Republican civil war

Danton et FarentholdThe French Revolution spawned many important things aside from the motto "Liberté, égalité, fraternité." Before the French Revolution, for example, a debauched and unaccountable monarchy and aristocracy ruled mankind with impunity and conspired with the Established religions to give that the imprimatur of ruling by "Divine Right." Things really did change because of the monumental revolution, even if they've slipped back in the ancien direction-- substitute plutocr

McConnell is an ugly example of the American ruling elites who have perverted democracy for the advancement of their own careers. At this point, it almost doesn't matter if McConnell is a conservative or a liberal; all that matters is that he represents Mitch McConnell in the U.S. Senate, not the working families of Kentucky.

It's almost as though King has a political death wish. His House district has been redrawn and while still the reddest seat in Iowa, it isn't nearly as safe as it once was. The PVI is R+5, Romney beat Obama 53-45% and King himself had a relatively close call, alos winning just 53% of the vote against Christie Vilsack. Vilsack beat him in 7 counties, including two of the three big ones, Cerro Gordo and Story.

Nothing left of the Tea Party Caucus but garbageThe latest battleground is over the debilitating and draconian spending cuts extremist rightists who are in the pockets of the 1 percent are demanding. These are cuts even greater than the cuts neo-liberals in the Obama administration and among the New Dems and Blue Dogs have been implementing.

Kerry Bentivolio (R-MI) is one freshman who has not been embraced by the GOP House Establishment. The very strange Tea Party activist is very much an accidental congressman, who slipped into office when long-time GOP incumbent, Thaddeus McCotter, resigned as part of a deal to keep him out of prison for election fraud. Bentivolio has a typical GOP voting record (a ProgressivePunch score of 6.73) and hasn't done anything to distinguish himself since being elected last year.

John Barrow-- anti-immigrant Blue Dog (GA)Politically, the battle over immigration reform in pretty black and white, right? The Democrats want to reform the system. The Republicans don't. If only it could break down that neatly! The genesis of the immigration problem is tied up in wealthy corporate interests-- primarily backers of the GOP-- who want cheap labor and lots of immigration to drive the cost of labor down and dilute the power of unions.

Mike Lee threatens to shut down the government if he's not put in the pictureRepublicans are tearing each other apart over a number of issues. In the last few days that's been personified by the increasingly bitter personal exchanges between domestic spying advocate and Establishment whore Chris Christie and Kentucky libertarian/Tea Party isolationist Rand Paul.

Predictably, over the weekend the Louisville Courier-Journal columnists were all buzzing over Kentucky's mega-high profile Senate campaign. Old, steeped in corruption and wily, Mitch McConnell, is facing a mainstream Democrat, Alison Lundergan Grimes, and, in the GOP primary, a very credible Tea Party candidate, Matt Bevin.

It shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone that Mitch McConnell is one of the dirty politicians in America-- not just in terms of taking massive legalistic bribes from special interests, but also in terms of how he runs his campaigns. Not just ruthless but sleazy and downright dishonest are words that describe his political career. Closet cases are often sociopaths and this kind of behavior is typical.

Boehner's job-- trying to herd the fractious, racist, unpatriotic teabaggers in his own party-- is so thankless and stressful that there are rumors he's contemplating retirement. Since the rumor originates with Politico, they may not be entirely credible, although they insist that "the rumors are real, and they’re bouncing from Capitol Hill to K Street.