The pope stole my Maker’s Mark

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford making a few observations you don't want to moss.

And I am, clearly, far from alone. Witness tens of thousands of hardcore fans wailing like alcoholic banshees at the makers of Maker’s Mark, after the company announced it was going to add a tiny bit of water to the product – you never would have noticed, silly – because it turns out bourbon’s popularity is skyrocketing and they can’t keep up with demand, and by adding a little water (thus cutting 90 proof to 84, from 45 percent alcohol to 42) they would ensure enough supply going forward.

Mistake! Blasphemy! This is America, you fools. You do not mess with semi-automatic assault weapons, fetish porn, secretly gay Republicans or the recipe for a hugely popular but not exactly world-class mixing bourbon that might nevertheless just have the best price/quality/inebriation quotient of all Kentucky bourbons this side of Woodford Reserve.
...

Is this you? Are you one who likes to believe, with a jaded and weary sigh, that the world is still run by old, rich white males who loathe everything you stand for and will do everything in their power to destroy you, and there’s little anyone can do about it?

Behold, some balm. I am delighted to report that even supposedly impenetrable, high-powered Wall Street execs turn into whiny, defensive five-year-olds when a whip-smart liberal female – this time in the form of Sen. Elizabeth Warren – calls them out and pretty much tells them straight up what charlatans, fools and jackals everyone knows they really are.
...

Speaking of whom. Ex-pope Benedict! Feel better, sir. Sorry to hear you’re so tired and infirm. But oh, you really were an unmitigated disaster, miserable and regressive and sort of pathetic, setting the church back a good 100 years, which no one thought possible given how far back it was in the first place.

You were, in the eyes of anyone with even a slightly progressive soul, a bit of an abject failure in your handling of the sexual abuse scandal, or condoms in Africa, or any sort of even moderate reform, a weak and ineffectual leader who invited back all sorts of vile ultraconservatives into the church folds. You’ve also made sure that your successor won’t budge the crusty faith forward a single millimeter until Jesus himself comes down and slaps you all upside the head with a giant gay marriage certificate, a Magdalene priestess and a heaven-sized bottle of Maker’s Mark. Soon, honey. Soon.

More. Go. Enjoy.

Mud on the Highway

Apropos of absolutely nothing except some controversy about 40 miles east of me, I thought you might like to see a short video of the Comstock area around Virginia City/Gold Hill, Nevada.

YubaNet

VIRGINIA CITY, Nev. Feb. 18, 2013 - The Senior Planner for Storey County announced at a recent County Commissioners meeting that, despite a so called "Gentleman's Agreement" to limit the negative impacts of open pit, or 'strip', mining in the National Historic Landmark, Comstock Mining Inc. (CMI) intended to begin soon running heavy ore-hauling trucks through neighborhoods along Hwy 342 until midnight. Those trucks began hauling ore this past President's Day weekend, in darkness on the narrow two-lane highway, leading residents to believe that they could be subjected to this industrial travesty 7 days a week for the foreseeable future.

Godwin is ROTFLHFAO!

Godwin observed that, given enough time, in any online discussion—regardless of topic or scope—someone inevitably makes a comparison to Hitler or the Nazis.

The Nazis are calling the other Nazis Nazis. Heh. Politico.

A top tea party group is taking its clash with Karl Rove to a new level, sending out a fundraising email Tuesday featuring a photoshopped image of the GOP operative in an SS uniform.

“Wipe the Smirk Off Karl Rove’s Face,” reads the subject line of the email, from Jenny Beth Martin, co-founder and national coordinator of the Tea Party Patriots.

The email features a photo illustration in which Rove’s face is grafted onto a photo of a uniformed officer in the Reichsführer-SS, an elite class of soldier in the German Schutzstaffel during Adolph Hitler’s Third Reich. The lower left-hand corner of the photo features the inscriptions “Reichsführer-SS” and “K. Rove,” and appears to match a photo of SS Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler.
...

The tea party drew scathing criticism when a relatively small number of activists used racist rhetoric and Hitler comparisons in their criticism of President Barack Obama. Tea party leaders quickly denounced the rhetoric as unrepresentative of the small government movement, and pointed out that liberals protesting the Iraq war had compared former President George W. Bush to Nazis.

Yes, yes we did. Glad you Nazi fuckers are catching on.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

GOP Sen. Mitch McConnell: Legalize Hemp
And arrest anyone caught smoking it.

Just give them some aspirin.

Colorado Gov. Drinks Glass of Fracking Fluid to Prove Its Safety
Services are Thursday.

Heh.

Republican Schism: Karl Rove, Tea Party at Odds
One side believes in scorched earth ad hominem attacks to achieve victory at all costs, the other side feels that approach is too soft.

Someone please put the last man standing out of his misery. At the ballot box.

Toy Drone Sells Out on Amazon
Pentagon buys every last one.

Related:

Pentagon Creates New Medal for Drone Pilots
The Distinguished Couch Potato Cross.

I've had that one with Battle Stars and Oak Leaf Clusters for years!

Better-Late-Than-Never Headline of the Day

‘Lincoln’ inspires Mississippi to finally ratify amendment abolishing slavery

Actually, they ratified it in 1995 but never bothered to tell the federal government until now. 1995. Yeesh.

A Message To The College Of Cardinals From The Holy Spirit

Goblinbooks is on fire today! Do not miss this!

Folks, I'm not coming.

I don't know how you're going to pick the new guy. I don't care how you're going to pick the new guy. Puff the white smoke, don't puff the white smoke, it makes absolutely no difference. I refuse to be a part of this, this - I want to say train wreck, obviously, but at least train wrecks have the decency to stop at some point.

Flip a coin, play Monopoly, try competitive teabagging... however you select the new pontiff, I want everyone reading this to understand that I, the breath of the Almighty, the small still voice of Yahweh, the third distinct Holy Person in the mystical entity known to the faithful as the Triune God, will play absolutely no role in this purple freak show. I will be inspiring none of you. I will invest no one with the strength to become the heir of St. Peter and manage the affairs of the Bride of Christ on earth. Suck it, chumps. You're on your own.

This should surprise no one. Anybody following the Charlie-Sheen-porn-family you people have become will probably not even shrug at this announcement. It's difficult to find a Cardinal who doesn't resemble Keyser Söze in drag. Pick the spiritual leader of millions? Most of you guys are lucky you're not in prison.
...

I could go on, but why bother? You have proven repeatedly that you're willing to enforce your extremist laws on everyone but yourselves. For you there are always excuses, loopholes, and chances to sit out the scandal. Everyone knows this. Because of you, there are now two kinds of Catholics: People who take Rome seriously and people who are paying attention. I've got better things to do than put a stamp on whatever rightwing gargoyle you're going to pick.

In fact, if I'm going to use any of my influence it'll be to remind the good, decent Catholics of what they already know. That the only moral response to you is rebellion. If they take me seriously, and some of them still do, I'm telling them to oppose your terrible nonsense. They need to fight back, and maybe finally walk across the street and join a church that doesn't run afoul of the RICO Act.

Okay, enough. You people exhaust me. I've got a couple of next year's Grammy winners to crap out, and then it's back to bed.

Remembering that one "aw shit" wipes out 10,000 "attaboys", for all the good works done by lower level church people, it's still a top-down medieval institution, the trappings and wealth of which, not to mention the anachronistic policies and rituals, disgust me.

Then there's the pedophilia cover-ups. Jesus weeps.

"Happy Presidents' Day, Which I Totally Invented" By Richard Nixon

Goblinbooks

Hi there. I am speaking to you from the ninth level of the Kingdom of Shadows, where I am encased up to my buttocks in a lake of ice. And I wanted to wish all of you a very happy Presidents' Day, even though I completely made it up, and it's not real.
...

You're having that M. Night Shyamalan moment, aren't you? The whole world flipped inside out, and now you feel queasy and powerless. Plus I just reminded you of M. Night Shyamalan, so it hurts even more. This is what I do. And it's why this day is my real legacy. I have left an imprint on your conceptual world, and it allows me to screw with you from beyond the grave. So have we all.

