Greetings from Sunny Soggy South Florida.  It’s been raining now for about the last eighteen hours, and the storm is still 4-6 hours out.  We’re told that we are fortunate that TS Nicole more closely resembles a monsoon (and we do believe that last part) as it carries the bulk of rain to the east, rather than having a more equal distribution.  As we are on the west side of the storm, we will only add another 4-8 inches to the 2-4 that we’ve already experienced.  Thrills, joy and rapture!  My street is already flooded, so the critters and I will be definitely trapped inside for awhile.  Thus far we have experienced no power outages, but I’m getting this done bright and early so as to take no chances.  FP&L (Florida Plunder and Loot) is none too famous for either equipment maintenance nor rapid restoration.

There has been a veritable political flurry ever since those shirt-sleeved stalwarts of the Republican Party have shared their rather amorphous “Pledge to America” with the masses.  Barack tells us to “Buck up” and Uncle Joe orders that we “stop whining”.  Jeebus, it gets harder and harder to tell them apart.  The Republicans swear that the Democrats are spending us into oblivion, completely glossing over the financial extravaganza of the 2000-2008 period.  They warn darkly that we could be “hit” by terrorists at any minute if the Dems remain in power, as they are “soft on terror”.    There is no answer given as to why they presided over enormous tax cuts that swelled the national debt to mammoth proportions, nor to the cracker jack concept of tax credits to American companies that take jobs overseas. They now announce that the Republicans alone have the secret to job creation.  (Maybe it’s the need for more child care workers once choice has been completely eliminated?)  About the ridiculously expensive – in both blood and treasure – invasion of the wrong damned country:  there is no longer even the feeble admission that “mistakes were made”.  Few of them will admit that the current sad state of affairs is not a Democratic creation.

The Democrats are not much better.  The Miracle-Worker-In-Chief has turned into The Emperor Has No Clothes.  Obama’s frequent early comparisons to FDR are a joke, as he has neither the capability nor the inclination to connect with the populace.  He appears to have forgotten that the Repubs fought FDR tooth and toenail when he attempted to introduce the New Deal.  FDR commenced his famous “Fireside Chats” which rallied voters in his behalf.  (The new “Backyard Chats” seem more like a droning lecture punctuated by occasional questions from the enthralled Peanut Gallery.) Obama has mentioned the outsourcing thing and has made modest note of the fact that the income gap has not been this large since the Gilded Age, but the Orator of 2008 seems to have become the Milquetoast of 2010.  He appears to have been underprepared for the country’s problems and managed to surround himself with an insular group of absolutely ineffectual advisors who cannot seem to separate the forest from those pesky trees.  Corporations have been taken to task, but with apparent immunity for  culpable individuals..He spent way too much precious time trying to compromise with people who were hoisting the black flag and preparing to take no prisoners.  The casualties are mounting:  increased foreclosures, expanding long-term unemployment, and a massive increase in the number of Americans subsisting below the poverty level.   Guantanamo?  Open for business.  Wiretaps?  Up and running.  DADT?  Still enforced.  Healthcare for all?  Well, sort of.  

So does the White House blame themselves or the Republican noise machine for its tumbling numbers?  Not at all – the problem, you see is ”a handful of liberal bloggers“.   They’re the entire problem, you see.  Well, that and the whiny Democrats who refuse to “buck up.”

The only thing that may (and I stress MAY) just save them is the poor quality of some Republican candidates.  (It’s the American dream – anyone can grow up and win a Republican nomination.)  The electorate is angry, unsettled and dissatisfied.  We have let the chances of a generation slip through our fingers.

This is an open thread.