Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Fine Mitterature

Mitt Romney loves the Twilight books.

I guess his only real advantage on Palin now is literacy.

MORON-FIREBREAK!!!!

Oh please let them be like matter-antimatter.

Westboro Baptist Church vs. KKK



You say "let's hope they both lose" but really, look at the individual membership, they both already have.

I would like to see

The Venn Diagram of those who took the "Weiner-weiner" pic as being legitimate with those who thought the Onion's article about Planned Parenthood's $8 billion Abortion-Dome was also legitimate.

I bet it's pretty overlapping.

And speaking of overlapping, I've done the kerning of the pic in question with the photo analysis I perfected over various junk-shots sent to Jenn Sterger (as opposed to those sent by BP) and it reveals the following "Breitbart" influences (it's all in the kerning people!)

Meanwhile, there hasn't been a clear night here for it seems like months

I suppose there are cooler places on earth than mountains with large telescopes on them, but they still make for great videos...and I imagine this is really good with pot.

The Traumatic Duo

Oh how lucky for the citizenry involved a fantastic pair of federal and local officials not caring!

Today on CBS’ Face the Nation Cantor doubled down on using the tornado victims as political hostages for spending cuts to clean energy. He compared the situation to that of a family facing an unexpected expenditure.


Eric Cantor apparently comes from the kind of family that will not spend the money to get their dog spayed only to later go on to drown the resulting puppies. Sure it is somewhat motivated by being cheap and short-sited, but mostly for the thrill of possibly killing puppies.

Cantor has a kindred spirit in a small Alabama town of Cordova devastated by a recent tornado:

A mayor in a small town devastated by a tornado has sparked outrage over his refusal to let homeless residents stay in trailers provided by the Federal Emergency Management Agency...

Mr Scott, however, has heard all the complaints but is unrepentant.

He said: 'I don't feel guilty. I can look anyone in the eye.'


So residents who lost their homes are out-of-luck, but the Mayor and city officials? They get to use the same, otherwise banned trailers.

Mr Scott defended that decision by saying the city can use small trailers because it is for the common good.


As opposed to unfortunate citizens getting a roof over their head. I guess it's the "Trent Lott's Porch Doctrine".

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Monday, May 30, 2011

Sunset Tonight at 19:19

A little over two hours to ManhattanHenge!

Photos here.

Time for another teleprompter joke...

She's still writing shit on her hand because she is incapable of saying nice things off the cuff.



Enlargement and story found at Oliver Willis

Well, that's good to know

Who could have anticipated!?

Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is not fully prepared for heavy rain and winds of a typhoon heading towards the country, officials admit.

Memorial Day

Remember to say bromides about "protecting our freedoms" appropriately -- in, uh, Afghanistan.

KABUL, Afghanistan, May 27 (UPI) -- Improvised explosive device blasts in southern Afghanistan killed eight U.S. troops in one of the worst such attacks on record, military officials said.


And...

A NATO airstrike targeting insurgents inadvertently hit two civilian homes in the volatile southwestern Helmand province, killing 12 children and two women, an Afghan government official said Sunday...

He said NATO hit two civilian houses, killing five girls, seven boys and two women.


And about those "freedoms":

US President Barack Obama approved the four-year extension of the Patriot Act on Thursday, May 26, 2011, while on his Europe tour.


Why fight to protect "freedom" -- no matter whether the place is irrelevant or outdated -- when you are so willing to sign them away?

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Below the belt

Andrew Breitbart is now using internet hacking to try to show Democrats private parts?

...obsessive about much there beardy?

And you'd think if he's going to post fake pictures of Democrats' packages he'd make them less endowed, after all, only Republicans can be big pricks.

Yeah, that Barcelona was pretty good yesterday

At "the Soccer" -- a match-up that pitted the two best teams in the world was pretty much the other football equivalent of a Super Bowl rout...but what does it really matter, when Stevenage won promotion to the English League One by beating the hometown of Basil Fawlty.

Memorial Cloud Taunting

Apparently Grampy McCain is on a Sunday Talk Show -- how very rare.

Saturday, May 28, 2011

Let's not even pretend

If this ruling is upheld (and 5 to 4 it will be) then say goodbye to even pretending we're not a kleptocracy.

A U.S. judge has ruled that the campaign finance law banning corporations from making contributions to federal candidates is unconstitutional, saying that a recent Supreme Court decision gives companies the same right to donate as individual citizens enjoy.

"Anyone not in a hover-round!"

Florida Governor Lex Luthor is determined to get even less popular.

Many in the community would likely not be plehttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifased with Scott’s cuts, but those voices remained unheard — mainly because they were banned. Declaring the town square event to be “private,” Scott’s staffers had Sumter County sheriff’s deputies remove Democrats and those with “liberal-looking pins and buttons” from the event

Friday, May 27, 2011

From the Department of Unintended Consequences

You're the conservative prime minister of AusterityLand.

You engineer a photo op for your spouse with the extremely popular spouse of the American president.

Grasping for a "Jus' Folks" vibe, your people pose the ladies in the kitchen.

That sacred underwear must be too tight

I can understand pranks that are witty, but this just seems -- like so much about Mittens Romney -- not all mean or anything, just really really lame. Sending leftover pizza to a political opponent?

Unless there was a horse-head inside the box, what was the point really?

Happy Centennial Happy Warrior


Rick Perlstein's fine remembrance of Hubert Humphrey.

Humphrey made his national political debut in 1948 when, as mayor of Minneapolis and a candidate for Senate, he headed the Minnesota delegation to the Democratic National Convention. There he led a faction insisting the platform include a federal fair employment commission, a controversial goal of the civil rights movement.

Segregationist Southerners threatened to walk out, a move that could have paralyzed the entire fragile Democratic coalition and handed the White House to the Republicans. The Democrats’ first presidential defeat in 16 years might have been laid at the feet of this ambitious 37-year-old.

Humphrey could have been excused for quietly backing down. Instead, the man who had earned the nickname the Happy Warrior gave one of the greatest speeches in American political history.