Every one of us, every thug, liar, and scoundrel who managed to shimmy up that greasy pole changed how we govern the country in big and small ways... some of them quite unnoticeable. People want to honor the brave and the smart and the honest. But isn't so much of our history about guys like me?
...

Tricking you into observing a fake holiday is a perfect monument to what we do. And the way you, the American people, celebrate it is also fitting: You don't care. You just want to max out that credit card for some crap you don't need.

From the depths of hell, I salute you my subjects and citizens. We need each other, don't we? We're all in this together in the dark.

Tell Liddy I'll come for him soon. Bye.

Enjoy your holiday anyway. To us retired folks, and many lower wage employees, it's just a day with no mail.

Obama is a pot-smoking Black Panther hip hop artist

Note: Very realistic although a tad more intelligent than the real thing, but this is CLEARLY LABELLED SATIRE. Via Raw Story.

Word

Thanks to oldfartrants.

Headline of the Day

Topeka, Kansas, Urged To Remove Fluoride From Drinking Water To Protect Legislators' IQs

Heh. I think that ship done sailed. Or, barn door, meet gone horse.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Emmylou Harris performs "Red Dirt Girl" live at Farm Aid 2005 at the First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre in Tinley Park, Illinois on September 18, 2005.

Thanks to farmaid.

DesperationNews

TPM

Herman Cain Joins Fox News As A Contributor
...

Former Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) also joined the conservative news network as a contributor this week.

This is known colloquially as "rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic". FauxNews and the GOP can hold hands and sing "Nearer My God To Thee" as they sink into the depths with my blessing.

We're winning.

Keep It KKKlassy, Teabaggers

Arizona Tea Party Leader Scraps ‘Be Mein’ Hitler Valentines

According to the Capitol Times, other cards featured Fidel Castro, Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong as well as Karl Marx and Leon Trotsky. Viramontes told the Times that FreedomWorks is planning a big push for legislation that will limit the ability of public sector unions to collect money from their members for use in political efforts.

This ill-fated Valentine's Day stint comes on the same day that Mother Jones reported that FreedomWorks executives in Washington, D.C. made a video -- which they almost showed at a tea party conference -- in which a fake panda performs oral sex on a woman impersonating then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Despicable petty bullshit is what we've come to expect from these assholes. They do not disappoint.

Headline of the Day

Colorado Senate president reacts to marijuana smell in Capitol: ‘Please douse all the doobies’

With video! This is getting better and better! Let's take this to the national level. Someone please pass a joint or a brownie to Grampa Walnuts. I bet he'd be fuckin' hilarious. Heh.

Drinking his bong water?

No GOPer would dare do this! He might see the light. I doubt that, but I wish they'd all do it.

Upon a little reflection, it dawns on me that they may have tried it and just got it wrong. Note to the GOP: You're supposed to smoke it, not drink it. Heh.

Via Raw Story.

Nancy Pelosi et al On Ted Nugent

HuffPo

The decision by Rep. Steve Stockman (R-Texas) to invite controversial musician Ted Nugent to be his guest at Tuesday night's State of the Union address has become a bit of a distraction.
...

"I am more concerned about Steve Stockman being here than Ted Nugent," she said. "Ted Nugent will leave. Steve Stockman will still be here."
...

"I don’t think that highly of him at all," she said of the congressman. "He invited a guest. He has the right to do that. If a liberal had ever invited somebody to a State of the Union who had made the statements Ted Nugent made about cutting off our heads, and that he'd be 'dead or in jail' if the president got elected -- if a liberal or a progressive had ever invited somebody who had made those kind of comments to the State of the Union, can you just imagine? Can you just imagine?"

I believe Nancy knows full well that IOKIYAR.

"He has the right to invite the person and that is a statement about himself as much as it is about his guest," she added.
...

Pelosi is clearly not a fan of Stockman. Earlier in the interview, when discussing gun control, she noted that he was "eating out of a trash can" (my em. Heh.)before he won his first congressional election back in 1994.

Now he's feeding at the gravy train trough on our dime. Nancy had the good grace not to call the guy a despicable asshole, which grace I do not have.

The Nuge sat quietly and did not applaud or stand. I don't think he much liked being there, but his duty as a great patriot required his presence, I guess. Those pesky commie seating planners plopped him next to a gay civil rights activist from Oregon. Heh.

Following the President's speech, Nugent took to Twitter to assure his followers that he remained as headstrong as ever. "It deeply pains me to report that the prez is a master scam artist," Nugent wrote. "Didn't believe a word."

Then again, it's unclear if he was even paying attention.

According to Slate's Dave Weigel, the Nuge didn't stand up for anything the president said — not even "our brave men and women in uniform are coming home."

Yes, a great patriot. Fucker makes me wanta puke, but I ain't giving up my lunch for the likes of him.

Twitter's a good thing for him. It's QUIET.

From The Reverend Al:

The aging rocker called Rhode Island Rep. Jim Langevin ”s*#t for brains” for his comments that Nugent was an “odd choice for a member of Congress to invite someone who threatened the life of the President.”
...

He took on the president too, criticizing his “predicable, flowery, feel good, save the children, end world hunger insanity.”

Yeah, that's a bad thing in right-wing bizarro world. Yeesh.

When challenged by NBC news reporter Luke Russert over comments he made last year, comparing Democrats like Obama, Joe Biden, and Hillary Clinton to coyotes who deserve to be shot, Nugent became agitated, cursing at Russert and calling him a liar in vulgar terms.

When Russert pressed him to explain what he said, Nugent repeatedly claimed he “never said that,” even though he can be seen on camera comparing those Democrats to coyotes who deserve to be shot and have their heads chopped off.

Damn if the Russert kid ain't got a pair! 'Bout fuckin' time, kid! Maybe there's hope for you yet! Maybe.

Here's something new:

Nugent became even more agitated when asked why he didn’t stand in acknowledgement “of the brave men and women of our armed forces” during the address. His response? “Both of my legs are shattered, I can’t get up and down because of the pain,” he said. “I’m actually forgoing a double knee replacement today to be here tonight.”

He then lumped Russert into the same category as Congressmen Langevin for even asking the question.

It’s not the first time Nugent has used a physical ailment as an excuse for his behavior. Last May he blew up at a CBS reporter after he insinuated the rocker wasn’t a moderate.

After the interview ended, Nugent’s wife urged him to apologize, and he justified his behavior by pointing out he was rushed to the hospital to treat a kidney stone after the outburst.

I'll file that info. Now I know right where to kick him and put a few quick sharp-knuckle rabbit punches. From one hardass rabbit. Heh.

Just a loudmouth no-class right-wing chickenhawk punk. Nothing new.

You and your terrifying orange juice

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford sounding off on ... orange juice as the symbol of our spiritually dysfunctional society.

Confession! I do not drink much orange juice. I do not ever buy those giant, brightly colored cartoon jugs that look like caricatures of life, those carefully molded plastic things covered in scripty fonts and clip-art trees and pretty, hyper-saturated oranges made to look as if your own exploited Mexican laborer picked them five minutes ago and squeezed them into a drinking glass just for you, and then died.

Neither do I. My Dad would drink nothing but freshly squeezed orange juice. He would squeeze it at home and specify it in restaurants. You could get it in restaurants in those days. He claimed that, 20 minutes after squeezing, orange juice morphed chemically into a substance exactly like rattlesnake venom. I don't know if that's true, but he believed it.

He missed out on the chemicals and food processing techniques we "enjoy" today whereby rattlesnake venom may be the least harmful thing we can consume. Freshly squeezed, of course.

Texas Rep Stomps Repugs' Pecker

Ted Nugent’s SOTU Invite Is The Best News Gun Control Advocates Have Heard All Week

If you say so...

So much for shedding the 'stupid party' label
...

For the record, I don't much care about Nugent's ridiculous antics. He's obviously a fringe extremist who uses vile language; he hasn't had a hit since the '70s; and he's generally better left ignored.

But Nugent has also gone after President Obama with rhetoric that was violent enough to get the attention of the Secret Service. Try to imagine the political world's reaction if a washed-up entertainer targeted a Republican president with violent rhetoric, and then a Democratic member of Congress invited him as a special guest to attend the State of the Union.

