that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the rich straight white guy, by the rich straight white guy, for the rich straight white guy, shall not perish from the earth.

Meet your new Congressional Committee Chairmen!

 From this mornings Huffpo : "First, the top contenders are all men. Nearly all are white. Most have deep ties to the business community or the industries they will soon oversee. Some have former staffers who now work in the lobbying world and could seek influence before their committees. And many have gotten the lion's share of their campaign monies the past two election cycles from special interest political action committees." ( the rest )

• #2 is the walking pile of horse shit that apologized so eloquently to BP for us being so mean to them , making them clean up the gulf. Yeah, he will be in charge of regulating big oil

• #5 is gazillionair Darrell Issa, who will chair the house committee on oversite. Remember the FUN that WHITEWATER was? Well get ready folks, it's coming back to you over the next two years : Obamagate, double live, two.

From some horrible thing called Fox Nation we get : GOP's First 4 Potential Investigations of Obama, ( stop what you are doing and read this one, really )

• #6 is the real Amityville horror, Peter King, who, please Buddha, New York can get rid of with re-districting
• #12 Isn't Paul Ryan's hair ever so dreamy!?!  Be distracted by it as he tries to take away any social safety net in the country. 

Ten Dollar Republicans

Still a little shell shocked after last night - earthquake tsunamis will do that to you.

So, I am online right after the new speaker had dried his last tear, and start chatting with a most dear friend in Atlanta. She was pretty darn happy about the outcome for the most part.... " less government / Washington Bad ", you know the spiel by now.  As a rule, I am water off a ducks back when it comes to folks back home who cling to their god and guns and tea parties.... cause #1, wtf are you gonna do about it, and #2, I live in the deepest darkest blue state there is. But still wet from the tsunami, I got a little combative, well, as combative as you can get typing on the facebook . "Ding, dong that Pelosi witch is dead" sang my pal, all aglow in the prospects of the trickle down to come.

She knew to fuzzily hate Speaker Pelosi, for sure, but had never heard of Marco Rubio from a bordering state. I just innocently asked what was one program, one anything at all that the YOUNG GUNS could cut from that mass of Washington waste that would make her happy. She was not exactly sure, but the ONE THING that she was the most happy about was that she and her libertarian/GOP pals had killed, their most prized dead deer on the hood of their metaphorical pick up trucks of election day 2010 : They had stopped the state of Georgia from tacking on a TEN DOLLAR fee to the annual tag tax/fee to go towards TRAUMA CARE CENTER FUNDING. Fucking emergency rooms, people!

LONG a thorn in my side when a resident of Fulton County was the fact that the rest of the state got to bemoan and lock their car doors while in the City of Atlanta, but little lily white Tiffany-Ann up in the ring of outer burbs gets a severe burn or horrible trauma, their ass in helicoptered to downtown Atlanta's Grady Hospital, one of the best trauma centers there is ( lots of practice..) BUT hell would freeze over before a penny of that " some of my best friends are..... " tax dollar would go to pay for Grady . So this just set me off, to no avail. She was sticking to her guns , " I already pay too much in taxes! "

 Now, I know that my friend is a very good person at heart and the whole conversation just got sort of filed away in the haze of all those RED states on the front page of the NYT, until I read a conversation chain from some other pals in Ga , again, on the facebook ( it IS 2010...). Some rather timid pals as it turns out, but again, water off a ducks back. So a googling I went for a background and insight into GEORGIA AMENDMENT 2 : Trauma Care Funding.

Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended so as to impose an annual $10.00 trauma charge on certain motor vehicles in this state for the purpose of funding trauma care?
(__) Yes 
(__) No


That is it, the entire amendment. No legalise, no wherefores of parties of the second parts, just hey " ten bucks out of your entire year to C.Y.A. for WHEN you or someone you love needs a fully functioning emergency room close by" Seriously. 

Had the Amendment passed it would have raised 80+ million to fund these centers. From the AJC : "Those who voted against the trauma care plan said Georgians can't afford more government fees and taxes, and that the private sector should fill any gaps in these health services.Heather Buell, 34, a Canton accountant, isn't convinced the extra money would save lives, and she doesn't believe the state should pay for these centers. Noting that many of the state's existing trauma centers are in metro Atlanta, she said metro residents should not be burdened with paying for a lack of trauma centers in south Georgia.
"We already send our money to educate their kids, we don't need to fund their health care," Buell said. ( the rest )

I SO DON'T GET IT.

