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Jerry Berggren

Going Deaf in an Echo Chamber

by Jerry BerggrenFebruary 19, 2010
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Yesterday, Joseph Stack intentionally crashed a small airplane into the IRS offices in Austin, TX.
The left-leaning media and blog-o-sphere has made every attempt to link Mr. Stack to the Tea Party movement, but finding no evidence (one wonders if they even looked for any), conjecture of a link filled their news stories. The Washington Post,  [...]

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What is the Tea Party?

by Jerry BerggrenFebruary 17, 2010
Tea Party

Friday is the anniversary of Mr. Santelli’s call.
A year later, the Tea Party movement is still rather amorphous. So what is the Tea Party?
On February 19, 2009 Rick Santelli of CNBC called for a Chicago Tea Party as a protest to the Obama administration’s plans to prop up people unable to afford their mortgages.
A [...]

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Channeling Pat Robertson

by Jerry BerggrenFebruary 8, 2010
Hell Frozen Over

WARNING: This post is not overtly about political things. This post is about the Super Bowl, the snowstorm in the Mid-Atlantic states, and a conversation I had with my father when I was but just a boy. Ultimately, though, this post is a prophecy. A prophecy about the end of the world.
In the sense of [...]

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Political campaigns running away from establishment like never before.

by Jerry BerggrenFebruary 2, 2010

It’s Groundhog Day and I feel like I’ve been here before.
The odds of the Democratic caucus retaining their 59 seats in the U.S. Senate is about 10% according to the guys at fivethirtyeight.com. They are now estimating 53 or 54 seat Democratic Caucus. But there is also an undercurrent of state Tea Party movements pushing [...]

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Robert Menendez thinks he’s soooo clever.

by Jerry BerggrenJanuary 27, 2010

Robert Menendez (D-NJ), chair of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee thinks he’s come up with a strategy to cause Republicans to fight amongst themselves. According to Politico,
Menendez and his staff will distribute a memo Tuesday advising Democratic campaign managers to frame their opponents early — and to drive a wedge between moderate voters and tea-party-style [...]

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SCOTUS says Corporations have Unalienable Rights

by Jerry BerggrenJanuary 25, 2010

Back in September, I posted an article about the Supreme Court case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission to assess the limits on speech imposed on corporations and unions by the McCain-Feingold Act. The Supreme Court has now ruled on that case in favor of Citizens United, and in a sweeping change in campaign finance [...]

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On the verge of realignment

by Jerry BerggrenOctober 28, 2009

There is a major political realignment underway in this country.  Thanks for this political shift are due to our elected leaders’ actions going all the way back to March 2008 when Bear Stearns was sold to Morgan Stanley for pennies on the dollar.
The fiscally irresponsible actions of Republicans and democrats has been under a magnifying [...]

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Insurance companies have limited anti-trust protections – as they should

by Jerry BerggrenOctober 15, 2009

I always get a little nervous when Sen. Charles Schumer of New York starts speaking about the need for increased competition.  He came out yesterday on every news and news-like outlet available to him supporting the repeal of the limited anti-trust protection insurance companies have under federal law.  I looked into this, talking with people [...]

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WWAHD – What Would Alexander Hamilton Do?

by Jerry BerggrenOctober 9, 2009

This post was inspired by Laura Bramble’s post on Alexander Hamilton.
The governors of the the 50 states have been reduced to lobbyists.
In a Washington Post article about the health care reform legislation, Medicaid financing is becoming a major issue for governors.  While most Democrat governors are generally supportive of Congress’ health care reform efforts, they [...]

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The Schizophrenic Politics of Alan Grayson

by Jerry BerggrenOctober 2, 2009

Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) has become something of a folk hero among Democrats for describing the Republican’s two point Health Reform plan as “don’t get sick” and “die quickly.” Mr. Grayson is an ardent supporter of the House’s version of health care reform, HR3200, and based on his support for the “public option,” we can [...]

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Welcome to the New Americka?

by Jerry BerggrenSeptember 23, 2009
The New America

If you have ever needed an example of what happens when government is involved in the market, we have had the luxury of seeing a number of examples of the predictable devolution of our representative democracy to that of thugocracy in just the past few months.
The firing of executives of GM by the Obama administration, [...]

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