The whiny bastards'd have a fuckin' cow and piss all over themselves as victims of the mean-ass bully godless commie liberals. Heh.

As the Stockman/Nugent story reminds us, the problem isn't that Republicans have some "cranks, haters, and bigots"; the problem is that Republicans are a radicalized party in which "cranks, haters, and bigots" routinely dominate.

This is America. Nugent is entitled to his opinion and can spew any right-wing garbage he wants to at any volume he can manage short of an actual threat. By the same token, I can think of that washed-up has-been never-was as a drawers-crappin' chickenhawk punk that I'd dearly love to deck. That's not a threat. It's an offer. Any time, any place, asshole. I would like nothing better than for him to have to explain to his wingnut buddies that he got all those lumps and bumps and bruises when a pussy liberal kicked his ass.

Hey, WaPo, feel sumthin' tuggin' atcher lip?

TPM

The Washington Post on Tuesday issued a correction to a piece that incorrectly claimed Sarah Palin was joining the pan-arab news network Al Jazeera. In the piece, published Tuesday morning, Suzi Parker quoted The Daily Currant, a satirical news site, on Palin's move:

“As you all know, I’m not a big fan of newspapers, journalists, news anchors and the liberal media in general,” Palin told the Web site The Daily Currant. “But I met with the folks at Al-Jazeera and they told me they reach millions of devoutly religious people who don’t watch CBS or CNN. That tells me they don’t have a liberal bias.”

Actually, given Moosebreath's tenuous grasp of, well, everything, I can almost understand WaPo falling for it. Heh.

The Man Who Shot bin Laden

Raw Story

“What they offered when he came out, the day after the raid, was a form of witness protection,” Phil Bronstein told NBC host Matt Lauer. “Someone, perhaps jokingly, at the SEAL command said, ‘We can get you a job driving a beer truck in Milwaukee, and you have to break all contact with your extended family.’ It’s like a Mafia snitch.”

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

"Would you fellate that donkey?"

Dress rehearsal of the SNL opening skit you didn't see, probably because it wasn't all that funny. From Crooks and Liars. More at Raw Story.

It is not hard to imagine the pearl clutching and cries of outrage (Outrage, I tell you!) had this skit gone out on the airwaves, depicting the blatant pandering and ridiculousness of the dialogue in Washington surrounding the hearing on the nomination of Chuck Hagel to the position of Secretary of Defense. I'm sure that Lindsey Graham and his BFF Grampy McCain would be issuing a proclamation of censure and a threat to deport Lorne Michaels back to Canada. How dare SNL mock the "When did you stop beating your wife?" line of questioning that the Republicans proffered to prove how much more they love the state of Israel? I'm still wondering if anyone in the Beltway media will ever wonder why blind obeisance to Israel is considered a requirement for holding an American political office.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Netanyahu Says He'll Seek Broad Coalition to Govern
Drawing from leaders of both the right and the far right.

Note to Bibi: Using our House of Representatives as a model only works when the Southerners aren't shooting at you.

Republicans Trying to Rebrand Party
As young, forward thinking, ethnically diverse obstructionists.

Instead of old, backward thinking, racist obstructionists they are now? Less grey hair and liver spots is the only difference I can see.

Poll: Fox News Credibility Suffers Sharp Drop
Fox blames Obama, mainstream media, Satan.

Heh. Introspection isn't their strong suit.

Of interest to Fixer perhaps:

Probe Finds 680 European Soccer Matches Fixed
But the fights in the stands were real.

That sport'll soar in popularity when they figure out how to fix those. Heh.

Many more good ones today.

Banging Head On Keyboard Headline of the Day

Fox News Claims Solar Won't Work in America Because It's Not Sunny Like Germany

The stupid, it burns...

You may shoot me now...

...for there is nothing left to see.

Thanks to dBzMoviesAndEps.

I have reprinted the lyrics because I've got a hunch that vid isn't going to be there too awful long. Heh.

Fuck Me In The Ass Because I Love Jesus

..to live by God's rule
So whatever people tell me that the Bible tells me, I will do
Walk the halls of my school with my purity ring
Unlike those other girls, I've got my morals in check
It was easy to do till I got a boyfriend
And pardon my French, but he's cute as heck
And I made a pact
To keep my hymen intact
And Jesus and I are tight
Never learned about the birds and bees
I was taught to keep an aspirin in between my knees
Because the Bible says premarital sex is wrong
But Jason says that guys can't wait that long
And I don't want to lose him
To someone who'll do him
I need to figure something out
Well, there's a loophole in the scripture that works really well
So I can get him off without going to hell
It's my hail Mary full of grace
In Jesus' name, we go to fifth base
Oh, thank you for making me holy
And thank you for giving me holes to choose from
And since I'm not a godless whore
He'll have to come in the back door
Therefore
Fuck me in the ass because I love Jesus
The good lord would want it that way
It's the sweet sensation of a throbbing rationalization
It's just between you and me
Because everyone knows it's the sex that God can't see
It's hard to be as pure as me
To resist the urge to lose my vaginal virginity
To wait until my marriage bed
To give my husband my unsullied maidenhead
So take your cock out
Shove it in my ass
Fuck me until you come
Oops!
I mean let's join our souls
And unite our bodies
And fly with the wings of God
Whatever you do, don't touch my clitoris
If you ring Satan's doorbell, God can't ignore this
And no prophylactics when you put it in
Because birth control's for sluts, and it's a sin
I've emptied my bowels
And laid out the towels
I'm ready for romance
I'm praying to the power that's the highest
But of all of my holes, this one's the driest
And we can't procreate if we anally copulate
And God's OK with sodomy, but only if you're straight
And I'm staying pure no matter what
So I'm OK with everything but
Everything but
Everything butt
Fuck me in the ass because I love Jesus
The good lord would want it that way
Give me that sweet sensation of throbbing rationalization
It's just between you and me
Because everyone knows it's the sex that God can't see
I do whatever the Bible tells me to
Except for the parts that I choose to ignore
Because they're unrealistic and inconvenient
But the rest, I live by for sure
So let's not talk about how the good book
Bans shellfish, polyester and divorce
And how it condones slavery and killing gays
Because those parts don't count of course
Let's cherry pick the part about losing my cherry
And ? for ambiguities and omissions
And circumvent any real sacrifice
And still feel pious in my arbitrary parroted positions
And don't you dare question my convictions
And don't look closely at the contradictions
Just focus on the sacrificial crucifixion
And have faith in its complete jurisdiction
It's the only way to measure if you're good or not
And when you're in a debate, just say to have faith
Because when up against logic it's the only card you've got
So close your eyes
Take a deep breath
And
Fuck me in the ass because I love Jesus
The good lord would want it that way
Give me that sweet sensation of irrational rationalization
It's just between you and me
Because everyone knows it's the sex that God can't see
Yeah, my chastity belt has locks
So sometimes you need to think outside the box

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Published on Feb 8, 2013
July 19, 2011

Thanks to Christopher Donohue.

Crazy alert!

Not much going on today, well, sure there is but it's all same old, same old, so I'll just play it for shits and giggles.

Thanks to TheBigPictureRT.

Karl Rove Is Done

Music to my ears! Howard Fineman.

Tea Partiers rightly ask what Rove and his rich-as-Croesus American Crossroads super PAC have gotten for conservatives or even the GOP. Rove is a master tactician, but not necessarily a great judge of political horseflesh. His taste tends to run to rich guys who can pay him a lot -- which worked out well only in the case of W., and then only by skin of Justice Antonin Scalia's ("get over it") teeth.

Now come the likes of senators such as Ted Cruz of Texas and Rand Paul of Kentucky to challenge him: smart, angry and anti-establishment conservatives who loath the country club types and who want to remake the Republican Party in their own uncompromisingly isolationist, anti-governmental, anti-social-welfare and anti-tax image.

Deep-dyed conservatives have a right to ask the Roves of the world what the establishment GOPers have done to erase the debt, limit the reach of the federal government or enhance a libertarian view of the world. The answer, to the Rand Pauls of the world, is simple: nothing.