“To those who say this civil rights program is an infringement on states’ rights,” he thundered from the convention podium, “I say this: The time has arrived in America for the Democratic Party to get out of the shadow of states’ rights and to walk forthrightly into the bright sunshine of human rights.”

The motion carried. The Southerners walked out and ran Strom Thurmond for president. When Harry S. Truman won nonetheless, Democrats were on their way to becoming the party of civil rights. Hubert Humphrey catalyzed that change.

Our Villagers and their enrapturing

The cocoon of the Beltway is amazing. In this country you would think Republicans had exchanged their self-proclaimed patriotism in exchange for a tiny Israeli flag.

But in the nation that is the object of their affections...

More evidence that Israel derangement syndrome is a malady among the American political class and a narrow sliver of the AIPAC elite, but that most Israelis and most American Jews are far more pragmatic and humane.

57 % of Israelis support Barack Obama’s speech on Middle East peace, and are critical of that of Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

Shot to the Heart (BLAM BLAM BLAM!!!)

And Paul Ryan's to blame:

It's clear the guy makes Cheney's heart go pitter-patter.

...only metaphorically of course.


You can literally see him adjust his colostomy bag in excitement -- get the bile moving!

Take us at our word, not our bombing runs

According to the Guardian:

David Cameron has been told by UK intelligence that Muammar Gaddafi is increasingly paranoid, on the run, and hiding in hospitals by night with senior commanders in the regime unable to communicate with one another.


It's almost as if people are trying to kill him and his family by bombing their various places of residence.

But seriously, we're expected to believe that hiding in a hospital alone makes Gaddafi more crazy or malevolent when NATO's explanation for deploying Apache Helicopters is this?

The implicit threat in the use of the helicopters is that it will be easy to assassinate Gaddafi. But the French foreign minister, Alain Juppe, insisted that was not the plan. "We don't want to kill him," he said. "Because we are not killers."


Well, that's all simple enough logic is it not?



If only DSK were also in this pic!
(via Daveeza at flickr.com)


[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Thursday, May 26, 2011

"Dear American Jews, be more (and/or less) Jewy", sincerely Catholic Asshole

Well, here we go, Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Raptureland).

The short answer is that most American Jews are liberal, and most American liberals side with the Palestinians and vague notions of “peace” instead of with Israel’s wellbeing and security. Like the president, the U.N., and most of Europe, too many American Jews aren’t as pro-Israel as they should be

Well, maybe in that she talks to the voices in her head....

Oh Lord, now Rich Lowry is gonna start beating it while imagining her in a chain mail bikini straight out of Boris Vallejo.

A new film commissioned by Palin, the former governor of Alaska, will present her as a Joan of Arc-like figure


Yes, because we all remember the best known fact about ol' Joan, that she always resigned before things got difficult.

Now this is how FoxNews would do it



Nice job Huffington Post, someone did something sort of silly and sexist...roll-out the boob shot!

Classy.

Egomaniacal Much?

Apparently it is Roger Ailes articles month, as Rolling Stone gets in the act. Think Roger Ailes has a high opinion of himself? The man doesn't just perpetuate and practice the paranoid style of politics, he lives it:

Convinced that he has personally been targeted by Al Qaeda for assassination, he surrounds himself with an aggressive security detail and is licensed to carry a concealed handgun.


Considering his network is inadvertently (I think) the greatest asset the organization has in actually harming America (cheer-lead into wars much Rog?) I'm pretty sure they would never touch him.

Doesn't Rich Lowry have enough of these videos

In his personal spank-bank? A Sarah Palin documentary?

Is this one with, or without Lisa Ann? And to Rich Lowry, does it really matter?

Priorities

How are those bills to create more jobs coming Mr. Speaker?

The House has passed legislation that would bar teaching health centers that receive federal funds under the new health care act from using the money to teach abortion techniques.

Rep. Virginia Foxx, the sponsor of the measure, says she wants to make it “crystal clear” that taxpayer money is not being used to train health care providers to perform abortions.

...The amendment passed 234-182, over the objections of some Democrats who said it would prevent medical residents from learning a basic procedure in women’s health care.


Well, can't have that -- just tell them to pray.

And sponsored by such a quality individual like Virginia Foxx too.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Deep Thought

The Ryan plan is brave.

P.S. Dems, Here's complete roll call on the Ryan plan. Please see that you wield it whenever possible.

Oh, and bye, Paul.

U.S.S. Loserville

Now here's a campaign platform...

"We've got to build more aircraft carriers...out of grandma's medicare."

Alert Mr. Godwin

Because I think the GOP has found its best Roland Freisler impersonator yet:

People really love the Republican plan to kill medicare

In that they love to hate it...oh, it's so "serious".

Leave it to the Democrats to squander their advantage.

Rehash The War on Tiara

Having discovered that a large bill at Tiffany's is no longer a liability for a candidate, it should come as no surprise that tiara-enabling repetitive number enunciating sociopath Rudy Giuliani is thinking of re-running for President.

New York Republican Rep. Peter King told CBS News Tuesday that he "would not be at all surprised" if former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani entered the 2012 presidential race.

"In fact, I would say if he had to make the decision today, it would be yes," King told CBS News Congressional correspondent Nancy Cordes.


This time, he's going to get two delegates instead of one! At this rate Rudy shall be unstoppable in the 6040 Presidential election sponsored by Oxygen-flavored Doritos.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Never too dumb to fail

Over at Salon Alex Pareene has a list of hopelessly wrong political books. The only amazing thing is that Dick Morris doesn't have every slot -- but maybe he only wrote one book, goodness knows I'm not going to take the time to find out.

Here's his 2005 bit of wrongstradamus:



And here's more.

At least Stoners have an excuse

Alan Greenspan was just an asshole.

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan once doubted his own existence...
"...in his 20s he is sitting with me in my apartment telling me that he cannot say with certainty that he exists, he cannot say for certain that I exist and he cannot say for certain that this conversation exists,"


And I continue to doubt his sanity exists.

Irrationally exuberant.

"You stay classy, 20/20 foresight"

One does wonder about the attention span of those who keep electing clowns like this.

Self-proclaimed libertarian Billy Long got himself elected to fill Roy Blount's old congressional seat in Missouri last year on the strength of voters "reflex memory" alone.

