I have failed on the last one

Today’s rant is about lying politicians.

Firstly - in answer to all those unasked questions yesterday. No – I cannot prove that God does not exist. That is not my job.

My job is to look after Cate and the cats – love my children and grandchildren - be as kind to as many people as possible – have a nice life and do what I can to leave the world a better place than it was when I arrived.

OK I have failed on that last one but it was not for want of trying and when I was young and enthusiastic I really did care - but there are so many people absolutely intent on trashing the planet at the moment that it really does seem rather pointless to me when I separate my white and colored wine bottles and drop them in the bins outside Spar.

While I am doing this – and putting my cardboard in the special bins downstairs – the Republicans are gutting every piece of EPA legislation in the USA.

Are these people really so dumb that they do not know the difference between climate and weather? Do Republicans REALLY believe that there is no such thing as climate change or is it just a charade to try to get elected. I am being charitable here and assuming that they cannot ALL be fuckwits.

Do they not have children and grandchildren that they care about enough to try to do something – anything – to try to counteract the effects of global warming.

There is no developed country in Europe – or indeed the rest of the world - that does not accept that global warming exists and is a real problem. And Europe has been working on solutions and alternative energy sources for years.

America has been working mainly on developing alternative honking lunatics like Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann who spout endless flapdoodle about how carbon dioxide is not dangerous and how alternative energy kills economies.

The problem in America is that there is no real constraint on what people say about anything – certainly there is no desire by anyone to tell the truth. In other developed western countries there is some sort of convention that you do not stand up in public and tell outrageous bare-faced lies.

In a budget speech in the US Senate in April Senator John Kyl (R) of Arizona claimed that Planned Parenthood “devotes more than 90 percent of its resources to providing abortions.” The actual figure is about 3% and his office later issued a statement saying that the Senator hadn’t intended his remarks to be a factual statement. This was in the US Senate.

The problem is that most of the speeches and comments made by politicians are not intended to be factual – and are in fact lies. Most of what is said by Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann is in fact complete bullshit. Sarah Palin’s ‘Death Panels’ lie was rated as the biggest lie of the last Presidential election. She repeated it in every speech she gave.

You can check some of the whoppers here.

And of course when they say all this stuff there are people with minds like the inside of ping pong balls who actually believe them! I am not joking!

A few of them can read and write – after a fashion - and I read what they say when they comment on forums – and it’s very scary. Now if they actually get out there and vote you could get someone like Michele Bachmann as President and – well – I would not want to be around when that happens.

Unfortunately I probably will be. So I have lost part of my incentive for recycling my empty milk cartons and now just throw them in the rubbish bin. See what this whole crazy business has done to me.