TPM reports on a Boehner associate’s remarks on how dysfunctional the House GOP caucus is at the moment.
“Right now, Jesus himself couldn’t be the speaker and get 218 Republicans behind something, so I think Speaker Boehner is trying his best to come up with a plan that can get close to that,” said Rep. Patrick J. Tiberi (R-Ohio), a longtime Boehner ally. “Whatever we move, there will be critics everywhere, but at the end of the day we still have to govern.”
Clothe the naked? Feed the poor? Heal the sick? Suggest the rich could not squeeze into heaven anymore than a camel could thread the eye of a needle??
Jesus would not have a chance today. The GOP would have their talking heads on Faux Noise Nutwork 24×7 proclaiming him a Commie Socialist Marxist Fascist as soon as he opened his mouth.
Don’t believe me? Let’s look at what they had to say about Pope Francis, when he suggested the super wealthy might just want to think about the plight of rest of the 99% of humanity, and especially the poor.
Pope Francis has declared war on those who aspire to provide a better life for themselves and their families, expressing the misguided snobbery of a man for whom money has never been an issue.
In the first week of his papacy, when briefing the media, the pope exclaimed:
“Oh how I long for a poor Church for the poor!”
This statement is a perfect summary of Francis’ papacy, a primary theme of which has been a peculiar dislike of prosperity. His first major document, — “Evangelii Gaudium” — was a prime example of his disdain for those who are not content to soak in poverty or to submit to socialism.
In the document, Francis says that “the powerful feed on the powerless” in a free market economy, and that those who engage in the market become “incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor.” He says the “culture of prosperity deadens us.”
The pope’s snub of the struggle for prosperity is a typically derisive attitude toward the American quest for self-development, and an attitude that is often encountered among rich European liberals, or, in this case, clergymen who have not had to work to provide a better life for their families.
And Fox News Judge Napolitano lashed out at the Pope in a commentary. According to Napolitano, the Pope is DFH Marxist, apparently, who has no business telling the rich and the corporations how to run their business, or questioning their morality.
[He] attacks free-market capitalism because it takes too long for the poor to get rich. “They are still waiting,” the pope wrote. Without capitalism, which rewards hard work and sacrifice, they will wait forever. No economic system in history has alleviated more poverty, generated more opportunity and helped more formerly poor people become rich than capitalism. The essence of capitalism goes to the core of Catholic teaching: the personal freedom of every person. Capitalism is freedom to risk, freedom to work, freedom to save, freedom to retain the fruits of one’s labors, freedom to own property and freedom to give to charity.
NAPOLITANO: Pope Francis should be saving souls, not pocketbooks
The Pope has not snubbed the rich. He has rubbed their faces, and the faces of assholes like the author of the above Fox News post, in the simple fact that the super wealthy own a staggeringly unfair and disproportionate share of global wealth. There is no aspiring for the 99% to become part of the 1%. It is mathematically impossible. What the Pope is talking about is a fair share of the fruits of their labor for the poor and working class. Nothing more. Nothing less. Not much of an aspiration, but easily achievable.
Here is a video which went viral not too long ago on YouTube. It graphically illustrates what Americans think a fair distribution of wealth would be, what they think the actual distribution is, and then, what the reality is. And the difference is stunning. The grossly disproportionate share of wealth held by the top 21% of the population leaves them owning the vast majority of all wealth, with the majority of the population having virtually no real wealth or assets at all.