Given his districts residence in the heart of 'Tornado Alley' one would think ol' Billy might appreciate 'civil defense' protections like warning systems. But, you would be overestimating Billy Brooks sociopathy when he mocked such things last year.


And then this weekend happened in his district.

Good job in advance Billy.

“Let them eat their own Payless Shoe Store bootstraps!”

Fitting that in 2011, the Republicans are branching out from Ayn Rand's political philosophy to one once attributed to an Austrian in a foreign land (insert Arnold Schwarzenegger joke...or joke about anything involving "insertion" and "Arnold Schwarzenegger"...here)...Marie Antoinette:


Republicans proposed cutting $832 million – or 12 percent – from this year's budget for the federal nutrition program that provides food for low-income mothers and children...Two analysts from the liberal research and advocacy group Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, Zoe Neuberger and Robert Greenstein, said Monday that the cuts could mean turning away as many as 475,000 people from the Women, Infants and Children program if food prices continue to rise.

Let them eat, uh, nothing!

Although, you have to admit it's not like poor infants and children are going to vote for John Boehner, let alone donate to him, anyway. He saves his tears for those who can afford to play in his foursome.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Monday, May 23, 2011

Missouri

In March there was Japan.

In April it was Alabama.

And now: Missouri.

As always, if you've a few bucks to spare, the Red Cross could probably put it to good use.

Other organizations -- local or national -- to which you typically direct help? Put links in comments, please.

This about sums it up

There's something off-putting about how quickly the folks who reflexively proclaim themselves "more patriotic than thou" have a shit-fit when the President of the United States restates what American Presidents have said since Lyndon Johnson -- and decide to go for the leader of another country forced into even greater extremism to maintain his coalition of whack-jobs.

What does it all mean, Thers sums it up:

The obvious 2012 GOP nominee is Benjamin Netanyahu. Not giving a rat's ass about how the US economy actually works as long as the big bucks get funneled to the right people is basically a plus for the Republicans, and allowing a hard right Israeli government veto power over US foreign policy, well, why the fuck not.

The wingnut position is that greater loyalty and deference is owed to the foreign head of a client state than to the democratically elected president of the United States of America.

Awe, hell I cannot resist

It's a feline miracle.

Full of Crazy versus Empty of Charisma

Herman "Crazy Bread" Cain is in, but Mitch Daniels is out.

Another good weekend to be Barack Obama.

Meanwhile, even the otherwise sane candidates like Romney, Huntsman and Pawlenty who in relative sanity make up for it with a complete lack of charisma are forced at "Rush point" to agree with the insanity of the Paul Ryan "budget fantasy and old people fuck".

Next time try a calculator

I'm flabbergasted anybody ever listens to any of these patent charlatans:

[T]here was Camping, "flabbergasted" in Alameda, wearing tan slacks, a tucked-in polo shirt and a light jacket. [...]

"I'm looking for answers," Camping said, adding that meant frequent prayer and consultations with friends.


I'm confident that after "prayer" and "consultation" Camping will emerge with the "revelation" that the Almighty somehow has a plan that involves people giving him money.

I sort of feel sorry for those morons who were taken in, but frankly there are too many of them and far too many that are just a shade more "reality-based" than them that have us with politics laden with fantasy -- i.e. the modern Republican Party.

Deadly

Oh sure, part of the evidence of climate change are more powerful storms...so I guess Steve Doocy will be short of 'what global warming?' jokes this morning.

Tornadoes tore through parts of the U.S. Midwest on Sunday, killing at least 30 people in the Missouri town of Joplin and causing one death in Minneapolis as well as causing extensive property damage.

The Joplin deaths came from a powerful tornado that plowed through the southwestern Missouri town of some 50,000 people late on Sunday afternoon...

"We have heard up into the over-100 (range), but ... I don't think anyone has a good count right now," he said of the casualties. He also said that 11 bodies had been recovered from just one location.

Citizen Lame

When I last read anything of interest about Roger Ailes it was about his small-town homage to Lionel Barrymore's greatest role.

But that is not enough for the President of a self-proclaimed news organization -- fair and balanced and all that b.s.:

...for all his programming genius, he was more interested in a real narrative than a television narrative—he wanted to elect a president.


And it appears that thanks to his machinations for driving the GOP to the Right, he will once again elect one -- just the opposite of who he wants.

As much as I'd like to just cut to the chase and have him whisper "Rosebud", Ailes actions get even more disturbing, yet lamer. For Ailes who once "loved" Sarah Palin only to be the last person on Earth to discover she's a moron, has a new crush object -- apparently discovered at something that must have been sponsored by Lap-Band:

A few months ago, Ailes called Chris Christie and encouraged him to jump into the race. Last summer, he’d invited Christie to dinner at his upstate compound along with Rush Limbaugh, and like much of the GOP Establishment, he fell hard for Christie


I'm pretty sure that in all things, when Ailes falls, it's a hard one.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake.com]

Sunday, May 22, 2011

They're all about responsible gun ownership

Future recipient of the Wayne LaPierre outstanding gun-rights advocate award from the NRA, Maine State legislator and, of course, Republican Frederick Ladd Wintle:

In what police termed a “bizarre” series of events, Wintle allegedly started talking to Seamans about the infant that died this week at Mid-Maine Homeless Shelter on Ticonic Street and said he was looking for the mother’s drug dealer.

News reports made no mention of drugs involved in the infant’s death and did not reveal the family.

He then pulled a .22-caliber handgun out of his pants’ waistband and pointed it at Seamans in the Dunkin Donuts parking lot, located on Kennedy Memorial Drive.

Well this is embarassing

Since I'm still here and unraptured, I guess I'm going to find out from my credit card companies that simply enclosing paper with the words "suck it" is not considered a legitimate form of payment.

Saturday, May 21, 2011

Minnesota Nice

Used to be my birth state's motto (I have my birth certificate and everything), but no more, this moron was invited to give the non-denomination opening prayer before the State House yesterday...

