A small contingent of Baja Arizona Kossacks attended yesterday's debate among the candidates for the House in Arizona's 7th Congressional District. I was among them. We left early.
We here on the Daily Kos are used to a different ethos from that of the society at large. We are expected to be able to back up everything we say with a link or an authoritative quote. We know before we post that any assertions we make are likely to be challenged and we come prepared. This is not the case with Tea Baggers and Libertarians. The bullshit from the Right was flying so fast and furious last night that we just couldn't take it. We bugged out halfway through. The coverage below will be mostly from the local paper whose reporters are paid for their work and must sit through it all.
The debate took place in the cafeteria of a local community college and was sponsored by the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. The candidates were the incumbent Democrat Raul Grijalva , Republican Ruth McClung, a Libertarian named George Keane and independent Harley Meyer.
The Kossack contingent, that'd be rasbobbo, DaNang65 and your humble narrator, arrived early to show support for Grijalva who is not only a DKos favorite but our congressman as well. We wanted to make sure that there were at least as many of us as there were Tea Baggers. Judging from the numbers milling around outside before the debate and the applause and noise inside the hall, I do believe we had them outnumbered.
The format was tightly moderated, equal time for all. This in itself presents a problem since it means that 75% of the total time goes to nut-jobs of various kinds while the reality-based candidate gets only 25%.
The first question was, predictably, on immigration. The Congressman got first crack at it and laid out a common-sense comprehensive approach. So far so good. The next question was about jobs and the economy and this was the one where the Republican and Libertarian responses maxed-out our bullshit meters and drove us from the hall.
I don't know what it is about "tax cuts" that resonates so strongly with low-information voters but it is always touted by their mythology-based candidates as the solution to everything. My theory is that Wingnut knows that he can't do anything about the price of a gallon of gas or milk, but he sees a chance to better his situation by paying less in taxes, even though his tax "burden" is pretty damned low in the first place.
The Libertarian claimed that companies are paying "half of their revenues in taxes". This is a meme that's been floating around the Libertarian loonasphere and I don't see how they can repeat it with a straight face. Half of their gross revenue ? That's insane. You can see why we wished we could have asked him to provide a link for that one. Of course it's a debate, not a DKos comment thread so no one can call him on it.
The mainstream media has been promoting the notion that the current crop of empty-headed GOP women candidates represents something new. Don't you believe it. Behind the poor grammar and goofy talking points these Ditzy Chicks promise the same discredited "free-market" policies that have nearly destroyed our country. Case in point: Ruth McClung. Her proposals for jobs and the economy ? You guessed it, tax-cuts and deregulation.
How's this for unintended irony:
We cannot continue in the same failed policies of the past 10 years.
Uhhh, Ruth, the "failed policies of the past 10 years" HAVE BEEN REPUBLICAN POLICIES. It's the irresponsible tax-cuts and reckless deregulation that got us into this mess in the first place. Not only that, but your opponent has been one of the few progressive voices courageously speaking out against this Friedmanite hooey the whole time. Yet they still believe. She got hoots and applause from her supporters for this crap. Me ? I couldn't listen to it anymore. This is where we decided to split before we forgot our manners and began to shout: "You lie." A person can only stand so much stupidity.
There was one exchange that I kinda' wish we'd stuck around for so we could hoot and holler like a 'bagger. Ruth McClung has a B.S. in physics and promotes herself as a "rocket scientist", but she's kind of coy about where she works. If you go to her website (No, I will not link it.) You'll learn that she works at "a local engineering firm". That's cool, solar energy perhaps, rainwater harvesting ? No, the local engineering firm is actually Raytheon a huge defense contractor, a member in good standing of the MIC and a company whose revenues come almost exclusively from the US Government. I'll let Raul take it from here:
Raytheon gets $110 billion in federal contracts, most of them non-competitive, for the last 10 years, $110 billion. Whether she wants to admit it or not, her paycheck is coming from the same source as that third-grade teacher's paycheck from the taxpayers.
I'd be willing to bet that McClung makes more than the teacher does too.
So there it is, what we saw at the CD-07 debate, and what we didn't have the stomach to stick around for. Here's another link to the Grijalva campaign, do what you can and wish us luck.