I don’t know about you, but I’m going to move to the other side of the electoral bed and light up a cigarette. Anyone have a match?

       

And how sweet it is!

       

Please, if only till the last ash is flicked, let me just lie here and savor the moment. I’m not used to such extended foreplay, or such a rich sense of satisfaction and afterglow.

       

Let me contemplate Karl Rove handing out T-shirts that proclaim, “I spent $400 million on the Goddamn 2012 election and all I got is this lousy T-shirt!”

       

Let me picture Eddie Haskell’s twin, Paul Ryan dragging his 87-year-old mother onto the stage repeatedly, as if they were both trapped in a nightmare that wouldn’t go away, to prove to blue-haired and highly-wrinkled audiences everywhere his heretofore-hidden concern for the elderly.

       

Best of all, as I suck in the aromatic smoke from this symbolic-but-delicious cigarette, I see Willard Mitt Romney himself, foot in mouth, shape-shifting and position-changing like some creature from a 1950’s William Castle horror flick. Think “The Tingler” or “The House on Haunted Hill,” made over by dint of Mitt’s millions into “The Shapeshifter” and “The Creature From The Hollow Core.”

       

“Step right up, folks!” the narrator calls, “Watch the man on the screen change from pro-choice to pro-life, from advocate of universal health care to advocate of universal emergency rooms, from moderate Republican to conservative ideologue. Don’t be afraid, children, it’s only a movie.”

       

In the end, Mitt, as most fairy tales go, you were saved from an eternity of shape-shifting by the kiss of the handsome dark prince.

       

I can’t see you in the dark of the room, boys, but I can hear your heavy breathing.

       

Let me take a lungful of smoke as I savor the thought of Karl explaining to his billionaire friends how hard he worked, and how difficult it can be, to create hundreds of totally discreditable TV commercials that could chase people out of their living rooms faster than an air raid siren.

       

Just imagine, Karl, if you had only had another $100 million and one more year to work with…The Democrats might have recaptured the House!

       

And one more smiling drag on the butt to recall Paul Ryan balancing on the razor-thin edge of fatuous logic, explaining how he and Mitt were the ones looking out for the interests of the poor and the elderly and how especially he—his house budgets aside—had not come to bury Medicare but to save it. 

       

Well, the ash grows longer, boys, the time grows fleeting. One last drag, Mitt, to accompany these sleepy memories of all the glorious gaffes you blundered through. How you managed to insult the British and the Palestinians on your whirlwind foreign affairs tour. How you inelegantly managed to insult 47% of the entire population at your chummy millionaires’ fundraising dinner. How you inhumanely, and ill-politically, tied your faithful dog Seamus’ carrier to the top of your station wagon for the 12-hour trip from Massachusetts to Canada.

       

Good grief, if I start recalling all your gaffes here in bed, Mitt, I’ll smoke so many cigarettes I’ll ruin my lungs.

       

Better to crush out the butt and forget how badly you and your friends tried to screw America.

       

No hard feelings, Mitt, we only flirted with you for a few cheap thrills ourselves.

       

Could you pass over the ashtray?

       

(sung to the tune of “You’re so Vain” by Carly Simon)

You walked into the party like you had always been on the right,

You’re so dumb, you probably think we can’t see right through you

Scott Brown either has no moral character or no political record he can stand on. On Tuesday the voters of Massachusetts will offer their own opinion on that critical question.

As a member of the party that elevated swiftboating to an art form defending bad behavior and questionable representation of the people’s interests, Scott Brown has clearly decided Elizabeth Warren’s proven record of defending the interests of the middle class will trump his own record of defending the rights, the wealth and the power of the privileged class. His cynical pretense to be a fair-minded voice for sanity and compromise in the U.S. Senate is as shallow as his record in sponsoring meaningful legislation or rebalancing the wholly lopsided aggregation of our nation’s wealth by the shamelessly piggish 1%.

Swiftboating, as anyone living in our modern era can tell you, is the aiming of LIES at an opponent’s strongest qualifications. George W. Bush’s campaign used swiftboating to undermine John Kerry’s record as a highly decorated swiftboat captain in VietNam (hence the term ‘swiftboating’), Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan are attempting to swiftboat Barack Obama’s rescue of the auto industry, and Scott Brown is pathetically attempting to swiftboat Elizabeth Warren’s record as a fierce consumer advocate.

If Scott Brown had done more to represent the majority of his constituents he wouldn’t be forced to attack Elizabeth Warren with lies, innuendoes and fantasy assessment’s of Mrs. Warren’s past record. Or to cling like a drowning man to the irrelevant question of Elizabeth Warren’s Native American heritage.

As I’ve written elsewhere, Scott Brown has a history of waiting until issues are decided before casting his vote. In most cases voting against his fellow swiftboaters when the vote no longer matters and he can use it to highlight his sham willingness to work across the aisle.

The truth is Scott Brown has aligned himself with a gang of thugs who will trample a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body or to earn equal pay for equal work. A gang that, pumped up by corporate greed and billionaire donations, would bring us back to an era when Malthusian economics decreed we should allow America’s poor, elderly, and sickest citizens to live or die on their own without any help from the government. A gang that would virtually wipe out all the social, humanitarian and egalitarian progress we’ve made as a country since Franklin Delano Roosevelt first introduced Social Security as a citizen right back in the 1930’s.

A corporate and billionaire-funded gang of political hacks that denies global warming, sees the American government as its enemy, and is intent on taking food from school children’s lunches to support further expansion of an unnecessarily bloated military machine.