Dean -- founder of the youth ministry You Can Run But You Can't Hide, and drummer for the "second-best unsigned band in the nation," Junkyard Prophet -- has said in the past that gays deserve to be jailed for breaking the law. He believes there's no difference between Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden. And as TPM has reported, Dean calls Rep. Keith Ellison's (D-MN) support of "homosexuals" part of a plot to implement Sharia law.


Because no Nation is more famously tolerant of gay people than Iran. Naturally, this bonehead managed to offend even most Republicans.

And, of course, he is Michele Bachmann's buddy.

Good to know

That while the rest of the country is moving inevitably toward the conclusion that recognizing gay marriage is no big deal, the state that gave us the Scopes' Trial and anti-government-government employee, Ernest T. Bass, Esq. is continuing their history of bigotry.


Tennessee Senate Approves Ban On Teaching Of Homosexuality


So the score card is, afraid of Muslims, Gays, and all manner of intelligence.

Dear Res...

Aw thanks, likewise, but this is awkward as everyone from Skippy the Bush Kangaroo is here with me huddled in a bunker.

Nevertheless, I would like it known I will spend humanity's last day doing laundry.

So really, a dream come true.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

/via Balloon Juice

I actually wanted Newt to be the nominee, because he'd get so badly shellacked, but it looks like I'm going to have to make do with a couple of months of hapless campaigning, at best. Hopefully, there will be at least one "Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor" moment along the way.

P.S. Callista, Have you checked those receipts yet?


Friday, May 20, 2011

In Case of Rapture

Dear Attaturk,

If the world really does end tomorrow, I want you to know that I have always been truly, madly, and deeply in love with you.

xxx...res

Anxiety

Last Saturday's arrest of DSK made me wonder about tumbrels and scaffolds. Then this week, I began to re-read Howard's End, and I came to this sentence
The boy, Leonard Bast, stood at the extreme verge of gentility. He was not in the abyss, but he could see it, and at times people whom he knew had dropped in, and counted no more.
And finally, and as if on cue, watertiger sends me this Guardian column about what keeps those tumbrels idle and the scaffolds disassembled:
As psychologists will tell you, fear of loss is more powerful than the prospect of gain. The struggling middle classes look down more anxiously than they look up, particularly in recession and sluggish recovery. Polls show they dislike high income inequalities but are lukewarm about redistribution. They worry that they are unlikely to benefit and may even lose from it; and worse still, those below them will be pulled up sufficiently to threaten their status. This is exactly the mindset in the US, where individualist values are more deeply embedded. Americans accepted tax cuts for the rich with equanimity. Better to let the rich keep their money, they calculated, than to have it benefit economic and social inferiors.
Whether you're on the extreme verge of gentility or a solidly middle class wage slave, the abyss and its attendant anxieties feel perilously close during good times and bad. It's not "Hey, one day I could be rich!" but rather, "Hey, one day I could be poor!" that helps maintain the status quo. Keeping you anxious by, say, selling you credit rather than giving you wage increases for thirty years running, simultaneously keeps a small number of people obscenely rich, and those tumbrels in garages and those scaffolds in warehouses. Neat trick.

Howard's End is very worthwhile, by the way.

If this keeps up

Newt is going to need help from Dan Savage's "It Gets Better" campaign:

I thought Michelle Malkin hated "liberal" movie stars?

I guess not.

Look who's trying to kill the Good Humor Man

I always sort of figured "Ice Cream Truck" music was playing in Debbie Schlussel's head at all times.

Oh, now he is concerned about moneyshots?

It's only fair, I mean John Edwards film career has stalled.

"At the request of Arnold Schwarzenegger, we ask Creative Artists Agency to inform all his motion picture projects currently underway or being negotiated to stop planning until further notice. Gov Schwarzenegger is focusing on personal matters and is not wishing to commit to any production schedules or timelines."


...or back child support.


Meanwhile, FoxNews has handled this in the completely rational and fair way you have come to expect:

“I don’t think infidelity should ever signal the end of a marriage,” and argued that Shriver should try to salvage the marriage. Oddly, throughout the interview Ablow and the host seemed most concerned that Schwarzenegger didn’t cheat with someone more attractive.

Loofa

Please allow Bill O'Reilly to "generalize" in his no spin, all spin kind of way.

"For every Muslim in the world that wants democracy and wants human rights, there's one who doesn't, and the one who doesn't doesn't have any rules and will blow the hell out of the one who does."


Bill-O's source for this was impeccable, his own ass, or Rasmussen...same diff.

Earthshaker


An artistic representation of the state of the Gingrich campaign...he's not the birds, he's not the people, he's not the inanimate objects, he's the film-maker.

Yesterday Newt Gingrich called his campaign a once-in-a-century kind of event. I suppose that's true, if you think of it like the Tanguska Event or Krakatoa.

But if a campaign like his comes along once a century, how come he is on the same monthly "Apologize to Rush Limbaugh like you Bogarted his Hillbilly Heroin Tour", every other Republican with a moment of sanity has to partake in?
[Regarding Paul Ryan's Medicare Replacement Plan] "I don't think right-wing social engineering is any more desirable than left-wing social engineering. I don't think imposing radical change from the right or the left is a very good way for a free society to operate."

Oh really?
"I have an enormous personal ambition. I want to shift the entire planet"
- Newt Gingrich

I guess he really does think he's one of those once-in-a-century events.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Dear Callista

Check the receipts.

xxx...res

It never really existed, but Ben Stein would like to bring it back

Jus Primae Noctis, the right of the Lord to get first dibs on a bride's virginity never actually existed -- though perhaps David Barton would differ -- but it is amazing how Ben Stein seems to want to bring it back.

Man, I can hardly wait to see

The Foo Fighters on May 23rd.

Fuck.

...same thing Bin Laden was thinking.

Oh those internets

Other than the fact it was a newspaper the LA Times that broke the news on Arnold's child of normal-chinned mother, Bill-O is totally right in that the only thing that is emphasized:

...the reason most politicians get brought down down by scandals involving their personal lives is because of "cowardly sociopaths" on the Internet who "hide in the weeds in their basements" and write "the most vile things" about them.


The internet is also totally responsible for loofahs, masturbating on phone calls, and Andrea Mackris' breasts.

He once saw the Globetrotters on TV!

