Bachmann’s Comments Embarrass

Susan Rego, St. Michael
Letter to the Editor
St. Cloud Times
April 30, 2012

She blamed the home mortgage crisis on minorities. She trumpeted an accusation that a vaccination [against HPV] caused mental retardation. She claimed that Iran has plans for turning a divided Iraq into a training ground for terrorists. She bragged that if she were president, we wouldn’t have an embassy in Iran. (We haven’t, since 1979.)

She wanted the media to look for “anti-American” members of Congress. She recommended eliminating the minimum wage because it would wipe out unemployment. She drew a connection between swine flu during the terms of two Democratic presidents — Obama and Carter — until she learned that the 1970s swine flu was during the term of President Ford, a Republican.

She credited our nation’s founders for battling “tirelessly until slavery was no more.” Eight of the first ten presidents owned slaves, and it took nearly 90 years, the last five the bloodiest in history, to end that institution.

Of 53 statements checked by Politifact, 49 percent of hers were determined just plain false and 23 percent got their “Pants on Fire” rating. …

Rep. Michele Bachmann, go home. Go home to Iowa, or to your golf course mansion in the Fourth Congressional District. Just go home and stop being an embarrassment to the people of the Sixth District.

The Minnesota Independent

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Related interest

The Top 10 Craziest Things Michele Bachmann Has Ever Said

Click through for a look at Powerwall and Business Insider’s compilation of Michele Bachmann’s most controversial statements and blunders.

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5/21/2012 Update

Real leadership

What can we, as Americans do together?

That question is the element that’s missing from today’s leadership.

By Tom Horner and Tim Penny

May 19, 2012

Excerpts

As we head into summer’s trifecta of national holidays — Memorial Day, Independence Day and Labor Day — politicians are readying their speeches to graduating students, patriotic picnickers and political rallies.

Almost certainly, the speakers will remind us that our nation became great — and our freedoms protected — because throughout our country’s history each generation shared a vision of a future that is better than today. And, as a nation, earlier generations were willing to pay the price for progress.

These speeches will predictably praise an America that used to do big things. Audiences will be reminded that Social Security and Medicare were created to provide a safety net for the elderly.

Some politicians will speak of leaders who shaped a bold future by building a national network of highways and launching a program to place a man on the moon. Many will highlight how we started on the path toward a more fair society with the Civil Rights Act.

Missing from most speeches, though, will be the attribute that also is most absent in public policy today. Americans in previous generations didn’t just do big things, they did them with a commitment to shared sacrifice for the common good.

Social Security didn’t pay out benefits until a payroll tax was in place. The Highway Trust Fund — created in 1956 to pay for interstate highway construction — was financed with a dedicated gas tax. President John Kennedy didn’t just articulate the goal of landing a man on the moon; he committed his personal prestige to funding the program.

Shared sacrifice created common ground. Each of these achievements, along with issues as contentious as the 1965 Civil Rights Act, won bipartisan support in Congress. Our country is at its greatest when bold rhetoric is backed by courageous and responsible leadership that unites rather than divides us. …

Look at the reality of leadership today. Congress ignores the exploding costs of Social Security and Medicare. They politicize the debate instead of offering solutions that would make these programs sustainable for the long-term.

Today’s Congress can’t muster the votes to reauthorize a highway bill, even though roads and bridges are crumbling, because too many politicians fear the political consequences of voting for tax increases.

America’s health system is in crisis, but the solutions offered by Democrats, Republicans and their allied interest groups have little to do with the real and necessary changes that could lower the cost of health care for all.

Today’s leaders … not only can’t find common ground … they polarize the debate further, leaving no room for constructive dialogue about a sensible solution. …

Politicians’ behavior serves only one purpose. It helps them keep their jobs without doing their job.

The solution starts with “we the people.” If we want better leaders, all of us need to be better voters and citizens. That begins by asking ourselves — and every candidate we encounter — two questions.

• On the big issues of the day (fiscal responsibility, entitlement reform, infrastructure needs and immigration) where will you find common ground with those in other parties?

• On what major issue do you disagree with your own party and its interest groups? …

To move ahead as a nation, and to secure a better future for our children and grandchildren, we must move toward common ground by holding ourselves and our political candidates to a higher standard.

Tom Horner is a public-affairs consultant and was chief of staff to former U.S. Sen. Dave Durenberger, R-Minn. Tim Penny is president and CEO of the Southern Minnesota Initiative Foundation and is a former Democratic member of Congress. Both are former Independence Party candidates for governor.

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