First Cuppa Coffee, Monday, February 27, 2012: Occu-Toddlers, Bullets and Bubbles

As more and more Americans are becoming aware of the hallucinatory claims being made by increasingly desperate Republicans candidates around the nation, the notion of a credible competitive conservative campaign against entrenched Democratic incumbents appears to be slipping further and further away.  As of two weeks ago, well over half the TV advertising purchased by or on behalf the various 2012 GOP candidates was characterized as negative, even vitriolic, as opposed to 6% of ads purchased in 2008..

Some groups, like the National Rifle Association, are embracing the crazy: their newly minted “Trigger the Vote” campaign features Ted Nugent and Chuck Norris tiptoeing around suggestions that if ballots don’t work, bullets will.  You have to remember that, after four years of unrequited warnings that the Second Amendment was about to fall, these anti-government extremists have realized that yelling louder is probably their only hope of being noticed.

Some State governments are even getting into the act. Legislators in Wyoming are hard at work crafting plans for what to do in the event of the complete economic and/or political collapse of the United States.  The newly created task force will look at the feasibility of issuing State currency, examine conditions under which Wyoming would need to implement its own military draft, raise a standing army, acquire strike aircraft and an aircraft carrier. (Note: Wyoming is landlocked.)

Meanwhile, angry red haired reactionary cablecaster Lou Dobbs has stirred up the right-wing hive over at Fox Business with claims that this week’s release of the movie adaptation of a Dr. Seuss’ book, The Lorax, was indoctrinating children against big industry. Even more threatening to the Dobbster is the distribution of the Japanese children’s film, “The Secret World of Arrietty“. “Hollywood is once again trying to indoctrinate our children,” he warned. He claimed that the movies were “demonizing the 1% and espousing green energy policies.” A guest on his show, one Matt Patrick, went on to say; “What we’re doing is creating Occu-toddlers,” He directed parents to “buy huge tubs of popcorn, ram it in your face,” leave the litter behind and walk out of the movie.

California State Republicans met this weekend in a closet somewhere near San Francisco. Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich made an appearance to remind the gathering that this year’s GOP Primary in California might mean something, especially since the White Sheets dress code, mandatory in past years, was made optional for 2012 with an eye towards attracting Latino and young voters. The Reason.com blog described the overall atmosphere at the GOP confab as the “scent of death”.

San Diego is somehow not part of this fetid reality of Republicanism.  Here we have three out of four candidates running for Mayor of “America’s Finest Tourist Plantation” and not one of them can be accused of waving a coat hanger at women voters.  It’s as if The Grand Old Party has spun the local races into a holographic alternative reality.

But the slime is starting to seep in around the edges, former Carl DeMaio associate Will Rodriguez-Kennedy (now working for GOP candidate Nathan Fletcher) penned a article in San Diego’s LGBT Weekly showing that the DeMaio Mayoral campaign has accepted over 12% ($121,245) of its funding from sources who contributed heavily to the 2008 (Proposition 8) campaign to roll back Gay marriage in California. While fellow Republican candidates Bonnie Dumanis and Nathan Fletcher also received donations from Proposition 8 backers, the amounts of money involved were 1% or less of their total fundraising. Congressman Bob Filner, also known as the Democrat in the race, was the only candidate with no contributions from Proposition 8 supporters. DeMaio and Dumanis are both openly gay candidates. All the candidates in this race have has expressed support for LGBT causes including marriage equality.

The race for the 52^nd Congressional District, another political contest in this region that’s been relatively untainted by the general pandemonium has gained some national attention as Daily Kos and Act Blue have “discovered” Democrat (and progressive) Lori Saldana, guaranteeing that she’ll be on the receiving end of their considerable fundraising efforts. One unusual connection between the Mayoral race and the Congressional contest involves a lawsuit filed by Mother Earth’s Alternative Healing Cooperative against the Federal Government’s current suppression campaign aimed at suppliers of medical marijuana.  Congressman’s Bilbray’s daughter Briana is among those suing the Feds. The other Congressman running for office in San Diego, Bob Filner, is among those who sent a letter to President Obama in October 2011 asking the Feds to back off in their campaign.  Bilbray has previous indicated that, while he supports his daughter’s dedication, the family doesn’t necessarily agree on this issue.