Of course he was rooting for the Washington Generals:


David Barton, the Republican establishment’s favorite amateur historian, claims in tax records reviewed by HuffPost to be something of an expert on African-American history...

It’s a curious claim for the Tea Party favorite, who has twice given speeches in front of white supremacist groups -- protesting later that he was ignorant of the groups' professed racist ideology.

Of course this self-proclaimed expert on African-American history once tried to get Thurgood Marshall removed from textbooks, because what did he ever accomplish compared to Clarence Thomas? You must be lazy and/or illiterate to proclaim otherwise.

This ridiculous information would be trivial except this charlatan is the ahistorian of choice for Republican Presidential candidates putting tri-corner hats in place of their consciences. From former candidate Mike Huckabee ("Americans should listen to him at gunpoint") to Michelle Bachmann (the founders ended slavery [or at least 3/5ths of it]) to Newt Gingrich and his spokesperson, most recently heard defending Newt with a press release ending with "...THIS IS SPARTA!".

Time for David Barton to be given a permanent "pundit's chair" on Meet the Press, I suppose.

[Cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

A Post That Will Make Attaturk Proud

Okay, whoever wrote this article about Philip Roth winning the Man Booker has a sense of humor, because the verb choice in the first sentence of the second paragraph just cannot be an accident. Remember the raw liver in Portnoy's Complaint?

Well, he is a Republican so this may work in the Village

Gingrich declares that anyone who truthfully says what he said is by definition a liar.

Which reminds me of one of my favorite stories of Iowa crime, a former Iowa State University basketball player who while recognized by name during an alleged robbery replied...

"I'm not me!"

Man...

I was hoping for Deangelo Vickers or Tommy Hudspeth, or maybe even Dick Sergeant but not to be:

Al Qaeda has appointed an Egyptian militant as temporary leader and named a new head of operations following the killing of Osama bin Laden by U.S. commandos, al Jazeera reported on Wednesday, citing its own correspondent.

In a brief news flash, the Arab satellite channel said Saif al-Adel was named interim leader and Mustafa al-Yemeni, whose surname hints he is from Yemen, would direct operations.


Both sound like #3s to me.

Projection

It's one hell of an affectation.

Dick Morris without the Toe-Sucking

Although when it comes to Mark Halperin, the sucking is universal:

...any pundit (I'm looking at Mark Halperin especially) who took Newt as a serious heavyweight, just turn in your pundit badge and go home before you embarrass yourself any further. Halperin, you may recall, tried to make the argument in 2008 that having eight homes was good for John McCain (and, yeah, we still say it whenever good news for Obama comes out.) Halperin's argument on Hardball Monday night that Newt is a candidate to reckon with is another classic blown call and another example of pundits never having to be accountable. Come to think of it, until this week, Newt was a pundit...




The Village!

Pretty Much

Of course she was

Modern 'Murica:

Maria Shriver found time to dine with one of America's most empathetic listeners on Monday night.

Shriver joined Oprah Winfrey, her partner Stedman Graham and Winfrey's best friend Gayle King for a meal, a source at Chicago's RL Restaurant


Wonder what Stedman was thinking...other than how the hell he could get the fuck out of there...and what was in season?

Suck it Osmonds!

Sell as much of that magic underwear wearing; Mountain Meadows Massacre Cover-upping; Utah Jazz attending piece of shit as possible.

Sincerely, non-Utah resident.

Who needs friends, with enemies like these?

whether we're disappointed or not, there's not a lot of incentive for the Obama Administration to change if the opposition pushes candidates that are cartoons.

In the last week, Trump ended his quadrennial ratings grab of a mock campaign after becoming a laughing stock, serving as the perfect foil to bury birthers. Mike Huckabee, most liked of a cast of universally repellant characters also bowed out. Now Gingrich is imploding as spectacularly as his past marriages. The latter doing so, while forcing Republicans to defend the otherwise despised Paul Ryan medicare elimination plan.

Obama may unilaterally negotiate to a maddening degree, but the GOP is suddenly self-triangulating to the point of suffocation in way a fundamentalist in a two-ply wetsuit could appreciate in his auto-erotic last moments.

And it only gets better as who is riding to the rescue but this guy!
John Bolton has his first New Hampshire trip as a potential presidential candidate on the calendar.
[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

"He's like a leech."

Wow. Read this 1984 "Mother Jones" profile of Newt Gingrich.

Then think about all the shit this shameless huckster has pulled since 1984.

"That's right Mr. Sulzberger, and I'm playing Catcher!!!"

David Brooks life summarized in a photograph.

Remembrance of Group Sex Things Past

I didn't know that Roger Stone was advising The Donald, but I guess I'm not surprised.
None of this is to say that there was not some segment of the Republican Party that was receptive to [Trump's] message. Some conservatives said they were willing to forgive his past abortion rights position after he declared he was now antiabortion. “Where you were in the past no longer matters, it only matters where you are today,” said Mr. Trump’s informal political adviser, Roger Stone.
He's right! Because if Republican rubes like the New Hampshire voter quoted in the last paragraph of the article didn't believe that very thing, Stone wouldn't have a career.


Wonder if His Contracts Include a Morals Clause?

Wondering if the producers are rethinking these plans:


Last month, [Schwarzenegger] announced he would star in an animated children's series, "The Governator," about a superhero with an everyday family life. He told The Times he was ready to reclaim his former Hollywood glory and to make sequels of his greatest hits, including "Terminator," "True Lies" and "Kindergarten Cop."

I guess Orrin Hatch now knows why Arnold didn't press harder on Hatch's Equal Right to Govern Amendment:
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, a political ally of Schwarzenegger, introduced the Equal Right to Govern Amendment in July 2003, a few weeks before the actor declared his candidacy in the recall election in which Californians ousted Democrat Gray Davis as governor.

If Hatch's amendment is adopted, an immigrant who has been a naturalized citizen for 20 years could run for president or vice president.

Schwarzenegger, 57, has been a U.S. citizen since 1983. He has retained Austrian citizenship.