The party of Paul, Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, Gov. Rick Scott of Florida and many others is a throwback to the nativism and principled know-nothing-ism of conservatives whom the likes of William F. Buckley and Ronald Reagan purged from the party long ago, making it safe for the Roves of the world to advance.

It took the likes of Buckley and Reagan two decades to rid the GOP and the mainstream conservative movement of the John Birchers, ultra-isolationists and flat-out segregationists and to create a party and a platform that would win a national election.

Now leaders and potential leaders such as Cruz (a rising force to be reckoned with) and Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida need to perform the same cleansing task -- and will probably have to take on the Paulites (who are paranoid conspiracy theorists at heart) to do it.

The war for the soul of the Republican Party is real, deep and reminiscent of that earlier conflict. For the GOP it ended well: they harnessed the energy at the grassroots to take over Washington.

This equally bitter GOP civil war may end in the party's revival, too. But it won't be Rove, or one of his clients, who is able to end it.

He's done.

Howard, I hope you're right. I volunteer to stick a fork in him as many times as it takes to make sure.

2013: The year women abolish God

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford on the sins of The Church and why it's even still around.

Could this be the grand finale? The glorious death knell for the ugliest portions of organized religion and its relentless, impressive beat-down of the stubborn female species for lo these past 2,013 years? Can we at least hope?

This much we know: Here in the stumbling, fumbling first world, where minorities have suddenly become the majority, gay marriage is increasingly no big deal, sexually awake women are surging into leadership roles like never before and the scales of influence have tipped away from frightened white males, organized religion is somehow looking even more dangerously, even cruelly out of touch and hostile to all that is beautiful, positive and worthwhile in the world.
...

It all points to the most intriguing possibility of all: Two millennia into the church’s brutish rule of guilt, shame, abuse and fear of anything with an active vagina, we might finally be at a point where organized religion is hammering the final nails into its own coffin. Or perhaps refusing to remove all those it put there 2,000 years ago. Whichever.
...

I know, it ain’t over yet. The GOP’s relentless war on women, abortion rights and contraception continues to repulse millions. And the church isn’t about to vanish completely. Besides, let’s be fair: organized religion still offers some balm, even to women: community support, a respite from the chaos, a rich connection to faith, ministering to the poor (that would be the nuns), a place to fully indulge in one’s spiciest daddy issues, all steeped in hazy devotion and murky tradition. Just because that tradition includes centuries of sexual abuse, shame, and the ongoing subjugation of women, just because the Catholic church itself no longer allows its priests to be alone with children, doesn’t mean it has nothing left to offer. But it’s close.

Not close enough. There's more but what amazes me is how young Mark
managed to pen a whole screed on the Catholic Church without once using the phrase "medieval bullshit".

American Hero Of The Day

Andrew Sullivan

Mike Bertha sets the scene:

A 54-year-old Tacoma man has been arrested for allegedly driving his car into a Pacific Gas & Electric worker in Fresno, trapping the man between two vehicles. According to a witness, Jett Simmons claimed to be the reincarnation of Jesus Christ before making racially charged threats and ramming his car into the PG&E worker. The witness—a hitchhiker “from Dogtown” by way of West Virginia named Kai (that it—just Kai)—says that after Simmons rammed the man, he got out of the car and tried to smother a bystander with a bear hug. That’s when Kai sprung into action and hit the 6’4″, 290-pound Simmons on the head with a hatchet. Once, twice, thrice. In the aftermath of the ordeal, the victim asked not to be identified and said that he only hopes his assailant gets the help he needs.

Kai, meanwhile, gave the greatest interview in the history of television news. Peep the full, NSFW version [above].(Below - G)

Update from a reader:

The Dude did not abide on that one. Fucking awesome.

Fucking awesome indeed. NSFW indeed! Heh.

There's cheap and then there's chickenshit cheap

I'm as, er, thrifty as they come, but even I wouldn't try to get away with something like this. But then, I'm not a corporation and therefore have a conscience.

Raw Story

Tech company forced to repay Mexican workers after getting caught paying them in pesos

A California tech firm that boasts Gen. Colin Powell as a board member was ordered to pay more than $60,000 in back wages and penalties after the U.S. Department of Labor found it had paid a group of tech workers from Mexico less than $3 an hour in pesos for two years.

I'm glad the cheap bastards got caught and had to pay those vatos.

2013 Political Animal Awards

Will Durst. These are pretty good. Here's just a few:

...you’d be well advised to brandish a stainless steel umbrella on the street because its awards season and golden- plated statuettes are being tossed about like manhole covers during an underground methane explosion.

THE BEST IMPRESSION OF REANIMATED HALLOWEEN PUMPKIN AWARD. And the winner is… oh, forgive me, that’s right, we’re all winners here. The award goes to Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell.

BEST DIRECTION OF A COMEDY. To Mitt Romney’s campaign manager, Matt Rhoades.
...

THE WHY DOESN’T ANYBODY RETURN MY CALLS ANYMORE AWARD: Karl Rove, and it couldn’t happen to a nicer guy.
...

THE HEAD IN THE SAND LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD. The coveted Ostrich goes to executive vice president of the NRA, Wayne LaPierre.

THE BEAT A DEAD HORSE UNTIL WE’RE ALL COVERED IN A FINE RED MIST AWARD. Another tie: Senators Lindsay Graham & John McCain who remain determined to get to the bottom of Chuck Hagel’s role in Benghazi.
...

And finally, THE CONTINENT OF ATLANTIS AWARD. For the fastest most complete disappearance in political history, Mitt Romney. They must have powered him down, folded him up and placed him back into the original packaging.

Paranoia, thy name is NRA

Michael Tomasky

One of the sure markers of the paranoid mind is the urge to keep lists. In particular, lists of enemies, subversives, no-goodniks; the pestilential nuisances, as Sir W.S. Gilbert famously put it, who never would be missed. It virtually goes without saying that the keepers of such lists are always the bullies who survive by fomenting hatred and making sure that their constituents stay in a state of constant agitation. And so it was no surprise to learn over the weekend, via Josh Marshall, that the National Rifle Association has a little list of 497 people and organizations who are in some way, shape, or form anti-gun. It makes for hilarious reading, although it’s sort of frightening to think about the demented minds of the people who assembled it.

Go see the list. Some of your favorite people and organizations are on it.

And yes, the NRA is too deranged to be allowed to have firearms.

Liquid Alert Headline of the Day

Karl Rove launches initiative to keep tea party candidates out of elections

Bwahahahaha! This used to be known as "locking the barn door after the horses got out". You're waaaaay too late, Turdblossom. Heh.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

Dozens Apply for Job of Washington State Marijuana Consultant
All applicants so far have been deemed overqualified.

Hillary Clinton Says She's Done With Politics
Makes tearful farewell address at gathering of Hillary '16, her new super PAC.

Fox News Ratings Hit 12-Year Low
Part of decline in scripted comedy vs. reality programming.

Republicans Now Call for Immigration Reform
As long as path to citizenship doesn't include right to vote.

Paranoid-Delusional Headline of the Day

LaPierre: They’re Coming For Our Guns No Matter What They Say

The "nervous disorder" that got LaPee-air his draft deferment during Vietnam has apparently metastasized into total mind-control paranoid delusion.

Note to Wayne: Don't worry, sole occupant of "Wayne's World", those boys in the white coats with the big net aren't there for your guns. They're there for you. Heh.

And as they lead you gently away in the lovely canvas jacket with the really long sleeves, content yourself with knowing you were right about one thing: flouridating the water actually worked on the Dead End Quarter. Heh.

Headline of the Day

Krugman: NRA thinks ‘we’re living in a Mad Max movie’

Mr. Krugman is a very smart man, obviously a regular reader of the Brain, who agreed with me on a Sunday Gasbag show. Video too.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Emmylou Harris och Rodney Crowell framföra "Old yellow moon" exklusivt för SvD.

Thanks to svdtv, Sweden.

Get Your Apocalypse On

I'm sure we've all watched and enjoyed post-apocalyptic movies. Methinks LaPee-aire and Miss Lindsey might have seen The Road Warrior one too many times. Or maybe The Book Of Eli. Heh.

TPM

Back in late December, when NRA Chief Wayne LaPierre delivered his first bracing, snarling comments about the Newtown mass killing I noted how LaPierre repeatedly diverted into the language of secular apocalypse, the total breakdowns of public order that are his signature device to play up the need for everybody to be armed.

It’s almost … scratch that, it’s not almost as if it were a tailor-made focus-group litany meant to incite maximal fear and hysteria, it clearly is just that. We just had Sandy. We’ve had black outs. We’ve had big terror attacks. We don’t go all Escape from New York or Mad Max. Yes, you can come up with a lot of scary scenarios and there are gangs and you do have looting sometimes. But these are terror fantasies. The whole thing is intended to portray a world just one slip down from a rapid descent into chaos....

It strikes me as something like comical. But it just drives home to me how this is an organization, at the leadership level, entirely focused on creating hysteria and maximal fear to drive its agenda, even in cases where the rhetoric simply becomes comical.

Does it ever! Jon Stewart rakes the whole it'd-be-funny-if-it-wasn't-so-pathetic NRA fearmongering bullshit over the coals.

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

And just as an aside, my personal vision of the post-apocalyptic world derives from somewhere between watching The Grapes of Wrath and Beach Blanket Bingo perhaps one too many times. I'm still trying to shoehorn Aunty Entity and The Himalayan Suspender as my weapon of preference in there somewhere...

Will wonders never cease?

Yertle finally said something I agree with!

McConnell backs hemp legalization in Kentucky

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Thursday announced his support for hemp legalization in Kentucky.

“After long discussions with Senator Rand Paul and [Kentucky Agriculture] Commissioner James Comer on the economic benefits of industrialized hemp, I am convinced that allowing its production will be a positive development for Kentucky’s farm families and economy,” he said in a statement.

Of course, Kaintuck is setting up for a fight with the feds over this that is exactly the same as the fight over legal marijuana, but it's a good fight whose time has come.

Today In Hagel Bashing

Great article by Charles P. Pierce.

There really shouldn't be as much low farce in confirming a Cabinet appointment than was on display today as the Senate Armed Services Committee got its chance to blow off steam and posture in front of Chuck Hagel today in Washington. If it wasn't John McCain, bellowing his outrage that the world no longer recognizes his obvious geopolitical genius — even the folks in the monkeyhouse love the grumpy old RINO today — and that the world has not rewarded him with laurel leaves and flagons of the finest mead. So he spends six minutes trying to get Hagel to admit how brilliant he was to have recommended the "surge" in Iraq. Hagel declines and McCain's fumes, probably because he'll have to wait until Sunday morning to get the kind of fluffing that's the only reason he's still in public life any more. Well, that, and a war with Iran.

But at least, McCain has a certain amount of what is at least alleged gravitas on the subject of foreign relations. Jim Inhofe was reduced to citing Jennifer (Wrong) Rubin's account of the tiny Hagels that have replaced the tiny Romneys in her tiny brain.(This is the equivalent of a clown taking singing lessons from a goat.) Later, it was time for the rookies to demonstrate that their IQ's doubled as soon as they were sworn in. Hagel's fellow Nebraskan, Deb Fischer, who less than a year ago was a noisy state legislator and the third candidate in a three-candidate primary field, pretended to be well-briefed on nuclear policy. And Ted Cruz, the Tea Party gossoon from Texas, took almost his entire opportunity to fit Hagel for a kaffiyeh. Listening to this interview on...al Jazeera! Here, let me reference the Holocaust. Why hasn't Hagel sent the committee the proof that Hezbollah's been paying his honoraria for 12 years! Listening to his cut-rate Joe McCarthy lounge act makes me wonder about the future of the World's Greatest Deliberative Body. I think they may need HazMat suits before this guy's done.
...

It was a bizarre, devotional exercise. Hagel was not being asked for his qualifications to lead the Department Of Defense — which, it should be noted, is largely an administrative one when it comes to the country's foreign relations. He was being asked to engage in a vague kind of theological debate. He was not being asked to profess his faith to Israel so much as to recant his heresies against the policies of the United States that were produced by adherents of a certain sect. He wasn't being asked to endorse Bibi Netanyahu so much as he was being asked to recant his unorthodox opinions as regarding the good works of Bill Kristol or John McCain. He was being asked, en ensemble, by Republicans old and young, essentially the same question John McCain spent six minutes hollering into the wind.

Please admit that we were right.

No. You were wrong. You were wrong in 2003 and you were wrong in 2006 and the Iraq war was a murderous cock-up from start to finish and Hagel, at least, figured that out in midstream.

There's more, and I have nothing to add.

Grampa Walnuts wants Hagel off his lawn...

Andy Sullivan nails the old fool on "the surge".

It didn't work, as we all know by now, on its own utopian terms. It did help us get out with less humiliation. But McCain still insists he was right about everything from the get-go:

McCain to Hagel: Please tell me I was right about Iraq
McCain desperately seeks vindication

Thanks to dkostv.

The good news is that we almost got a real debate on this question. Not exactly, because describing the "surge" as a p.r. exercize to disguise the complete failure of the Iraq War is not something Washington can yet cop to - just as it has great difficulty copping to the fact that the last president was and is a war criminal, under the strictest legal definition of that term.

But Hagel is right: without the switch in Anbar and the exhaustion of ethnic segregation and warfare, those extra troops could have been there indefinitely - and, if McCain had won in 2008, would be there still most likely. What's striking to me is not McCain's fury or douchiness (what's new?) - but his complete assumption that he couldn't possibly be wrong, his insistence that this debate is already over, and his refusal to allow for the notion that this question may only eventually be resolved by a more distant historical judgment.

After Iraq and Afghanistan, McCain's views on military intervention have not changed. Hagel's have. Somehow, I think Hagel is closer to where the country actually is.

Probably. And McCain is most definitely not and hasn't been for a long time on foreign policy. It's rockin' chair time, Gramps.

Shot by Their Own Men

A tip o' the Brain to Citizens UnTied.

Truthout

While this might seem like just another instance of silly old Southern Republicans doing silly things to keep the good ole' boys back home happy, I would argue that it is emblematic of how the Republican Party is content to destroy itself, shattering itself on the petard of its own bigotry. The gerrymandering the Virginia Senate Republicans did just before Senator Stosch moved to adjourn for the day is helping it hoist that petard.

This is why the January 21 moment in Richmond is symbolic of why gerrymandering is not going to work for the GOP in the long term. So long as the GOP gambles on redistricting - often based on rather crassly corralling or breaking up areas predominantly based on color (and especially if it does so by playing as dirtily as they did in Virginia on MLK day) - it will ensure that some number of its politicians will take care to speak to the extremists, the crazies and the bigots in the party. In the age of the Internet, this gets noticed. If Republicans think that Hispanics and Asian Americans - or young voters, or non-Christians, or women - won't notice or mind Republican bigotry even if aimed at other groups, then they're in for a surprise. And don't forget about those unloved Republicans-in-name-only, aka RINOs, who keep leaving the party. The GOP is going to end up as a farm team to nowhere.

There's a final irony here. Just as the Republican Party is accidentally destroying itself through acts of gerrymandering and bigotry like commemorating Stonewall Jackson instead of Dr. King, one might note that something similar happened to old Stonewall himself.

You know how Jackson died, right?

At the Battle of Chancellorsville 150 years ago this coming May, Confederate troops accidentally shot him.

"Accidentally". Yeah, right. Today we call that "fragging".

If the Repugs wish to self-frag, I'm totally down wid it. And if they need to hoist themselves by their own tiny petards to get a better shot, I'm down wid dat too.

Godless liberal sickos win again

Great title, ain't it? If it's Wednesday it must be Morford on the culture war.

Your old-world grandmother will refuse to believe it. Your Southern cousin will likely shake his head like he’s throwing off lice, completely unwilling to process. Rick Santorum will, with any luck and God’s good graces, spontaneously combust. And of course, the NRA will shudder and reload in a panic because, honey, they’re afraid of everything.
...

And the Republicans lost.

The culture wars! What a silly idea. What a ridiculous and lopsided fight. All about gay marriage, women’s rights, pornography, censorship, “elitist” higher education, support for the arts, for science, immigration, the environment, legal marijuana, gays in the military, a black president, self-determined spirituality versus the deep poison that is organized religion.
...

On it goes. From environmental awareness to legal pot to abortion rights, movement is toward the progressive – or at the very least, away from the regressive (not quite the same thing, but in this climate, you take what you can get). Even many leading Republicans don’t want to discuss the classic cultural issues that defined them for so long, recognizing them as toxic to their future, realizing that the younger generations simply don’t believe in the harsh institutions and repressive dogmas of yore.
...

And of course, the South, despite flickers of progress in various college towns, remains as racist, anti-smarts, and gun-lovingly homophobic as ever. The good news? This used to be a problem. The South used to have enormous influence on culture and politics, acting as the genteel, racist heart of “real” America. But as the new rainbow constituency takes hold and a calm, intellectual black man enters his second term as president, that influence is waning; the South is now more isolated, emasculated, increasingly meaningless in the new America dialogue. This much we know: The South will not rise again. Ever. Praise.

I would like to see the South rise again. To its feet and walk out the door. It won't. It needs OUR money to survive. Flappin' their lips is the best they can do.

Please go enjoy the rest of young Mark's column. I think I'm in "good news" mode this week. So far. I'm sure it will change but I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts. It's been a long time coming.

The Real ‘60 Minutes’ Revelation

Michael Tomasky

But here, conservatives, is what you are missing and what you need to reckon with. Americans—except you—like these two people. Most Americans look at the pair of them—this black man who is still remote in some ways and this so-familiar woman who is now aging before us and allowing herself to look just a little frumpy—and feel reassured. Most Americans are cheering for them, and hence, most Americans probably wanted a softball interview. We have thus passed an important portal in American politics: Democrats are now the regular guys. Conservatives are the weirdos. (my em)

And your point is...?

The Republicans? It’s not just the extreme ideology. Of course it’s that, but it’s more. The whole shtick is old. Where once the Middle American ear may have been soothed by that low Cheney rumble belching out its grave assessments of the world situation, today it is accosted by all those caliginous Southern accents warning of socialism and collapse, and thinks: will these people ever shut up? Georgia Congressman Paul Broun told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution last week that Obama “upholds … the Soviet Constitution.” On any given week, I could fill a whole column, or two, with such nuggets. Enough already.

No shit. Waaaaaay past enough.

Conservatives, you can call me and others like me all the names you want, and you can whine about the evil CBS all you want. But Kroft and his network were actually in touch here with the pulse of the country, which wants Obama to succeed and Hillary to go have a nice long rest (and, maybe, get ready for 2016). Meanwhile, even Roger Ailes has gotten sick of Sarah Palin. Get the picture?

Here's the picture: I quote Colonel Shoup, who was the Commandant when I was in the Corps, in his assessment of the situation on Betio in 1943 and not a bad way of putting the slightly ascendant reality-based liberal/progressive/godless commies that we are:

On D+1 (21 November 1943) Col Shoup sent a message to divisional headquarters detailing the situation on Tarawa. This transmission has become one of the most famous of the war. Shoup radioed: "Casualties many. Percentage dead not known. Combat efficiency — we are winning."

As well we should. This country has been on the downslope since Reagan took office, and the Chimp threw it off a cliff badly enough that people finally noticed. The pendulum, if not swinging back the other way just yet, has at least stopped in its rightward arc.

Headline of the Day

Call the Waahmbulance! WaPo’s Chris Cillizza hurt GOP Sen. Ron Johnson’s wittle feewings

Heh. One would think that's the least of his problems after Hillary the Warrior Princess cut his balls off.

Makers, Takers, Fakers

Paul Krugman on the crux of the biscuit.

Republicans have a problem. For years they could shout down any attempt to point out the extent to which their policies favored the elite over the poor and the middle class; all they had to do was yell “Class warfare!” and Democrats scurried away. In the 2012 election, however, that didn’t work: the picture of the G.O.P. as the party of sneering plutocrats stuck, even as Democrats became more openly populist than they have been in decades.

As a result, prominent Republicans have begun acknowledging that their party needs to improve its image. But here’s the thing: Their proposals for a makeover all involve changing the sales pitch rather than the product. When it comes to substance, the G.O.P. is more committed than ever to policies that take from most Americans and give to a wealthy handful.
...

Why is this happening? In particular, why is it happening now, just after an election in which the G.O.P. paid a price for its anti-populist stand?

Well, I don’t have a full answer, but I think it’s important to understand the extent to which leading Republicans live in an intellectual bubble. They get their news from Fox and other captive media, they get their policy analysis from billionaire-financed right-wing think tanks, and they’re often blissfully unaware both of contrary evidence and of how their positions sound to outsiders.
...

Which brings me back to Mr. Jindal, who declared in his speech that “we are a populist party.” No, you aren’t. You’re a party that holds a large proportion of Americans in contempt. And the public may have figured that out.

Yes, yes we have.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

France Sends Troops to Mali
Hopes to follow Vietnam strategy by staying a few years then handing off operations to Americans.

Hmmmmm...

Study: Recent Elections Show Strong Link Between Racism And Political Preference
Most whites who hate blacks voted for Romney; most blacks who hate whites voted for Obama.

Sounds about right.

Virginia GOP Sneaks Through Redistricting Bill During Inauguration, Then Adjourns “in Memory of Stonewall Jackson”
And you thought the Civil War was over.

We may have to prove it to them again. Sigh.

Berlusconi Defends Mussolini For Supporting Hitler
Surprised others in attendance at Holocaust Memorial took offense at remarks.

WTF? Somebody should remind him how Il Duce ended up. Along with his bunga-bunga. Not the kind of "swinging" Berlusconi is used to...

"Minority Rule"

Old Fart Rants about Repug election rigging - "If ya can't beat 'em, cheat 'em".

Notable quote:

What a bunch of morons! The Republican Party, and its base, have degenerated into a pack of lying, thieving, anti-science, head-in-the-sand, backwards, vile, vulgar, evangelical, willfully ignorant delusional know-nothings with nothing to offer society but hate and divisiveness, especially since the Tea Party cockroaches infested Congress. They're a disgrace to America. Every one of these knuckle dragging idiots should be put on an inner tube and pushed out to sea. The depths to which the Republican Party has sunk in order to win elections is painful to watch and is a national embarrassment.

That ol' boy needs to come out of his shell and say what he really means. Heh.

Laissez le bon temps fool, eh?

Think Progress

Five Reasons Bobby Jindal Is Responsible For Transforming The GOP Into ‘The Stupid Party’

There's a paragraph on each one.

1. He permits Louisiana schools to teach creationism.

2. He allows state employees to be fired for being gay.

3. He has signed bills to intimidate women seeking abortions.

4. He seeks to dramatically cut taxes for the wealthy, increase taxes for everyone else.

5. He refuses to provide health care for Louisiana’s poorest.

There ain't enough lipstick to make the GOP pig look good as long as stupid is as stupid does.

Update:

El Rude-o weighs in.

When you live in Louisiana, you get used to a certain amount of Neanderthal savagery and brute stupidity. Sure, the education system is getting fucked beyond fucked and the state legislature thinks it's just jim-fuckin' dandy to teach that everything was created when an invisible sky wizard puked it all out, but, hey, how about that food? Sure, sex education is pretty much non-existent in a state where they have the most restrictive abortion laws in the nation, but, man, ain't that band playin' some hot zydeco? See? It's a trade-off. A state with a high sales tax, including taxes on food and clothing, lottery, and gambling, along with a state income tax, can't stay out of the red because tax cuts for rich people are so fucking important, so why not raise the sales tax even higher? It's what you get for wanting to laissez les bon temps rouler.