So when I read a mailer from Scott Brown declaring that “Elizabeth Warren is not who she says she is” I can see how desperate he is to avoid the real truth…that Scott Brown, unlike what his yard signs proclaim, is definitely NOT who he says he is.

And certainly not someone worthy of my vote. 

Hello folks, come on in. And welcome to the Republican States of America (RSA). I’ve been authorized by Karl Rove and the Koch Brothers and billionaires everywhere to invite you in for a visit. But not to stay.

You can only stay here in the RSA if you are a declared heterosexual, American-born—possessing two birth certificates if you’re black and running for the presidency—fully observant of the moral dictates of women-subjugating religions or right-minded politicians, and committed to enshrining selfishness into the Constitution.

While you are visiting with us in the RSA feel free to wear your gun to the movies, abuse your undocumented Latino servants and drop off your grandparents at the local emergency room, should they have health problems. In the RSA anyone struggling to earn a living wage is responsible for his or her own difficulties and is requested never to ask for assistance, especially if they’re poor, elderly, recently out of work, living in a single parent household, or in ill health. Take note that women in the RSA are not allowed to be raped or have abortions in cases of rape.

Also be aware that your unborn children are of greater importance to us than those noisy, filthy and irritating children poor people seem to breed as if they were sex-starved rabbits.

Please take note that as of January 2013, membership in a public or private employees union will be considered contrary to the public welfare, punishable by extended stays in Arizona or Wisconsin. In the interest of fairness, every citizen will pay the same percentage of his or her income in taxes, regardless of how rich or poor they may be, except in cases where a minimum level of assets qualifies you for the Oil, Gas and Millionaires tax loopholes.

In the Republican States of America it is understood we may declare preemptive war against a weak third-world nation anytime we deem it necessary to use up, and thus upgrade and re-manufacture at great cost, our store of aging armaments. If we de-stabilize a region, we take no responsibility and will blame it on the mainstream media.

In the Republican States of America it is perfectly acceptable to declare war on another country in the interests of spreading democracy, even while here at home we combat voter fraud by denying voting rights to minorities, students and other left-leaning elements of the population. To that regard, it is also permissible to steal elections in swing states.

Welcome to the Republican States of America. Please remember, we don’t do torture, and we’ll waterboard anyone who says different. 

 

If I sound harsh, forgive me. It’s only because the stakes are too high for us to make a mistake voting for Senator next month.

Senator Scott Brown is a nice guy. We can all agree on that. As far as his vision goes as a politician, we only really know two things about him. At some level he supports Republican doctrine enough to belong to the party. Secondly, he’s running for reelection based on the fact he plays nicely with others.

Ask Scott Brown why any of us should vote for him and he immediately points to his bi-partisan voting record, which by the way has him voting for core Republican positions almost every time, and alongside Democrats on the really tough political fights, like naming post offices or codifying rules of behavior for National Parks.

The nation’s two most important economic issues don’t seem particularly interesting to Mr. Brown. On the widening gap between rich and poor, he’s shown a surprising bent for siding with the wealthy and the powerful. On the destruction of the middle class, he mouths platitudes, but does little or nothing to help.

What does Scott Brown stand for, besides getting himself re-elected? Can you think of one issue meaningful to our lives that he has articulated or even slated for political action?

Elizabeth Warren has risen to challenge Brown exactly because she does stand for something. She’s a fighter for the middle class and, more important, she’s a defender of our rights against the very same entrenched interests Scott Brown and the Republican Party represent.

If you observe Scott Brown’s behavior in the Senate you’ll notice he’s very calculating about taking his “bi-partisan” votes. Most times he will only vote after the outcome is decided. Thus giving himself maximum time to see which way the wind is blowing, but also to devise a plausible reason to explain his vote. When Brown votes with Democrats it’s almost always on issues where his vote is next to meaningless and has little impact on our lives. I admit, he did vote for Dodd-Frank Financial Reform, but almost immediately tried to weaken its provisions.

And Mr. Brown always has a plausible explanation (read ‘excuse’) for his lock-step Republican votes. He’s never without a reasonable explanation for abandoning the middle class. On voting against cutting the Bush tax breaks for the wealthy, he rotely explains now is not the time to tax the ‘job-creators’. On voting against fair-pay for women, he argues the bill had too many unintended legal consequences. On protecting tax loopholes worth billions to the oil companies, he claims eliminating tax loopholes would only result in higher prices at the pump.

All reasonable, plausible explanations! But forgive me, I don’t think they pass the smell test. Rather than honest explanations they seem like thinly veiled political shields meant to hide a voting record that favors the high and mighty at the expense of the poor and unprivileged.

But what makes Scott Brown immensely regrettable is his taking up a space in the Senate that can mean so much to the lives of everyday Americans. Not every Senator can be a Teddy Kennedy or a Daniel Webster. But those are the footsteps in which Scott Brown walks, and it’s time he proved himself worthy of being there. It’s not enough for Scott Brown to rest on his laurels as a make-believe liaison between Democrats in the center and the crazies on the right. Nor can he expect to coast to a victory by defaming an opponent who has already accomplished more on a national level than he could ever hope to achieve.

Scott Brown makes a lot of claims in explaining a short Senate career filled with meager accomplishment. He claims that kings and other royalty confer with him regularly. He claims his 2-week summer rotation in Afghanistan qualifies as “doing combat duty in Afghanistan.” He claims Elizabeth Warren lied about being part-Indian and then spends half a debate regretting he has to bring the issue up.

Worst of all, Scott Brown claims to be protecting our interests while all the while giving cover to the whackos and billionaires who assault our interests every day.

Scott Brown may be a nice guy, but as our Senator from Massachusetts he doesn’t deserve your vote; he deserves to be an ex-Senator.