A symbolic message from the Roberts' Supreme Court

The Fourth Amendment, like your pot, goes down the shitter:

The police do not need a warrant to enter a home if they smell burning marijuana, knock loudly, announce themselves and hear what they think is the sound of evidence being destroyed, the Supreme Court ruled on Monday in an 8-to-1 decision.

“Your clothes, give them to me, now!”

L.A. Times:

Former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and his wife, Maria Shriver, separated after she learned he had fathered a child more than a decade ago — before his first run for office — with a longtime member of their household staff.

Well, that will teach it

Sun snuffs out comet...better it hit there than here, obviously.

In other tales of courage

Paul Ryan's new plan for getting rid of medicare is to whine that Democrats have pointed out he wants to get rid of Medicare.

How dare they.

Courageous. Almost as courageous as looking like a contestant at Ronald Reagan Night down at the drag bar.

What passes for Courage?

On the one hand, if it involves killing somebody:

President Barack Obama made a “very gutsy call” to send Navy SEALs into Pakistan to kill Osama bin Laden, outgoing Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in an interview broadcast Sunday.

"I worked for a lot of these guys. And this is one of the most courageous calls – decisions — that I think I’ve ever seen a president make,” Gates told CBS in a wide-ranging interview aired on “60 Minutes.”


On the other hand, if it involves something "boring" like fiscal sanity and government working and taking care of things like, oh, Americans -- courage is in short supply:


The advisers are deeply concerned about winning back political independents, who supported Obama two years ago by an eight-point margin but backed Republicans for the House this year by 19 points. To do so, they think he must forge partnerships with Republicans on key issues and make noticeable progress on his oft-repeated campaign pledge to change the ways of Washington.


Anybody think the GOP is getting less crazy, smarter, or easier to deal with through this "political" negotiating strategy?

It turns out the six-month spending bill Congress passed in April increased discretionary outlays through the remainder of the fiscal year by a bit over $3 billion.
[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Monday, May 16, 2011

"The underlying thematics are beginning to be universalizable in a way that has taken years of work."

Is that English?

What does it mean?

Need it in context? The rest is here.

This should be fun to watch

Please enjoy his fellow asylum residents running for President try to dodge this question as Teabaggers start to almost become self-aware:

Ron Paul Calls Social Security and Medicare Unconstitutional, Compares Them to ‘Slavery’

The lamest story ever blogged

If nothing else, you do have to admire John Engign's chutzpah...his really really stupid, hypocritical chutzpah.

On Christmas Eve, they met in Ensign's home office where the senator cried and both he and Cynthia said the affair would stop. Both couples told their children, and the next day, the families celebrated Christmas together.

But Ensign began texting Hampton again the next month, and the affair picked up. The senator gave her $3,000 in cash for hotel rooms and items for herself, and told her more than once that he wanted to marry her -- once at the National Prayer Breakfast.

When he traveled to Iraq and Afghanistan with Doug Hampton on a congressional delegation trip in February 2008, Ensign called Cynthia several times, running her phone bill up to nearly $1,000. Aware of the contact between Ensign and his wife, Hampton asked to borrow the senator's phone to call Cynthia and watched him scroll down to "Aunt Judy" instead of her real name.


Aunt Judy?

Kinky...offputting...but kinky.

The man is correct

Atrios blogged yesterday if the Japanese will be like Americans and throw out the old "Noboby could have predicted" line. Because we all know in the place historically most famous for epoch tsunamis the best place to build a nuclear power plant is on the shore.

Residents leave 2 more Fukushima towns


These two towns are 30 km away from Fukushima.

Meanwhile,


A worker at Japan's tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant died on Saturday, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co said, bringing the death toll at the complex to three since a massive earthquake and tsunami in March.


Maybe something else was involved as the worker was in his 60s...he started on Friday and was within an hour.

He's not worth the Salt of His Tears

In the words of Admiral Akbar, it's a trap:

"Rather than thinking of this as a crisis, I think of this as an opportunity to come together," [John Boehner] said on CNN’s “State of the Union,” adding that he would not support tax increases as part of the deal...


Aw, he wants to deal...right, the Republicans are always willing to deal...

On “Face the Nation,” Boehner invited President Barack Obama to join him in tackling entitlement spending, alluding to the House GOP budget that made major cuts to Medicare.


But, of course, as long as the poor and needy get screwed, it's all good...stepping on the "little people" makes sense to Republicans because they leave less of a stain on the carpet.

And what can the President expect in return?


Boehner has also ruled out tax increases as part of a deal for grappling with the long-term deficit


Ah, nothing.

This does seem right up Obama's alley though, I'm just surprised Boehner didn't wait for Obama to come up with it without asking.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Sunday, May 15, 2011

Sports

I know little-to-nothing about any of them, but this seems like a really big deal.

Good for him -- and good for sports.

(Just as an aside, Welts is fifty-eight? Wow. He looks good.)


One of Those Things

So I'm sitting here, slack-jawed, reading a news accounts of the IMF managing director who has been accused of sexual assault and I click over to his Wikipedia page and see that the popular press (in France, I guess) refers to him as DSK, which reminds me of BHL, which in turns reminds me of this pointless NYT article about Tina Brown (who thinks that Bret Easton Ellis qualifies as a "new writer"), which includes this passage:
As her guests said goodbye, Brown and Evans looked eager to get their furniture back. Suddenly the French philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy wafted in, dressed in black and trailing a cloud of cologne and his mistress, Daphne Guinness, who was wearing a revealing black cat suit and heelless Alexander McQueen platform shoes. Lévy was fresh from Paris, where, he proceeded to tell Brown and a few stragglers, he had just single-handedly persuaded his old friend President Nicolas Sarkozy to go to war against Col. Muammar el Qaddafi of Libya. (A few days later, Steven Erlanger of The New York Times reported that this had, improbably enough, been the case.)
And I wonder two things:

First, why the hell are the women with whom people like BHL step out on their wives invariably heiresses, and, second, when are all these damn people going to be loaded onto tumbrels and marched to the scaffolds?

Sheesh.

Well, I guess Jesus said "Meh"

Mike Huckabee out of the GOP nomination.

Leaving the GOP with a mixed cast of loud and crazy people, and boring people that will play along.