GOP glee as that poor family in Tennessee watched their house go up in flames because they forgot to pay the 75 dollar fee to the fire dept. All those happy smiling faces on the tv today, overjoyed at the fact that they are now in a position to give all power back to the BIG insurance companies for your health care. Orgasmic that the Koch Brothers will pay a little bit less of their billions in taxes. 

10 dollars out of your pocket, once a year , to save your kids life. Yeah, good job at taking our country back, fella's. What is wrong with you people ??!?

UPDATE from this mornings AJC

" my teabagger's crazier than your teabagger, my teabaggers crazier than yours...."

and in reality, for those not living in the Empire State, he is more..." batty", than you can tell from this little clip. Here is the scary part:

ALL of truly Western New York- where he is from - voted for this fool.
full interactive map from the NYT.

CHOP

I was just crispy, burned burned burned out... dreading what was coming. So , close your eyes and think of England: My dinner with a young Henry Tudor, for
four hours.

Neil was watching with me , but was on his computer and getting his little tweet/twats/twats on his phone. " Really, don't tell me anything at all ". I broke the rule at 8:09 when out Governors race was called. Then he let me know that Christine O'Donnell had lost......... Randy King, Randy King, France..... Four hours into it, I gave in. Did NOT watch any of the hysterics on the tv, namely because being all in a hair shirt Thomas Moore mood , I would have watched Fox News just for the self flagellation, "Mea Culpa public, Mea Culpa....."

I LOVE THE NEW YORK TIMES

Up here in my little cubby of an office, alone, calm, I snuck on, really to check my own house race which was never really in question, my guy was going to lose. No real feel for a Democrat down in the Southern Tier after Mr. Tickle me Elmo. BIG BIG win for GLBT New Yorkers, yet again, all the state wide forces that be , who were VERY pro Same Sex Marriage won. Have not figured out the state senate  yet to see if some real action can be taken.

The NYT lets you go into ever district or county in the entire country, in real time. Tried as I might to say away, the Siren call of political numbers was just too much. 

It's late, three Senate seats still up in the air, but I am going to bed. Much more in depth tomorrow, if only for me to work this out. No doubt at all that it was a terrible horrible, no good , very bad day for the Democrats, but it was NOT scorched and salted earth..... A couple of tea bag crazies slipped in, some big ones did  not. 

We are alive to fight another day.

calm before the storm

Beautiful day in the greater Mendon area

The lovely long Dahlia season came to a 

abrupt end, a killing frost, but still

we had them all the way until 

late October.

Did my part.... voted for Governor on 

the Working Families line, not 

Democrat, because cute Matt

Damon asked me too

The view from my polling place

Eve of Destruction

Number One : Calm Down. Really.

Number Two: join me in my 24 hour news black out, again, really. Just don't do it, don't do the gnashing and whaling. Have a nice glass of wine, read a book, plan your Thanksgiving menu. I am going to be spending the night lost in Sixteenth Century England.

Number Three: Look how hard it was for the GOOD GUYS to get what they did get passed, passed with the freaking super majority, the EVIL GUYS will not be able to   do anything other than be a bur in the saddle of the country for a couple of years. Yes, it is looking like we may have to deal with Senator Angle for six years, ( hopefully not ) but if we do, then fine. We will make her tin foil hat wearing , anti science self the poster girl of the GOP. " You want more of this nuttbaggery ??", elect more of these fools. The white male dinosaurs of the GOP will over reach, it's what they do....

GLBTQQIA America has a little bit to fear ... there are some BIG time gay haters coming up the pike. " all about lower taxes and less government " except when it comes to a woman's right to choose or for me to be a full citizen of the United States..... but, the tide of history is still against them. New York is going to elect a VERY pro gay Governor, and hopefully a few less theocrats to the State Senate, so could be an upswing here..

Yes, in a couple of days, I will dive into the full blown world of Nate Silver and just roll around in some post election numbers, who did , who didn't , who should not have, what have we learned and how can we please, please, please get Sarah Palin to be in Iowa in January of 2012....

" you are our last hope, Obi-Wan "

KARMA

In a little dose of karma for what is going to happen tonight, the San Francisco Values crowd took the Happy Texas right wing Bushies down in 5 games.

Buster and Brian, I love this photo, one more millisecond

and Buster is air born,  you can just tell..

I don't think we are in Kansas Dallas any more: