OKLAHOMA OK? PART I

Two months ago, probably 95 percent of Americans could not have correctly answered "who is Tom Coburn?"

Today, that number is probably 90 to 92 percent. Remember, we are asking folks to identify a United States Senator. These are everyday American citizens, roughly a third of whom couldn't find the U.S. on an outline map.

The hypothetical drop from the mid to low-nineties no doubt stems from the recent attention Coburn has garnered in which he has a) been involved in trying to both end, as well as cover up, the sexual affair by fellow Republican Senator John Ensign; and b) made an insensitive comment to Judge Sonia Sotomayor during the judiciary committee hearings on her Supreme Court nomination.

A little background is in order. Coburn is an Oklahoma physician from Muskogee who was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1994, served three terms, stepped down, resurfaced and then was elected the Sooner State's junior U.S. Senator in 2004. The senior senator is James Mountain Inhofe. Coburn and Inhofe combined have an intelligence capacity that maybe hits three figures. Certainly the two of them are leading the parade of fruitcakes who make up the ultra-right wing of the Republican Party. Today's post is a look at Coburn. The next will be a look at Inhofe.

Let's begin by considering Coburn's role as a medical doctor. I thought Bill Frisk, the GOP senator from Tennessee was the dumbest schmuck to ever be licensed to practice medicine. Remember back in the Terri Schivo days when he said looking at footage of her on TV had pretty much convinced him she still was functional? He also once said he didn't know if HIV could be transmitted through sweat!

When Coburn first came to the Senate there was a full court press by the Republicans who then controlled both houses of Congress and the Bush II Administration, to dramatically restrict class action, mass torts lawsuits. Needing some kind of "expert testimony" to support their arguments, Coburn was asked to give his medical opinion on one example of medical procedures where the so-called evidence countered the argument in favor of the lawsuits. He selected the issue of breast implants and said "there's no science that shows that silicone breast implants are detrimental and in fact, they make you healthier."

Tom Terrific apparently missed the part over 10 years earlier where silicone breast implants were banned in this country because of their history of rupturing and spilling toxic fluids into women’s bodies.

A few years ago, there was overwhelming bipartisan support to ease unfair restrictions on credit card holders and the bill was headed to the President's desk for signing. At the last minute, Coburn tried to attach an amendment which would allow people to carry concealed weapons into National Parks.

I always thought that the role of the doctor was to tend to the sick and injured, promote health and generally protect the living. Coburn sees it differently and in fact has called for the execution of persons associated with performing abortions.

The range of his absurdity is very broad. He has complained that girls’ bathrooms in Oklahoma are bastions of lesbianism. How and why Oklahoma ladies rooms are afflicted with this problem is unclear.

Coburn is the epitome of homophobia and has railed, screamed and voted against every measure on gay rights, funding for HIV/AIDS and even condom distribution and use.

He once said, at a Republican political meeting according to the online magazine Salon.com, that “the gay community has infiltrated the very centers of power in every area across this country, and they wield extreme power. [The gay] agenda is the greatest threat to our freedom that we face today.”

He's probably right. Thanks to his bathroom warning, lesbians have been flocking in droves to Oklahoma.

Coburn and his staff once hosted an event in Washington for young aides and pages to preach about the evils of sex with multiple partners highlighted with a slide show illustrating genital infections from various STDs.

He also opposes a national recognition of environmental pioneer Rachel Carson's birthday and raised hell when the film classic "Schindler's List" was to be aired on television because it had scenes of "frontal nudity." Those damn Nazis. Why didn't they have the decency to let those people keep their clothes on when convincing them they were just taking a shower instead of being herded into gas chambers?

Coburn's most recent example of outlandish behavior came last week when in response to a comment made by Sonia Sotomayor on the Second Amendment, Coburn said she would have "some 'splainning' to do" a famous line uttered by Desi Arnez, the late Cuban musician and actor in the "I Love Lucy" television series. Anybody over 35 knew Coburn's intent was to mock Sotomayor's Hispanic heritage.

But his best move in all this time has been both his cover up and advocate bribery in the John Ensign matter. Coburn knew about Ensign's sexual fling for well over a year, yet worked hard to help keep it a secret. After all, Ensign is not only a fellow Republican, but also another born-againer and lives with Coburn in that strange world of the Family, the C Street boys in Washington who pray (and "lay") together.

It was Coburn who came up with the idea of Ensign's super rich father paying nearly $100 thousand to the mistress and her husband to keep them quiet.

In the end, Coburn may be lacking any real seniority in the Senate and is still Oklahoma's junior senator. What he is not lacking is a pattern of very frightening behavior and positions on the issues which are a threat to every American if it ever becomes policy or law.

Coburn is the perfect physician to "heal thyself."

RIGHT-WING RANTS AGAINST SOTOMAYOR; STORMY GETS SERIOUS

Earlier this week, President Obama was still addressing the media and others with Judge Sonia Sotomayor at his side. Before the two could even walk off stage, the right wing lunatics were already screaming about her being nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court.

You'd have to stay reading this until the Fourth of July if I were to detail every crackpot utterance made by these people over the past few days. As in all cases like this, there are some which are so outrageous that they deserve repeating. Doing so convinces anyone with a clear head and a modicum of sensibility that the Republicans, namely the crazies who currently monopolize the party, are on a fast track to third party status. The Sotomayor matter is just another pathetic situation in which the right wingers find themselves. The vast majority of Americans have already pinned the economic crisis squarely on their over-inflated chests and letting Cheney, Limbaugh and Gingrich roll out into the spotlight has been nothing short of a disaster. Could we be witnessing the very early phases of persons like Colin Powell starting to wrestle back control of the party? Or will he and other moderate Republicans jump ship and become Democrats or, perhaps, sign up with the Independence Party so that in another decade that becomes the second major party in America.

Back to Sotomayor. Where to begin on all of the stupid comments made about her and the nomination is not easy. Just when we think we heard the dumbest (and most entertaining) comment possible, another one comes right behind it. And it's only three days since she was nominated!

OK, here goes:

Up until a couple of days ago, I never heard of Mark Krikorian who works for the right-wing Center for Immigration Studies. In a blog a couple of days ago, Krikorian bitched about the “unnatural pronunciation” of Sotomayor’s name. He said "deferring to people’s own pronunciation of their names should obviously be our first inclination, but there ought to be limits. Putting the emphasis on the final syllable of Sotomayor is unnatural in English."

As I said, I didn't know who Krikorian was. Now I do, thanks to his blatant ignorance.

Then there is Karl Rove, who said in referring to Sotomayor’s earning her undergraduate degree from Princeton and her J.D from the Yale Law School that he wasn't that impressed because "I know some rather dumb people who went to Ivy League schools." No shit, Sherlock! You must be referring to the dumb-ass you worked for when he was Governor of Texas and then the President of the United States!!

Speaking of the Ivies, several conservatives tied her attending Princeton and Yale to getting an education at two of the citadels of liberalism. Hmm, that's interesting. There's this guy named Samuel Alito (I think he presently sits on the Supreme Court and is viewed as a conservative jurist) and if I remember correctly, he is an alum of Princeton and Yale Law School. Oh well, never let those things get in the way of good ol' mud slinging.

Then there is our old, dumb-as-a-bag-of-hair friend, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Oklahoma.) Just to make certain he wasn't left out when it came to idiotic Republican reactions to the nomination, he sent out a statement indicating he feared that Judge Sotomayor would be unable to prove her legal decisions have not been based upon her race and gender. Inhofe said the Senate will "weigh her qualifications and character as well as her ability to rule fairly without undo influence from her own race or gender."

Let's return to Justice Alito. Back in 2006 during his confirmation hearing he remarked, "Because when a case comes before me involving, let's say, someone who is an immigrant -- and we get an awful lot of immigration cases and naturalization cases -- I can't help but think of my own ancestors, because it wasn't that long ago when they were in that position.

"When I get a case about discrimination, I have to think about people in my own family who suffered discrimination because of their ethnic background or because of religion or because of gender. And I do take that into account."

OK, enough of that. If you can't hang her on where she went to school and on her referencing of her ethnic makeup and that' she's a woman, how about that she is a racist.

Who better to make that charge than former U. S. Congressman Tom Tancredo, a Republican from Colorado. This schmuck made a career whining about immigration (by Hispanics, not Europeans or people fleeing the Muslim Mideast.) It turns out Sotomayor is a member of the National Council of La Raza, a l national organization that is "the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States." Appearing on CNN to lambaste Sotomayor for belonging to a group whose name would translate as "The Race," Tancredo made the false claim that La Raza has the motto, "All for the race, nothing for the rest," and bashed it as being "a Latino KKK without the hoods or the nooses."

To add to the piling on, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC (ALIPAC) accused her of belonging to "a racist organization called 'The Race.'" Said ALIPAC president William Gheen: "The US Supreme Court is no place for brown or Hispanic supremacists like Sonia Sotomayor."

Damn right! Only white, male supremacists can sit on our Supreme Court!

All this reminds me of something Harry Truman once said:

"I remember when I first came to Washington. For the first six months you wonder how the hell you ever got here. For the next six months you wonder how the hell the rest of them ever got here."

Enough of all this nastiness. Let's turn to something more serene, gentle and pure....like Stormy Daniels' candidacy for the U.S. Senate from Louisiana. A week ago Thursday, she announced the formation of an exploratory committee to look into the possibility of her running against
"Diaper Dave" Vitter, the hooker-loving incumbent.

An exploratory committee is always a sign someone is serious. Heretofore, Stormy, when she wasn't performing exotic dances at some of the more popular clubs in Louisiana, was simply on "a listening tour." The step from a listening tour to an exploratory committee means things could get really interesting.

I hope by next week to have more details to post. In fact, I am going to push for some direct quotes from Stormy herself. After all, I am the self-appointed chair of Minnesotans for Stormy.