"This Is Not A Game"

I think I've been immersing myself a bit too much in the alternate Universe that is the American Right.  Reading Roy Edroso's "Alicublog" and Wonkette is like entering a world where there is no sense, no facts, not even the comforting sense that time has a direction.

In the midst of the right's freak-out over America re-electing a black man President, the House busied itself today passing a non-binding resolution that President Obama set a date for a balanced budget.  Because, you know, that's really important!

Meanwhile, the real business of America gets ignored.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Wednesday $46 billion in U.S. military budget cuts would "degrade our ability to respond to a crisis."
Speaking at Georgetown University in Washington, Panetta said the impending automatic cuts, or sequestration, would result in "a serious disruption in defense programs and a sharp decline in our military readiness." . . .

"This is not a game. This is reality," Panetta said. "These steps would seriously damage a fragile American economy and they would degrade our ability to respond to a crisis precisely at a time of rising instability across the globe."

If you think he's joking, well . . .

The outgoing Pentagon chief delayed the deployment of the USS Harry S. Truman aircraft carrier and the USS Gettysburg guided missile cruiser, which were due to leave Virginia later this week, because of uncertainty over the department's finances, Pentagon spokesman George Little said.

"Facing budget uncertainty ... the U.S. Navy made this request to the secretary and he approved," Little said in a statement. "This prudent decision enables the U.S. Navy to maintain these ships to deploy on short notice in the event they are needed to respond to national security contingencies." . . .

The decision to delay the carrier deployment came hours after Panetta warned in one of his final speeches as U.S. defense secretary that lurching from budget crisis to budget crisis was threatening U.S. national security.
He told students at Georgetown University that Congress' failure to deal with the government's financial problems put the Defense Department on the brink of having to absorb $46 billion in spending cuts over seven months.
The cuts, which are due to go into force on March 1 unless Congress acts to avert them, would require the Pentagon to put as many as 800,000 civilian employees on unpaid leave for 22 work days, reduce Navy operations in the western Pacific by up to one-third and cut Air Force flying hours, Panetta said.

"It's difficult to believe, frankly, that the Congress would simply stand aside and ... allow the defense, economy and quality of life of America to be irreparably damaged," Panetta told the students. 

Governing is not a game.  Except for the children who currently hold the purse-strings in the House of Representatives.  Remember who actually pays for things.  It isn't the President of the United States.  It isn't the Secretary of the Treasury.  It is the House of Representatives.

They love the military, and they support the troops.  They just don't want to pay for any of it, nor do they want any wealthy Americans to pay a larger portion of their income in taxes in order to pay for them.

We are governed by mindless, stupid children.

An Experiment

I'm going to test a theory.  I propose that Marshall Art will defend pretty much anything a Republican official says or writes, regardless of its merit.  The test is simple.  All he has to do is read this article at Wonkette and I guarandamntee you he will put something in comments about how this guy in question shouldn't be called a racist dick.  Because we liberals are the real racists.