond that, they hate, hate, HATE being argued with, much less mocked.  It is my belief that DeMint still has nightmares over being the national laughingstock over his comments about single pregnant women not being allowed to teach.

Never again.  Just as Clarence Thomas will never be required to utter a word to anyone he deems beneath him, Jim DeMint will now be amongst like fellows.

So, I would like to join the Washington Post in saying that I'm tickled that you have decided to leave this august institution, making it just a bit more august than it was while you were there.  As South Carolina's own Representative Jim Clyburn pointed out, you didn't get along all that well with the other members of Congress, even those on your own side of the aisle.

I wonder how long before Heritage Foundation starts to realize just what they got themselves into....

The Depths of Inanity -- and Back

If I am going to be truly honest and open-minded, when I listen to Scott Brown's January, 2010, acceptance speech, I really have to say, "What a charming rogue."  This has absolutely nothing to do with his positions on issues, or how good he will be for Massachusetts in the U.S. Senate.  He is not good for us, not Massachusetts, and not the U.S.  He is heavily funded by Wall Street, and his method in the Senate appears to be to pick apart meaningful bills, so that they are gutted and impotent, when he does not vote to kill proposed regulatory measures outright.


He is  shrewd.  He knows when the tide is turning and a simple flirtatious wisecrack is no longer going to appease the voters.  This is when he acts like he really, really wants to vote for, say, the jobs bill, so why don't they just take the important parts (the parts that are going to look good to the voters) and leave out the bad parts (the parts that are going to actually affect Wall Street and the corporations).


So thank you very much to the person at the October 4 Massachusetts Senate Democratic Primary Debate who asked Elizabeth Warren how she paid for college.  I guess she could have given the long-winded answer about a hard-knock life and working her way through school, but I believe she was so taken aback by the question that her sense of humor kicked in and she replied that "I kept my clothes on".


Of course that became the quote du jour, and of course of all that happened at that debate, that was the comment that Senator Scott Brown was asked to respond to.  Mr. Brown, of the "take my daughters, please" school of humor, lowered the bar further by responding, "Thank god!"


Which everybody in the media then had to comment on.  Ad nauseum.


Elizabeth Warren, who has been fighting -- hard -- for our financial survival against the big banks and corporations that pay for Scott Brown's campaign, now has to learn how to deal with idiot America.  I expect that she will do it with her usual aplomb.  I just wish that, for this important race, it was not necessary.


So allow me to end with Warren's closing debate comments:

Elizabeth Warren

I learned yesterday that Elizabeth Warren has announced her candidacy for the Massachusetts US Senate seat.  That would be a proud moment for the state, after the guy in the truck convinced the voters that he was like them because he drove a truck.

Unlike Martha Coakley, Warren is not planning on taking much vacation time -- not that we won't hear about any occasional days off she does take.  She seems to understand how low her opponents will go, and she certainly knows how high the stakes are for them.

A risk for her is that she has seen the ugly in government; she has seen Obama hedge his bets rather than come out tough and determined to do what's right.  She knows Scott Brown has the full support of Wall Street because if she wins this race, Wall Street will look a lot less like Easy Street.

Here in South Carolina, we have a lot at stake in whether Warren gets elected.  Our sleazy right-to-work cheap, freedom for the wealthy, amoralistic moralists will be front and center of this battle, because Elizabeth Warren will fight against those pols who believe states' rights means the right to gut their state.

So they will attack her with all the irrelevant, highly-charged attack words they know, and I've already heard (ho-hum) "elitist"; I'm sure "socialist" has been thrown out there.

And she's been there already, and she's a fighter.

I plan on getting involved in this one, and I hope we all help fight the disinformation war that is going to be going on against Elizabeth Warren.