Other than teachers (who are really just terrorists with tenure, but, gosh, shouldn't they be armed?) protesting the shifting of public school funds to private ones run by churches and cults, there's been no real outcry against Governor Bobby Jindal and his merry band of GOP scum weasels in the legislature. But... [...]
...

Yeah, it's a cruel, cruel life in the Bayou State. But, hey, throw us some more beads, mister.

Thoughts on high capacity magazines

The United States won World War 2 and kept South Korea from being overrun by Communists with an 8-round magazine capacity. To wit:

After that, military magazine capacity went to 20 rounds in time for Vietnam and we lost that and every mostly unnecessary war since.

So ... if you want to lose every fight you get yourself into, go with large magazines.

Headline of the Day

Judge who ruled against Obama’s recess appointments has long list of ties to republican party shenanigans dating back to Oliver North

Fearless prediction: This ruling will be overturned and Obama's recess appointments will stand.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Something a little different. I have pre-ordered this new album. If you order albums from Amazon, a lot of them now come with AutoRip which means you can download them while you're waiting for the physical CD. Pretty cool.

Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell give the BBC an interview about their new duet CD Old Yellow Moon live Jan 21 2012. The good news for UK/Europe is that Emmylou says June 2013 is being lined up for a leg of the CD tour, I have left a couple of buffering stops in the video, I would normally edit these out but as it is an interview have left them in. Please click like and comment in the box below, thanks Ally.

Thanks to TakenAlsoAlso, UK.

Ho Hum...

Nothing much going on today that pops my cork.

The righties are going farther right. The ones that know what's going on are gaming the system to win with a minority. If ya can't beat 'em, cheat 'em.

Harry Reid snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Again.

Clinton and Kerry kicked the GOP House's ass. That was the bright spot of the week.

Ho hum...

You and me, Nuge

It's a slow day so pardon me for once again giving this asshole nobody space. It's Bob Cesca's fault. Heh. Many links at site.

Yes, Nugent not only threatened the president again, but he implied that he and his "buddies" would stage some sort of geriatric armed revolt if the president continues to push for new gun safety laws. I used the phrase "another chat" because this is the second time in less than a year that Nugent has popped off with some sort of not-so-subtle threat against the president. Rewind back to April, 2012 when Nugent said at the annual NRA Convention, "If Barack Obama becomes the president in November, I will either be dead or in jail by this time next year." The Secret Service responded to that one by paying a visit to Nugent's compound. Oh, and you might recall how, at a concert back in 2007, Nugent said that Barack Obama can "suck on my machine gun."

Yes, one of the gun culture's A-list spokesmen -- and a Republican campaign prop.

A-list? Really?! Asshole? Anachronism? Anarchist?

So here's what he said at the SHOT Show last week via a Guns.com video attained by Media Matters:

I'm part of a very great experiment in self-government where we the people determine our own pursuit of happiness and our own individual freedom and liberty not to be confused with the Barack Obama gang who believes in we the sheeple and actually is attempting to re-implement the tyranny of King George that we escaped from in 1776. And if you want another Concord Bridge, I got some buddies.

Do we have to go over this again? Nugent and his buddies would be utterly wiped out. Full stop. Actually, they might as well be threatening to ride velociraptors into the White House, armed with magic wands and accompanied by Space Monkey Gleek. It's just that ridiculous. The whole notion of an armed revolt and secession from the United States failed miserably in 1865, and the revolutionaries at that time were headed by skilled West Point commanders like J.E.B. Stuart and Robert E. Lee who directed massive armies. These gun nutjobs today have -- who? -- octogenarian D-list electric guitar player Ted Nugent and a gaggle of his redneck disciples. Good luck, boys.

In fact, you know what? Bring it on. Seriously. I'd like to see Nugent try his hand at something like this -- to actually follow through on one of his kneejerk treasonous threats. But considering how he chickened out of the Vietnam draft, we can safely assume that Nugent prefers to only shoot at things that don't fire back.

Note to Nuge: Your "buddies" won't show up anyway, so I got an idea - you and me, Nuge. One on one. We're both old farts so it'd be even. No guns, just you and me. Oh, and a few TV crews to document you saving the nation from the likes of me.

Besides, it'll be fun for the country to watch you get your mouth shut once and for all - swollen shut for a while, anyway - by a godless commie fuck pussy liberal. One who also avoided the draft. By enlisting instead of shittin' his pants.

Update:

It occured to me that if Nuge's dick was as big as his mouth, he could be a porn star. Then it further dawned on me that he could be a porn star anyway. With that mouth he could take an even bigger porn star, if you get my drift. If he could find one that would stick it in a garbage hole.

Poll of the Day

From an article in the LATimes. It looks better there and you can vote if you wish.

Should the president's inaugural speech have included more "outreach" to Republicans?
Yes No
7% 93%

In other words, fuck 'em.

Republicans may have their finger on the faint pulse of an America that is passing away, but Obama’s inaugural address spoke to the emerging majority in this country. Perhaps that is really what Republicans found unsettling in the president’s speech.

The dinosaurs weren't too happy with the meteor either. RIP.

Obama 1; Netanyahu 0

There's a lot on the interwebs today about the results of Israel's elections. My favorite is Andy Sullivan's.

Bibi is still highly likely to be prime minister for a while, but also as decapitalized by his re-election as Obama was recapitalized by his. That leaves an opening. In my view, the president and next secretary of state should now lay out a detailed, mapped, two-state division that the US supports and present it to both Fatah and Jerusalem. If Jerusalem balks, the US should switch its vote at the UN to abstain on Palestinian statehood. If the PA balks, we'll discover something important about them: their willingness to sacrifice for a state alongside and at peace with a Jewish one. Hamas? Leave them out of it for a while, or open up a back-channel. But as Obama's power waxes and Netanyahu's wanes, it would be crazy not to seize the moment.

And that moment is defined by a core fact: the Israeli public is clearly not on the same page as America's neoconservatives right now, not as fixated on the same things they are, and more concerned about their own core well-being than geopolitics or apocalyptic family psychodramas. What the American electorate just told the GOP, the Israeli electorate just told its own far-right government: moderate or get out of the way (my em). Which could be put more simply.

Meep meep.

Heh.

Four more years, oh thank God

If it's Wednesday it must be Morford being grateful. Here's just the last three ¶:

Which leads us straight to perhaps the largest gratitude offering of all. It is a kind of stunned, dizzy appreciation for the now-permanent truism the Obama era hath ushered in, once and for all and never to be repealed. Do you know it?

It goes thusly: When all the old, clenched white males are, en masse, apoplectic, when all the clammy, bloated representatives of the Old Guard could not be more full of hate and resentment for the polyphonic, multicolored direction of the nation, when it is very possible the seeds of calmly chaotic diversity and deep intelligence Obama has planted will bear fruit for decades to come, this is how you know. This is the kind of evolution you want.

Don’t worry, there is plenty of time to complain, find flaw, hold presidential feet to the fire. But let us, just for a moment, be glad those feet are his.

Amen and no shit.

Headline of the Day

Fox & Friends: Obama’s Inauguration Day Happens To Be The ‘The Most Depressing Day Of The Year’

Bwahahahaha! Suck it, bitchez!

The first rule of firearm safety...

...is never point a firearm at anything you do not intend to shoot. Heh.

Trinidad and Tobago security guard accidentally shoots off his penis
...

The wounded man was taken to San Fernando General Hospital where he remains under guard. Authorities ran a trace on him and found that he did not possess a license for the gun he was carrying. He faces charges of illegal possession of a firearm and ammunition.

Boy, that's adding insult to injury. Ha!

Unfortunately, these types of accidents are not uncommon. The Digital Journal listed reports of accidental gunshot wounds to the penis and testicles in Arizona and Washington state, as well as an incident from September in Port Lucie, Florida in which a man cleaning a newly purchased gun at a party shot himself in the genitals.

There's a buncha links in that paragraph.

I think the point here is, carry the damn thing in a holster that will direct an accidental discharge away from your body. Except for right-wing gun nuts. My advice to them is carry it in your waistband right behind your belt buckle loaded and unlocked.