Once again, the Republicans are the best friends Obama 2012 has.

There are no Democrats available

They must be in Church or something...yet there's always a fundy proclaiming Republican available. It's almost as if major television news organizations are run by Republicans...hmmmm

ABC’s This Week: Gov. Nikki Haley (R-SC). Roundtable: George Will, Cokie Roberts, Amy Walter. Economic Roundtable: Paul Krugman, FDIC Chair Sheila Bair, Former Deputy Treasury Secretary Roger Altman, Douglas Holtz-Eakin. Then, Richard Haass of the Council on Foreign Relations, Robert Kagan of the Brookings Institution and Anthony Shadid of The New York Times on the Arab spring.

CBS’ Face The Nation: House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH).

CNN State of the Union: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. House Budget Committee Chair Paul Ryan. Then, Joe Lockhart and Michael Gerson. Plus, Adm. Dennis Blair (Ret.) and John Negroponte.

Fox News Sunday: Fmr. Gov. Mike Huckabee. Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX). Then, Senate whips Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ). Roundtable: Brit Hume, Nina Easton, Kim Strassel, Mort Zuckerman.

NBC’s Meet The Press: Newt Gingrich. Roundtable: EJ Dionne, Mark Halperin, Peggy Noonan, Helene Cooper.


I wonder if Dancin' Dave will ask Gingrich how he keeps the magic alive in a marriage?

For those who haven't seen it yet

SNL had a funny skit again, bring back an old favorite with celebrity appearances...naturally Robert Smigel was behind it.



It did lack subtlety.

Saturday, May 14, 2011

ARUGULA!!!

Remember that elitist Obama liking a salad that wasn't just an iceberg wedge and ranch dressing.

Well, Ol' Freedom Fries had an interesting experience while his successor was killing Osama.

"I was eating souffle at Rise Restaurant with Laura and two buddies,"

Yes, and in the role of Stephen A. Douglas...

What a flatulent clown.

Republican Newt Gingrich told a Georgia audience on Friday evening that the 2012 presidential election is the most consequential since the 1860 race that elected Abraham Lincoln to the White House


Golly, amongst conservatives in GEORGIA I wonder how that is taken?

Bigger Meltdown

Fukushima or Trump?

(Although maybe we shouldn't be making Fukushima jokes)

Friday, May 13, 2011

Least shocking headline of all time

And not just because I predicted it.

As a data storage amount becomes larger the odds of porn being present approach 100 percent, no matter how big the repressive hypocrite [let's call it ATTATURK'S LAW (I'm calling it)]...and really, hypocrites don't come any bigger than bin Laden.

A stash of pornography was found in the hideout of Osama bin Laden by the U.S. commandos who killed him, current and former U.S. officials said on Friday.


Besides, who is better at discovering a porn stash than an American soldier?

This just in....

ALL MY GOOD IDEAS, HELL ALL MY IDEAS, COME BEFORE 8 A.M.!!!

THANKS BLOGGER!

Thursday, May 12, 2011

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

It was disgusting when it happened after Mission Accomplished, it's disgusting now -- although at least so far I don't see the DNC pushing it at the 2012 convention like the GOP did Bush in 2004.


And so the run of horrible Osama bin Laden commemorative death merchandise begins in earnest, with this ridiculous doll depicting President Obama as a Navy SEAL. And from the grotesque grin to the massive assault rifle to the very idea of the doll itself, there’s something here to anger just about everyone. Except your seven-year-old. He’ll love it.

Well, that's just awesome

Surely no reason to doubt a serious person's noble intentions here:

Meredith Attwell Baker, one of two Republican FCC commissioners, voted in late January to approve the merger of Comcast and NBC. Less than four months later, she announced that she is leaving the FCC to become a lobbyist for the merged company.

Oh out-of-context statements about Common is outrageous

But man, that Sean Hannity loved him some Ted Nugent threatening to kill Obama and Hillary Clinton...somehow it became Barack Obama's fault.


Fez Tip to Otoolefan via Twitter.

"Mommy, this fellow says he'd like to invite our Grandkids to Neverland"

"Oh, Ronnie let's send Michael or Maureen instead to make sure it is safe, before we send any of our real family."



Meanwhile, in FoxNews country

Now I know why Pat Buchanan's been off MSNBC for a while

He was over in Germany as a character witness.

A German court has found John Demjanjuk guilty of helping to murder Jews at a Nazi death camp in World War II.


I just hope Pat can make it back from defending an accessory to the mass murder of Jews in time to complain about the real crime of Common being invited to the White House.

He also hated Puppies and Tom Hanks' movies

I mean really, how dare he:

Bin Laden was determined to attack U.S. and not just New York, but small cities too (like Los Angeles -- really, that's what the article says -- the small hamlet of Los Angeles).

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Caption Contest

Like you needed more evidence

That Ernest T. Bass, ESQ is a complete and utter bonehead, look no further than...

Here

followed by

Here



Nice job there Cracker Barrel Darrow.

You can take AP out of Ron Fournier, but you cannot take Fournier out of the AP

This AP political article about Newt Gingrich manages to write an article on Gingrich's strengths and weaknesses without mentioning he runs as a moral conservative who is hypocritical enough to have cheated on every wife he's ever had...and he's had three...all in the name of patriotism by the way.

Perhaps now is the time to quote the eminent Mr. Bogg:

According to the New York Times, Newt Gingrich’s secret Presidential campaign weapon is going to be his brittle trophy wife (not a first place trophy wife, more like “participant” trophy wife) Callista, who is just a nice midwestern Catholic girl who had the good taste and judgement to allow Newt bounce his sweaty balls off of her chin for six years while Newt was married to another woman.

The conservative plan for higher education

Is for the Koch Brothers to own those professors Andrew Breitbart cannot get fired.

Here's an idea

Let's encourage them to hold a convention -- a well publicized one, we'll even let FoxNews cover it -- where they argue over the nominees.

Replacing bin Laden, who founded al-Qaida more than two decades ago and masterminded 9/11, may be no easy task. Analysts say the choice will likely depend on how the terror organization views its goals and priorities in the post-bin Laden age.

