Particle Board Democracy: Florida's GOP and Its Shameful Conduct ... by gimleteye

We have reached the nadir of the dumbing down of American politics. The path was cleared by ideologues: and why should the devastation not be delivered by the conservative right holding the Book of Ezekiel to their American flag lapels? I am half-tempted to go along with the Ron Paul wing of the Republican Party and let August 2nd come and go: just like Y2K right? (On Jan 1, 2000 it was imagined that computers would all shut down or short circuit because of they had not been programmed to accept the new millenium date. If you don't know what happens on August 2nd, you can stop reading right here.)

Republican brainiacs believe they can pin "this budget thing" on President Obama and the Democrats, but I expect if there is no resolution to the budget and debt ceiling crisis, there will be a stock market crash of at least 20 percent right off the bat. No one thought home values could be worth only half of what they were, five years ago. Let the GOP masterminds explain how it wasn't their fault our savings are worth only half of what they were.

That the Republican Party turned into a party of unrecognizable extremists didn't happen overnight. For those who thought Grover Norquist was just trying to shrink the size of government, look at the consequences of the decapitations that are working themselves out in slow motion. Norquist is simply an anarchist. Let's return for a minute to Florida's GOP wrecking crew in Congress.

If you were too focused on Texas' GOP initiative to save the incandescent light bulb, or the electric utilities' decision to abandon investment in reducing man-made chemicals that are causing global warming (because of regulatory uncertainty due to Republicans efforts to kill all environmental regulations), then you might have missed the Florida GOP delegations' most recent tactic in the Holy War against the US EPA: to gut the Clean Water Act as revenge for the EPA trying to clean up Florida's filthy waters where the state refuses (thank you, Governor Barely Legal Rick Scott).

The GOP is ginned up by campaign contributors from polluting industries like Florida's Associated Industries and its Jack-Ass-In-Chief Barney Bishop. "US EPA's proposed nutrient criteria rules will impose 'crushing burden' on families, economy" is dated July 9, 2011. It is a piece of the 40 Year War Against the Environment that provides the foundation for Florida's future: a haven for polluters.

Yesterday, a week after Associated Industries' kick-off-- followed up by a full scale lobbying press by Big Sugar in the halls of Congress-- the House passed The Dirty Water Bill sponsored by Florida REp. John Mica. Sierra Club wrote of the measure (supported, naturally by the Republican delegation from coal-polluting West Virginia); "H.R. 2018 guts the Clean Water Act, severely limits the federal government’s ability to protect waterways, and seeks to return the country to an era of inconsistent and ineffective state water safety standards without a federal safety net. Representatives also voted against an amendment that would have ensured continued protection of municipal drinking water sources."

H.R. 2018 would "prevent the Environmental Protection Agency, without state concurrence, from taking action to revise outdated state water quality standards, making it easier for companies to dump their waste and garbage into lakes and rivers." Like Big Sugar, frantically trying to fend off paying for its pollution of Florida and the Everglades.

It is sickening and disgusting: the GOP Congress is using the budget crisis-- otherwise consuming all the bandwidth of political energy-- to insert the will of big polluters and Republican campaign contributors. Call it "Particle Board Democracy" to the benefit of the Koch brothers (billionaires like the Fanjuls) whose profits derive, among other sources, from the manufacturing of formaldehyde; the binder in chip board. That's what we have come to: sacrificing democracy for the rights of Big Sugar and particle board makers. It is simply the case that the key Republican issue is protecting polluters; just look at the states where the GOP leadership comes from. The co-signer of H.R. 2018: West Virginia. Mitch McConnell, opponent of campaign finance reform and Senate minority leader, Kentucky. Big Coal, Big Sugar, then there are the Kochs.

The EPA recently-- after more than a decade of "study"-- declared formaldehyde to be a carcinogen, sending the Koch's into a tizzy of giving to Tea Party and other reactionary, revenge-seekers. Take a look at the U.S. EPA spending relative to other monthly costs of the federal government: the subject of so much spent energy by the Florida GOP delegation in the context of the budget crisis.

The monthly obligations of the federal government, all-in, are approximately $307 billion. You have to ask the question, if the best the GOP Congress and Florida's extremist Republicans in Congress can find to do is beat up on the EPA, whose budget represents .3 percent of monthly federal obligations, WTF is going on? We know what is going on: the House of Representatives and its Florida GOP delegation is marching through our democracy like General Sherman through Georgia. In 2012 voters will have a chance to redress these shameful ploys by Republicans. But God help us, for the next two weeks.