12 Ways Obama Smacked Down the Tea Party and the Right in Inauguration Speech

Tamped into a nice neat brick at Alternet.

Driving the message home were the hands of the Fates, who conspired to see the second inauguration of the nation’s first African American president fall on Martin Luther King Day, the national holiday whose very creation was opposed by so many who still today comprise the Republican Party’s right wing.

Yeah, that worked out pretty good. Heh.

1. Reminding the nation who won the Civil War. On the eve of Obama’s second inauguration, civil rights leader Julian Bond addressed a crowd of progressives gathered in Washington, D.C., at the Peace Ball convened by the activist restauranter Andy Shallal, Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, and a host of progressive entities. Bond spelled out the statistics of Obama’s 2012 victory for the crowd, noting that Mitt Romney’s voters were almost entirely white, and that the only states won by the Republican presidential candidate belonged to the old Confederacy.

“The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” the anthem of Union troops in the Civil War, long ago passed into the songbook of patriotic themes, and has been played during the inaugural parades of other presidents, sung on several different occasions by the very white Mormon Tabernacle Choir. But when the Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir, in all its multicultural glory, was tapped to sing the anthem not from a parade stand, but from the ceremonial podium, a different chord was struck, thanks to its context: the invocation that preceded it, and the president's speech, which followed it.

I got a big kick out of that. Poked the right-wingers right in the eye, that did. 'Bout fuckin' time.

4. Throwing right-wing rhetoric right back at ‘em. [...] To ignore the rhetoric of the right as it is deployed against him lends a sort of cover to the racism that is often implicit in it -- or the simplistic ridiculousness of it all. When Obama, as he has since his re-election, acknowledges and, yes, even repeats that language, he lets the rest of America know that he’s in on the joke, and he thinks it’s a pretty lame joke.

So that line about “the tyranny of a king”? Yeah, that was for the wing-nuts who paint the president as a tyrant in order to justify their call for his overthrow or the overthrow of the U.S. government. Later in the address, Obama, defending the social safety net, took on the right’s “producerism” trope, heard from pundits and politicians throughout Rightlandia, that America is populated by two kinds of people, “the takers” versus “the makers”.

8. Spanish is the loving tongue, amigos.

¡O Si! How d'ya say "heh" in Spanish?

12. Shining a light on voter suppression.

That is going to get worse before it gets better. If ya can't beat 'em, cheat 'em. Now the Repugs are trying to tie electoral votes to their gerrymandered districts. If they had been able to do that this time, Rmoney would have won and we'd be in the soup.

My main take-away from the inauguration was pretty simple: we're relatively safe from the forces of darkness for another four years, but we must be ever vigilant.

"I've Got Enough Crazy For All Of You" By Michele Bachmann

Goblinbooks

That's it. Obama took office, and the new Congress has been settling in for a couple weeks now. All those batcrap pro-life geezers like Todd Akin are probably still making scary rape comments, but they're doing it in their own paneled rec rooms. Newt Gingrich is trolling the talk shows where no one listens to him. Herman Cain and Rick Perry are like Amelia Earhart, only people actually looked for her. And Santorum's writing for a website. A website, do you know how pathetic and irrelevant that is?

If that includes blogs, yes, yes I do...

But Michele's still here. And don't worry children, because Michele will pick up that slack.

I'm a professional. You know this about me. And when my people need me I am ready to provide. And right now, it looks like what we need is extra crazy.

Oh fucking swell. Well, Crazy Eyes, you're just the person who can do it proud.

Going Joe McCarthy on Arab-Americans? I was warming up. Now we're going to talk about how the Amish secretly run MS-13.
...

Creationism? Nutty stuff about the Founding Fathers? We're going to have a national conversation on why Paul Revere's secret belief in Wicca almost destroyed this country, and how the truth needs to be taught in schools. We're going to halt the deficit by creating a cigarette-based economy like they have in prison. I will give half of my speeches entirely in my made-up angel language, and I'm going to bring a fully-automatic AK-47 signed by Jesus everywhere I go.

Oh wait. Now you're going to say that's how you lose elections. I can't govern or get things done by telling people global warming's a hoax and everyone east of Ohio's in a conspiracy, right? You people don't get it. The Republican party is not about governing, bitches. It's about sending chain emails and ruining next Thanksgiving. It's about bringing wicked-looking assault weapons to a rally and calling everyone Hitler. And most of all, it's about turning every crisis into a reality-show-style freakout over globalization and social progress and the fact that you have to dial 1 for English.

Michele is not on her way out. Michele's moment is on the track and headed into the station. And the whole country is going to get a big long ride on this crazy train before it's over.

Yawn. So what's new. I can hardly wait.

Health Care, Female Veterans, and the Rights of Us All

I owe ten years of sobriety to the VA. Go read El Rude-o's guest poster. It might be the longest post there yet.

Today, the Rude Pundit is giving over the joint to Navy veteran and health and disability activist Karen Vasquez, who also happens to be a longtime reader of this here blog. You can read her stuff all the time at The Mighty Turtle. Check this out. It's compelling, funny, and infuriating stuff:

Perspective is a funny thing. It’s shaped by our experience in the present, and those who came long before us in the past.

A woman not being considered a veteran in need of healthcare is in no way shocking, of course. Since the founding of this country, women have had trouble being considered anything other than property until recently. And more recent than you think. In the 1970’s, a woman could not purchase a car without showing she had permission from her husband. Pre-Roe v. Wade: A trip to the doctor for her lady parts required her to be accompanied by her mother or husband. Girls were told in one way or another that they were not in charge of their own bodies. If you find yourself thinking how this is relevant to veteran’s healthcare in the 1990’s, please slap yourself. Thank you.

I’m not going to bore you with my stories of public humiliation and degradation on active duty because I had a vagina. There are enough of those and many grislier than mine. I will dish a little: A certain Secretary of Defense who later went on to be Vice President once told me at a Submariner’s ball, “If they had girls like you in the Navy when I was your age, I would’ve joined.” Oh yeah, I’m sure all he needed was a pretty girl for him decline five deferments. Have another Coors light, Asshat.

Heh.

These are the same types of assholes that called me a "sick bay commando" and other assorted colorful names. They think they are being cute and funny. But they are only exposing themselves for as the ignorant fucks they are. Now, I call them ignorant fucks and not products of their environment because there comes a time in everyone’s life when we get to choose how to travel down life’s path. We can choose to travel with an open mind to nurture a life of change and growth though new information, or we can choose to travel with our heads up our ass in fear. Sometimes, an enlightened path is chosen after people spend years inside their own anuses. Something happens, they emerge, and they choose to be decent human beings. And some learn nothing from life experience and maintain an existence of ignorant fuckery that would insult a caveman.

There's a sentence in there that bears repeating: We can choose to travel with an open mind to nurture a life of change and growth though new information, or we can choose to travel with our heads up our ass in fear.

The crux of the stale biscuit we call "life in America" or "politics".

The short version: if we teach our sons and daughters we are all equal it will be so. Someday.

Word. Please go read the rest.

Headlines of the Day

Powell: Republican leaders should stop ‘idiot presentations’ from Palin and birthers

Good on ya, General. You'll mend your reputation yet.

Harvard scientist seeks ‘adventurous female’ to give birth to cloned Neanderthal

Have Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann been through the change yet? They'd be perfect!

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

OBAMA SWORN IN FOR SECOND TERM
Cites booming gun sales as sign of improving economy.

Poll: 64% of Republicans Think Obama Hiding Something About His Early Life
Like a decade of heavy drinking, or skipping his National Guard duties, or bankrupting a company, or DUIs that dad's friends were able to make disappear, or...

Wow, deja vu all over again...

Boehner's Office Vandalized by House Members of Tea Party, But Boehner Won't File Charges for Party Unity
Also because they're armed and dangerous.

Utah Smoothie Shop Charges Liberals More Than Conservatives
Tell them you're a nativist with an anti-semitic bent and your smoothie's free.

The guy actually said that all 3 liberals in his congressional district pay the extra buck without complaint.

Monopoly to Replace One Of Its Game Pieces
Will replace thimble with bong.