Dammit, Janet

Oh boy, this would be fun if the mainstream media ever gives a good goddamn (don't hold your breath):

Huckabee has joked that he "answers" to "two Janets." One is his wife, Janet Huckabee. The other is Janet Porter, the onetime co-chair of Huckabee's Faith and Values Coalition. And Porter, the former governor has said, is his "prophetic voice." But that voice has said some weird things over the years: Porter has maintained that Obama represents an "inhumane, sick, and sinister evil," and she has warned that Democrats want to throw Christians in jail merely for practicing their faith. She's attributed Haiti's high poverty rate to the fact that the country is "dedicated to Satan," and she suggested that gay marriage caused Noah's Flood. And there's this: In a 2009 column for conservative news site WorldNetDaily, Porter asserted that President Barack Obama is a Soviet secret agent, groomed since birth to destroy the United States from within.


She sounds like Jerome Corsi's dream girl.

Can’t blame ‘em for trying

I believe this falls under the definition of quaint:

A long-simmering movement by liberal stalwarts in southern Arizona to break away from the rest of the largely conservative state is at a boiling point as secession backers press to bring their longshot ambition to the forefront of Arizona politics.

A group of lawyers from the Democratic stronghold of Tucson and surrounding Pima County have launched a petition drive seeking support for a November 2012 ballot question on whether the 48th state should be divided in two.


Considering what the rest of the state's politics are like, often appearing to be one-part Yosemite Sam and one-part George Wallace becoming one entire Joe Arpaio, I cannot say I blame them for wanting the hell out of the State, but it isn't going to happen.

Besides, they just want to be a new State, but stay in the union.

Unlike some States that maybe should have tried a bit harder 150 years ago to leave...


After initial objections, lawmakers in Tennessee are moving a new version (pdf) of the most expansive anti-Sharia bill yet...when a Muslim starts practicing Islam with partners or in a group, they are forming a “Sharia organization”


[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Lies & The Lying Liars

File Under: You Can't Make This Stuff Up.

First, read Digby's "Drowning in BS".


You have to read [James B. Stewart's Blood Sport] for the full catalog of mistakes, errors of omission and downright lies in that hideous book. The idea that this guy is now rending his garments about Americans being a land of lies is pretty amazing. I guess he thinks he can "get away with it."


Rick Perlstein has coined a phrase "mendocracy" to describe how our elites have completely disavowed the very notion of honesty, even in fields like business and economics where one would assume that an agreement on the basic facts would be necessary to function. James B. Stewart is the walking proof of its existence.


And, as if on cue: Times Hires James B. Stewart, Financial Writer.

No mention of Blood Sport.

Uh, what?

The New York Times:



The guy playing Lincoln, played a rock & roll version of Andrew Jackson on Broadway.

Soon, he'll star in the sequel to this film, "Calvin Coolidge, Hobo Clubber".

I never watch the "Apprentice"

In any of its orangey-hued forms, so I note this juxtaposition only from what I've seen.

Trump: I'm Not Racist — One Of My 'Apprentice' Winners Is Black, Donald Trump wants to clarify that he's "the least racist person there is."


Meanwhile, last Sunday's episode seemed particular one-sided against "the Blacks", especially the ladies:

Three Black Women Booted from Celebrity Apprentice


But Trump wants you to know he doesn't have anything against "the blacks" or "the women", in fact, he thinks Beyonce has a great ass.

This will make someone very happy

Oh, bravo:

Pakistan may let U.S. investigators question the wives of Osama bin Laden, a U.S. official said, a decision that could begin to stabilize relations between the prickly allies that have been severely strained by the killing of the al Qaeda leader.


Jonah Goldberg has already emailed his questions to the CIA...

(1) How big was he...like a baby arm?
(2) Can you please convert centimeters into inches?

Bombs Away!

Is this not getting just a tad ridiculous?
NATO launched a number of missile strikes against targets in the Tripoli area on Tuesday that appeared to include Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's compound, witnesses said.

Libyan officials said four children were wounded, two of them seriously, by flying glass caused by blasts from NATO strikes in the Tripoli area overnight.

I have no problem decrying Gaddafi, in all his myriad spellings as a real bastard, but really, does it make the West look a lot better to keep trying to blow him up and get kids in the process? How many times have we tried to do this now all the way back to Reagan's raid in 1986?

In the Second World War, even when the heads of government included Hitler, Tojo and Stalin, this sort of targeting was not commonly practiced (highest profile Admiral Yamamoto, and he was in a real military uniform, not one he put together from a TJ Maxx catalog).

Yet in our more "civilized" era of smart bombs it has become de rigueur. But, when has it actually worked? We bombed Saddam in two wars, multiple times, and it did not work, we spent months leading up to Tora Bora imagining bin Laden cooped up in a Bond-villains cave-complex dropping MOABs and it did not work. How many predator drones have been aimed against "high-profile" targets successfully? Now we've made various efforts against Gaddafi, and accomplished what exactly? I suppose the argument is "it will help reduce civilian casualties", but really who can make that argument honestly when we have actually seen it in practice?

I know it is "easy" to drop bombs when you are so "militarily" superior, but is it very smart?

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Yep



I still prefer the University of Massachusetts video in all it's myriad forms:


(about 2:44 in)

Monday, May 09, 2011

Maybe she cared more than she let on

When Osama bin Laden, who carried a torch for her, was killed?

Whitney Houston In Out-Patient Rehab Program


Or not, just tossing it out there, like a right-wing blog would.

Wow, like a Freshman Nerds dorm computer

The contents may only somewhat overlap:

A law enforcement source tells CBS News that 2.7 terabytes of data were recovered from the laptops, computers, hard drives and other storage devices seized from the bin Laden compound. It's unclear whether all of the 2.7 terabytes are original files or if there are multiple copies of files.


Okay, let us make this simple...there are absolutely a lot of multiple copies.

Hmmm...

Interesting:

Former Vice President Dick Cheney says he hasn't decided whether to seek a heart transplant.


That's funny because I understand the Obama Administration found an anonymous and appropriately assholish donor just over a week ago and they're keeping it for him on ice.

Maybe they'll end up selling it to a Koch brother.